Eavesdropping plants
http://www.sciencenetlinks.com/sci_update.cfm?DocID=168
A lesson plan for grade 6 Science
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In this Science Update, students explore how chemicals that are carried on the wind might be a form of communication for plants. An ecologist at the University of California, Davis found that when sagebrush releases the plant hormone methyl jasmonate, tobacco plants are warned of environmental changes. Science NetLinks provides a link to the audio file, a written transcript, and questions to engage students in a discussion about how scientists determined that certain plants have a type of communication that warns of the entry of pesticides into their environment. The lesson also provides links to The University of California Botanical Garden and The Ontario Science Centre’s site, “Bug Bodyguards.”
North Carolina Curriculum Alignment
Science (2005)
Grade 6
- Goal 1: The learner will design and conduct investigations to demonstrate an understanding of scientific inquiry.
- Objective 1.01: Identify and create questions and hypotheses that can be answered through scientific investigations.
- Objective 1.05: Analyze evidence to:
- Explain observations.
- Make inferences and predictions.
- Develop the relationship between evidence and explanation.
- Objective 1.08: Use oral and written language to:
- Communicate findings.
- Defend conclusions of scientific investigations.
- Objective 1.09: Use technologies and information systems to:
- Research.
- Gather and analyze data
- Visualize data.
- Disseminate findings to others.
- Objective 1.10: Analyze and evaluate information from a scientifically literate viewpoint by reading, hearing, and/or viewing:
- Scientific text.
- Articles.
- Events in the popular press.
- Goal 7: The learner will conduct investigations and use technologies and information systems to build an understanding of population dynamics.
- Objective 7.03: Explain how changes in habitat may affect organisms.
- Objective 7.04: Evaluate data related to human population growth, along with problems and solutions:
- Waste disposal.
- Food supplies.
- Resource availability.
- Transportation.
- Socio-economic patterns.
- Objective 7.06: Investigate processes which, operating over long periods of time, have resulted in the diversity of plant and animal life present today:
- Natural selection.
- Adaptation.
