Aquatic Environment

Since water covers 70 percent of the Earth, it is especially important to discuss with students the ways in which technology impacts the aquatic environment. Even in the water, balance is the key. These resources will help your students understand how problems result when there are too many or too few organisms. Students can also learn that they may unknowingly contribute to problems in the aquatic environment through routine activities. You and your mathematics and science colleagues might be interested in collaborating to help students understand the skills and concepts involved in these activities.

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Wheeling Jesuit University/NASA-Exploring the Environment: Coral Reefs http://www.cotf.edu/ete/modules/coralreef/CRmain.html

Is technology part of the problem or part of the solution to the global decline of coral reefs? Students who complete this module, which is part of the NASA-sponsored Exploring the Environment web site, will learn that the answer is BOTH. The module follows a problem-based learning approach to help students consider the changes in the environment related to coral reefs. Its jigsaw puzzle metaphor guides students' consideration of some variables that contribute to changes in coral reefs. The module's graphs present an excellent opportunity for students to interpret the meaning found in data displays. In addition, the module contains background information about environmental changes, their causes, and technological methods to detect them. MSP full record

Building a Bloom http://www.bigelow.org/edhab/building_bloom.html

Harmful algal blooms, also known as HABs, are increasing in frequency around the world. Why might this be happening? What can be done to find some answers? Students intertwine aspects of technology, science, and mathematics as they conduct this activity. They consider how technology, such as transportation and manufacturing, promotes the development of HABs. Even though students are not necessarily working with harmful algae, they conduct experiments to determine if sunlight and nutrient enrichment have an impact on the increase in algae population size. Students use color and smell as a qualitative measurement and cell counts to quantitatively determine population size. Math skills come into play when they calculate population sizes based on sampling techniques and graph their results. MSP full record

Activities: Stop Pointless Personal Pollution http://www.epa.gov/owow/nps/nps_edu/stop.htm

How can it be that I am polluting just by walking my dog or washing my car? This article and its associated activities help students make responsible decisions about how they perform routine tasks to limit their impact on water quality. The article offers environmentally friendly tips about tasks such as car washing, motor maintenance, and lawn fertilization. You can pick and choose from a list of four activities to help your students study about nonpoint source pollution. Your students can exercise their math skills when they use fractions to determine whether it is better to wash with repeated small dilutions of dirt with water or one big dilution, calculate population density, and read a pie chart. Students strategize ways to reduce the bacteria entering watersheds from pet waste and perform experiments to see the effects of fertilizer runoff on dissolved oxygen in the waterways. Not only will your students learn technology, math, and science, but they will see how applying what they have learned will improve their environment. MSP full record

COOL Biology Projects: Gone Fishing http://www.coolclassroom.org/cool_projects/lessons/biology/biology.html

"Students, pretend you are journalists and your magazine assigned you to write an article to help fishermen predict where the good fishing spots will be off the New Jersey coast." What an exciting and rich cross-curricular task! As they work in groups to research the story, students learn about the food web in oceanic ecosystems, scientific and technological careers associated with the aquatic environmental, and tools to collect and analyze environmental data. The students gather information by viewing videos and analyzing satellite images and graphs of data collected with Conductivity-Temperature-Depth and Fluorometer sensors. Reading and interpreting graphs is a key part of this activity. The students write their magazine articles as the culminating activity of the lesson. Make sure to open the teaching tips; they offer great instructional ideas and background information, as well as a rubric for scoring the individual and group aspects of the project. MSP full record

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Copyright May 2007 — The Ohio State University. This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. 0424671. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.