Science outside the classroom

The 2016-17 School Year has started and I am fully immersed in programs.  I currently have more than 400 programs scheduled this year, and am still scheduling a few programs here and there.  Most of these programs are held in the classroom, but when the weather is nice during the first few weeks of the school year, and again during the last few weeks of the school year, I am able schedule many outdoor programs.

Last Thursday (22 September), two classrooms of sixth grade students from Fancher Elementary met me at Mill Pond Park to learn about botany.  I have worked with most of these students before - some of them have seen me every year since third grade.  After talking about how plants can be classified based on physical characteristics (such as leaf type and arrangement), and being given some identification sheets, the students were turned loose with the mission to draw and describe two wildflowers and the leaves of two different trees.

Here are a few photographs of the students and their work.

An identification sheet I gave the students

The backside of the ID sheet

 

Getting outside is always better than sitting in the classroom.

Drawing a maple leaf from life

 

Very detailed drawings

 

Coloring and labeling

Another student's worksheet

Sixth grade students color and label their drawings

Pointing out the characteristics of a wildflower

Filling out a worksheet

Fancher students working along a retaining wall at Mill Pond Park

This week, I met with third grade students at Vowles elementary to do a similar activity - Vowles elementary has its own small woodlot adjacent to the school grounds.  This time the students were only asked to draw and describe the leaves from four trees (no wildflowers).  As an additional activity, they also had to determine the diameter of several living tree.

Last week, in the classroom we had classified preserved leaves and measure the diameter of sections of tree trunks (also called tree cookies - mine are more like full sized pies than cookies).  Now the students learned how to measure the circumference of the tree and divide that by pi (3.14) to determine the diameter.  They were also tasked with removing any trash that they found in the woods (but not broken glass).

I didn't take nearly as many pictures of the 3rd graders as I did of the the sixth graders.  The younger students required a lot more help and guidance.  In fact, I only managed to get my camera out for one of three classes - a fourth class was cancelled due to the weather.

A group multitasking - students measure the circumference and pick up trash at the same time

Calculating the diameter

A student's worksheet

Students hard at work

Students search for leaves to identify and draw

Vowles Elementary teacher Johanna Raymond works with a group of her students

A quick "cone"parison

Yesterday, my scheduled presentations were cancelled due to a scheduling conflict.  This meant that for the first time since September, I had a day in the office with no scheduled presentations.  Normally on a day like that I try to get outside and spend some time with my camera, but the weather was drab and dreary, with flat light and gray skies that make photographs drab and dreary.  Instead i took a little bit of time to focus on a project that has been on my mind for a while.

Being someone who teaches about nature and science,  I tend to collect things.  A quick survey of my desk reveals 10 rocks, 5 fossils, 2 pieces of petrified wood, two jars with bugs that I really should pin, and other assorted odds and ends.

Here is another collection - cones.

With the exception of the large cone in the back, these five cones were all collected in Michigan.  Only two are native to the state.  From the front to the back these cones are the Giant Sequoia , Eastern White Pine (left), Jack Pine (center), Norway Spruce (right), and Coulter Pine.

The smallest cone of the bunch, the Jack Pine (Pinus banksiana) was collected at a park in Mt. Pleasant.  This cone is about 2 inches long and a little over an inch across.  The Jack Pine is native to Michigan.  It can reach a height of about 78 feet (22 meters), but rarely grows that tall due to poor soil conditions across much of its native range.

This Jack Pine cone weighs in at just 7 grams (0.247 ounces).

The other Michigan native in this bunch is the Eastern White Pine (Pinus strobus).  This cone was collected at the Brady Cemetery at Forest Hill Nature Area in Gratiot County.  It measures approximately 5.5 inches long and 2.25 inches across.  It weighed in at 17 grams (0.600 ounces).  Some White Pines that were logged during the 19th century were reputed to measure 230 feet (70 meters) tall!

The Norway Spruce (Picea abies) cone was collected from a tree in the parking lot at the Isabella Conservation District Office.  This Norway Spruce is not native to Michigan but has been extensively planted throughout the state.  This cone measures about 5.5 inches long and 1.75 inches across.  So far it is the heaviest cone of the bunch at 34 grams (1.199 ounces).  Norway Spruce trees have the capacity to reach a height of 185 feet (55 meters).

The giant of the bunch is the dried cone from the Coulter Pine (Pinus coulteri).  This enormous cone measures approximately 11 inches long and six inches across and weighs 911 grams (32.135 ounces)!  That's just over two pounds - the cones can weigh as much as eleven pounds when fresh.  Coulter Pines are found in coastal mountain ranges of southern California.  I purchased this cone at a rock and mineral show in Michigan.

The final cone is the one from the Giant Sequoia (Sequoiadendron giganteum).  This cone measures about 2.25 inches long by 1.5 inches across.  It weighs 21 grams (0.741 ounces).  I collected this cone from beneath a Giant Sequoia tree at the Lake Bluff Audubon Sanctuary near Manistee, MI. 

So why am I showing this pipsqueak of a cone last?

Because the seeds from this cone have the potential to grow into the largest living organism on earth.  The largest Giant Sequoias have been measured at 311 feet tall (94.8 meters) with a trunk diameter of 56 feet (17 meters)!  They are also among the oldest living things on the planet, with some examples estimated to be over 3,500 years old!

The lesson is, don't judge a book by its cover or a tree by its cone.