Bees keep you safe

Ecosystems (the mechanisms working to make our home) need to be maintained.

You need to understand the big ideas:

1) Energy comes from the sun, and everything needs energy

2) Big fish eating little fish, extends to a food chain.

3) Things eating more than one food source are more flexible and the entire ecosystem and adapt.

4) introduced species (cane toads) can be a real pest.

5) we can monitor our environment by Bioindicators to stop disasters, and protect ourselves.

Today I visited ANSTO at Lucas Heights. ANSTO gives Australia Nuclear knowhow for good. It may be to protect us from polluters, cure cancers, or basically put smarts into how we run Australia. Henk is an ANSTO scientist who is giving back to Australia by working with teachers and students at Penrith High. He read our Science Blog about Bees and their ecosystem and explained how ANSTO used local bee hives as ultra sensitive industrial waste scouts.

Imagine a map of an area covering a 2 km radius and the bee hive in the center. Imagine areas with particular flowering plants highlighted, and then imagine this animated to cover different areas as the year progresses and  different plants come into flower.  Henk's team collect the pollen that drops as little balls as the bees land at the hive.  Analyse the pollen for pollution and you have a great detector, and free honey.

There is only one problem,  pollution to flower to bee means that you get only the tiniest samples, and you want to nail the tiniest traces. You want super early warning.  Classic chemistry will loose these traces, you want to find atoms that jump up and down and wave at you... atoms that tell you they are there.



Here you can see the radiation rays shot out of ordinary rocks. A pollen clump will have much less than this, but by watching the radiation it is as if the pollen can mobile phone the information, some information gives the type of pollution, some the source, and some the date.  ANSTO plays "Cludo" with the periodic table, to keep your food and water safe, put polluters behind bars, and remove some of the guess work from saving the planet.

You can look at the population of bees as an indicator, move to looking at how they act as a bioindicator, or go even one step further get them working for you as field researchers.

Ecosystems - Jane Austin and Hives

You can look at Ecosystems through big ideas, or follow the lives of a particular species like bees.  Both ways bring together structure and content for a deep insight into the Science of Life's home.

But first some key terms..........

Eco - Home

Systems - Mechanics behind how something works, components and how they work together. Systems have inputs outputs and controls. - Novels, Stories, and Sports have systems that are communicated so we can understand how characters and players interact and we watch how the system evolve. We can empathize with characters and players, placing ourselves in their shoes. Their actions will determine their relationships in the system and the health of they system. It is my opinion that the current generation appear to be less committed but are in fact deal makers with a keen sense of systems.

The world of Elizabeth Bennett in Pride and Prejudice was set in the social system of 1800's England.  

"It is a truth universally acknowledged that any man ...."

ology - love or study of

Ec + ology - study of (our or an living organism's) home

Eco + systems - mechanics working behind the scenes to create an animals home

Population - the number of a species (type of animal or plant) living in an Environment

Bioindicator - Something you see in the environment that tells you how it is going. Animal behavior can be incredibly sensitive.


Things to get you thinking. Watch this ecosystem we build for bees.  See how the keepers put in a metal "Queen excluder" that imprisons her in the third story of the hive, but allows worker to feed her and tend the young. This keeps the hive put, and means that lower floors have no eggs and larvae and honey only for clean harvesting.



( you many like to install www.youtube.com/html5 to view at different speeds)

European honey bees have been introduced to the Australian environment.

Australian bees are stingless and keep unusual spiral honey combs. (http://www.aussiebee.com.au/keepingstinglessbees.html)

Ecology -Ecosystems - Where Science is taking us.

It is my opinion that:

a) we should have a Carbon Tax



b) the next logical choice is to change our life style to a low use, low waste slower pace life

c) nuclear power is beneficial, as part of a power solution for high population densities.

