Transpiration

For homework, we had to COMPARE AND CONTRAST nutrient transport in plants and in humans.

The set up for one group. The water in the petrie dish has purple food colouring in it.

One group's results: notice the food colouring in the xylem tissue.

Leaves

We agreed that plants only need leaves to absorb sunlight and carbon dioxide for photosynthesis. They actually prevent water entering them, except from the roots via the stem and veins.

The key parts of the leaf cross-section that we were encouraged to talk about were: wax cuticle, palisade cells, air spaces, stoma, guard cells, and the spongy mesophyll.

Pollination and Fertilisation

We used our sciPads to find out about pollination and fertilisation. We also had to think about how non-flowering plants reproduce.

Flowers - Introduction

Designing a Fair Test

Today was the first day of preparing our investigation on the effect of plant nutrient additives on plant growth.

STEP ONE: Method Described (Multistructural)

1. 180-190g of strained soil is weighed and added to a biodegradable punnet.
2. Three 2cm deep wells are made in the soil (evenly spaced out).
3. One sugar snap pea seed is put into each well. The wells are covered with soil.
4. 20mL of tap water is measured in a measuring cylinder then added evenly to the top of the soil.
5. The class's punnets are put in trays and placed in the window of the resource room.
6. 20mL of tap water will be added every Monday and every Friday.
7. The height of the plants will be recorded on Monday every week for 6 weeks.

We have yet to decide how to investigate the effect of the plant nutrient additives we have purchased - this is tomorrow's job!

STEP TWO: Variables Analysed (Relational)

Mr Nicoll identified some key variables that were controlled by using this method. We then discussed why it was important to control these variables:

Completing this HOTMap is our homework tonight.

OUR RESULTS

Cool Onion Cell Photo

This is a photo I took of the Onion Cells that we were studying under the microscopes today. I managed to snap this shot with my iPhone 4S.

Ecology Assignments

Over the past few weeks, the class have been doing an inquiry about a New Zealand animal. They needed to find out about its habitat, adaptations, place in a food web, and about its chances of survival. The following links are some of the websites/blogs which were made. Other students presented their findings as: written reports, posters, speeches, or on display boards.

http://nzbluepenguin.weebly.com/

http://newzealandweka.weebly.com/

http://redstagnz.weebly.com/

http://nzsnapper.blogspot.co.nz/

http://brittanyfindlayfantail.blogspot.co.nz/

http://blueduckstac.weebly.com