Wednesday, January 22

After we completed our moon observation journals, the morning was all about tomatoes!  It started with adding illustrations to a cartoon about tomato seeds that had been exposed to space conditions.

Scientists often use experimental inquiries to observe cause and effect relationships.

There are three types of variables in an experimental inquiry.

Independent variable (cause):  the material, or the way you use the material, that is going to change or be different throughout the whole experiment.  This variable helps you to test the exact question you asked.  There should be only one independent variable to ensure a fair test.

Dependent variable (effect): what is going to happen in your experiment. What are you looking for or observing AS the experiment is going on?  There should be only one dependent variable and it should be observable and measurable.

Controlled variable:  the materials, or the way you use the materials, that must stay exactly the same throughout the WHOLE ENTIRE experiment.  To ensure that the independent variable is the only thing affecting the dependent variable, all other factors must be kept the same.  It is very important to have controlled variables so that your test is fair, and helps make sure you don’t accidentally test a different question than the one you asked at the start of your experiment. 

We will be conducting our own tomato seed experiment.  We will be testing the question:  How does exposure to the space environment or space-like conditions affect the germination rate of tomato seeds?  It will be a blind experiment, meaning we do not know which are the space seeds and which are the Earth seeds.  Every student planted one of each seed this afternoon.

We will be creating a large solar system mural and did some research this afternoon to decide what we need to include.  We wanted our planets to be relative in size, so we looked at the diameter of the planets and came up with a scale of 1cm = 2000km.  

We will be building a moonscape in our classroom this week.  It is not necessary, but if you are able, please bring in some salt clay tomorrow to help us create the surface of the moon.  The recipe is below.  When I made some at home, I did not need to use the whole half cup of water and did not need to knead it for 10 minutes.  Please put it in a plastic bag or container so that it does not dry out and bring it to school.  

Reminders:

• Mandatory Outdoor School parent meeting tomorrow night from 6-7 pm.  See blog posts from last week for more details.
• Yearbook orders accepted until the end of February.
• Save the date- Grade 6 Learning Celebration Thursday, February 27.  More details to come
• Special lunch tomorrow for those that ordered
• PD Day- Friday, January 31- No school for students