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Water World,
Grades 3 – 4
Program Description:
The search for water continues throughout the solar system. Where there is water, can there be life? Would a sample of Martian soil near an apparent riverbed reveal fossils from a time when there was liquid water? What kind of life
forms would scientists be searching for in this soil? In this class, students will investigate some properties of fresh and salt water, manipulate water lenses, and observe life from our own watery world.
Vocabulary:
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bay |
lens |
river |
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brine |
liquid |
salt |
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estuary |
mouth (of river) |
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habitat |
ocean |
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Possible Class Activities:
- Introduction: Where there is water, can there be life? Overview of the search for water in the Solar System — Lunar Prospector, Mars, moons of Jupiter, etc.
- Students conduct observations of the physical characteristics of water.
- Students find out about some differences between salt water and fresh water with a simulation of fresh water meeting salt water — a bay or ocean.
- Students explore Earth’s two water worlds and some of the animals that inhabit them.
- Using a water tower, students predict and explore where various life forms prefer to swim.
- Closure: What did we find out? This is the time to review highlights of today’s investigations and acknowledge any questions that may have arisen as a result.
Pre-Visit Activities (in your classroom):
- Explain reasons for field trip (discuss theme).
- Stress need to follow directions exactly and listen carefully.
- Introduce vocabulary if appropriate (optional).
- Observe pictures of Mars, Jupiter and its moons, Earth and its moon, and any other water-related pictures or maps.
- Discuss the water cycle. Show evaporation using a pan of fresh water and one of salt water.
Post-Visit Activities:
- Use the “Environments” module from the FOSS curriculum to explore other aquatic animals such as crayfish and brine shrimp.
- Create a home or habitat for the above animals and conduct long-term observations.
- Explore layering of hot and cold water by using red food coloring in warm water and blue food coloring in cold water. Pour warm water gently down the side of a cup filled halfway with cold water. Try pouring cold water into a cup filled halfway with warm water.
- Visit one of the Web sites for further explorations.
Web Site References:
Microbe Zoo/Water World: Here’s a site that is appropriately named. Find out more about this microscopic world.
http://commtechlab.msu.edu/sites/dlc-me/zoo/zwmain.html
State of California Science Standards:
Third Grade
Life Sciences
3. Adaptations in physical structure or behavior may improve an organism’s chance for survival. As a basis for understanding this concept, students know:
a. ...and animals have structures that serve different functions in growth, survival, and reproduction.
b. examples of diverse life forms in different environments, such as oceans, … wetlands.
d. when the environment changes, some plants and animals survive and reproduce, and others die or move to new locations.
e. some kinds of organisms that once lived on Earth have completely disappeared, although they resembled others that are alive today.
Fourth Grade
Life Sciences
3. Living things depend on one another and their environment for survival. As a basis for understanding this concept, students know:
a. ecosystems can be characterized in terms of their living and nonliving components.
b. for a particular environment, some kinds of plants and animals survive well, some survive less well, and some cannot survive at all.
Investigation and Experimentation
6. Scientific progress is made by asking meaningful questions and conducting careful investigations. As a basis for understanding this concept, and to address the content in the other three strands, students should develop their own questions and perform investigations. Students will:
a. differentiate observation from inference (interpretation), and know that scientists’ explanations about what happens in the world come partly from what they observe and partly from what they think about their observations.
c. formulate predictions and justify predictions based on cause and effect relationships.
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