This Week in Science #6

This week in science we did many things.  On Monday we talked about things organisms need to survive like ourselves, and we were told that we would be observing crickets for the week.  David told us to search up 10 things crickets need to survive.  Also we wrote questions about what crickets would prefer in there tanks.  On Wednesday we talked about the cricket's behavior toward different things put in their tank.  Each group of 4 received 2  tanks of crickets.  The tanks were divided in half and half of the tank had damp paper towels and the other half had dry paper towels.  We were also given a mission challenge to help us record the crickets different behaviors toward the paper towels.  We timed ourselves while recording their movement, I thought it was really interesting how they responded.  Thursday we had another mission challenge and had to classify different jelly beans into different groups using a Dichotomous Key.  Two people from my group were not here so it was only 2 people in the group, it was still fun.

This week in science we learned many things.  For example I learned many facts about crickets like: crickets are omnivores and scavengers who feed on organic materials, they need to communicate with each other  by sound, scent, and touch, they eat fruit, nectar, small insects, and leaves, and also that they need warmth.  Those facts interested me the most.  I also learned that crickets like a habitat that is a little damp and warm.  Another thing is that, I learned before about a Dichotomous Key but i didn't remember how to use one,  I learned how to use and make to forms of a Dichotomous Key.  The final thing I learned was that Jelly Belly jelly beans have some really odd names.

This Week in Science #5

 This week in science we did many things.  For example, on Monday we worked on our rocket mission challenges.  We worked on improving and finishing our conclusions.  On Wednesday we work on our rocket mission challenges some more, and we were set up in groups based on the amount of work we got done.  One group was sent out of the room, while they were out my science teacher David decided that if we put away our laptops we could watch the animals.  By animals he meant the pet tarantula named Ocho and the crickets we were going to be experimenting with the next day.  On Thursday we started a next unit in science class about animal behavior.  For our warm-up we watched a video about a rare bird's reaction/behavior toward 2 men observing it in the wild.  Next we all went on our laptops and searched for videos to watch and share with the class, I chose one of a mimic octopus and a frog saving another frog from a snake.  Then we got into groups of 4 and each 2 people in the group got a small container like cage with about 3 to 6 crickets in them.  We then drew the crickets from different angles and made a T-chart  about things we observed and things we wonder about the crickets.

This week in science we also learned many things.  One thing I learned was how to take a snap-shot of a picture or piece of writing on Google-Docs.  Another thing I learned was that writing a conclusion to a rocket mission challenge is stressful.  I also learned that there is a rare bird in New Zealand called the Owl-Parrot and that there are currently only 90 of them left on earth.  I learned what crickets look like when the hop, and how they really look up close.  Crickets also respond to sound when I tapped my pen on the cage they would move their antennas.  Another thing I learned was that crickets make a lot of noise.