Marco James' Blogger: Earth Day, 2017

Saturday, April 22^nd is Earth Day

There is so much to bring to your classroom to support recycling, conserving resources, studying climate change and protecting our planet.

McDonald’s moves toward Antibiotic-free chicken – What will the effects be on costs at the restaurant, costs in the supermarket and the cost and changes required of farm production? Does this seem like a good move? Why? 4.MD.3, 5.NBT.5, 5.NBT.7, 6.RP.1, 6.RP.2, 6.RP.3, HSG.MG.A.2, HSG.MG.A.3 MP6

Methane Math – Carbon dioxide and methane are our two most prevalent human-contributed greenhouse gases. This holstein cow is one of many huge contributors to our methane production. Let students calculate percentages of greenhouse gas production from cars, cows, and people. Warning! Flatulence humor. 6.RP, 7.RP, 7.SP

Alarming ice cracks in Antarctica – A new, fast-growing ice crack is forcing the Halley VI British research station in Antarctica (shown above) to be moved. Fear of a huge break-off from the ice sheet is alarming not just to the scientists on the station but to all of us. At what rate is this crack growing and how large will this iceberg be when it breaks off? 6.G.A, 7.G.A, 7.G.B, HSG/GPE.B.7, HSA/CED.A.2, HSG/SRT.A.1, HSN/Q.A.1

The Blue Marble – Students compare maps with this famous photo and check to see which characteristics are maintained in each sort of mapping (Mercator, Goode homolosine, Gall–Peters, Winkel tripel) and which characteristics are distorted. Start your class with a wonderful movie (produced by the Overview Institute) that shows the Earth as it was seen for the first time from space and the impact of that view. 6.G, 7.G, HSG.GMD.B, HSG.MG.A

Cost of light bulbs – Students learn more about LED and CFL light bulbs as they analyze and graph their energy use and costs of lights and appliances. Students use decimals operations, order of operations, graphing, systems and piecewise functions in this activity to help them think about ways to conserve the energy that they use. 5.NBT.3, 5.NBT.7, 6.NS.3, 6.RP.3, 6.EE.1, 6.EE.9, 8.EE.8, HSF.IF.C.7.B, HSA.REI.C.6, HSA.CED.A.2

Recycling Mardi Gras beads – Mardi Gras is a last hoorah and is celebrated throughout the world with feasting, partying, and general indulgence. In New Orleans revelers throw and collect purple, green, and gold beads. Students get a chance to examine the monetary and environmental cost of this bead exuberance with our unit pricing and recycling activity. 5.NF, 6.RP, 6.EE, 7.RP

When should I plant my seeds? – The seed package tells me how many weeks early to plant seeds indoors and how long the seeds will take to sprout but this sure seems like a lot of counting backwards to figure out when I should plant my seeds here in Boston. This activity introduces students to the use of the computational power of a spreadsheets to easily count the time between two dates. HSF.BF, HS.M, HSA.REI, HSA.CED, HSN, MP.5

How do you count a Crowd – There will be marches this weekend to support the value of science and respect for our changing planet. In this activity students devise methods for counting the crowd’s actual size. We approximated by area of space covered but students my have lots to contribute. 4.MD.A, 6.G.A, 7.G.B, 7.RP.A, HSG.MG.A.2, HSM, MP4

What’s my angle? – We’ve used a little Solar geometry to analyze and estimate the proper angle for the tilt of my Solar panels. Should I tilt the panels on my roof to more accurately aim towards the Sun? If so, at what angle should I use? Should I be able to adjust the panels to better receive low winter Sun and high summer Sun? How do I figure all of this out? 7.G.B, 8.EE.B, HSG.CO, HSG.SRT, HS.TF, HS.C, MP2