In many circumstances, it is best to decide to act early so we are in good shape to manage everything. In monetary terms, spending a basic amount on dental checks or maintaining a car, is a sound investment. The underlying reality is a good diet or sensible driving really impacts the general situation you find yourself in. I don't drink or smoke, so the closest parallel in my personal life it the amount of milk I drink that I know will lead to a heart condition.

I have a profound sense that people profiting from supporting unsustainable living, have made parallel decisions in the real and moral world detaching themselves from the consequences. I don't discuss the model ... its up for discussion, but there must be something that explains why my opinion and that of many others are ignored.

In my life situation, the closest to the current situation of a shared future, and people living unsustainably is group houses during Uni. I am keenly aware, we are facing a different situation: we are in this group home forever.



As I see it we are going to have to talk our flatmates around, we can't pick up the phone and dial Dominoes for Planet Earth. Aussieecospheres  makes this point. Youtube

School Science that I teach is great, but at the end of the day it is not set up by practicing scientists. In my heart it feels a little two dimensional, and you have to spend so energy in diplomacy. The School Science point made at this point is that the name for a home, or place of life is "Eco". "ology" means the study of, or more closely " a love of" and as a consequence a body of knowledge. The group student home, could be an "Eco" but the term to capture the idea is "Ecosystem". The passionate point I am making is that what matters is both at a global scale and in the group home is the social inputs that feed into the behaviours or "Sociology".

My interest, is trying to research strategies, to reprogram the sociology, that will reset the "Ecosystem". Can I bring my knowledge to bare on this situation? Origin energy has this interesting social reprogramming strategy:




 Quite rightly, the school approach is to build the foundation ideas upward. To build, scaffold the ideas and concepts that are then filled in. However, in this case, it is the surrounding logic, that lock us into a very sequential approach. In a nutshell there is a view that there is a correct or best way of approaching a problem. It is here, I would like to share my experience from years of studying Quantum Physics has tapped me over into thinking in parallel. I discovered the smallest molecule, by fusing passion and curiosity to take me in areas I was ignorant. I had remember leaving the old way of thinking (very much black board chalk drawings, and pin ball machines) and moving onto waves, beautiful curves travelling through each other slowly becoming the new reality. As knowledge brought colour and depth to the night sky, quantum mechanics gave me a heighten sense of bulk (heisenburgs uncertainty principle) and feel for materials.

To be continued

Harry Potter Science Lesson

Hertz to Rolf Harris, with an appearance by Elvis

Our own Rolf Harris shows us his "Dipole" Wobble Board antenna,



3D antenna field pattern



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKCB2V4IGL8&feature=related



Bedroom Hertz Radio Setup



now play with your own dipole

http://www.falstad.com/wavebox/

Now look at an atom which a mini wobble board.

http://www.falstad.com/qmatomrad/

Important points, EM waves get detached from antenna and the spark is just a switch.  This effect can be scaled down to atoms for light emmission.  The sparks were also the first detection of the photoelectric effect. 

Electrostatics for I2I

worksheet for 10 Electrostatic.r -

Electrostatic Demonstator
http://www.falstad.com/emstatic/

magnetics Demonstator
http://www.falstad.com/vector3dm/

hands on electric field
http://phet.colorado.edu/sims/charges-and-fields/charges-and-fields_en.html

Computer Astronomy for School

Celestia
http://www.shatters.net/celestia/download.html

Worldwide Telescope
http://www.worldwidetelescope.org/Home.aspx

Google - Sky
http://www.google.com/sky/

SDSS
http://cas.sdss.org/dr7/en/
A sky scroll through
http://cas.sdss.org/dr7/en/tools/scroll/camcol.asp?Z=1&R=1140&C=1

Space at different wavelengths of light
http://www.chromoscope.net/



Lovely history of the Universe
http://www.historyoftheuniverse.com/index.html

Reference on Solar System
http://www.solarviews.com/eng/index.htm



Link to live sun movies

http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/

Discharges

Ideas to Implementations

How to write a Report

There are alot of articles on "How to write a report" http://www.wikihow.com/Write-a-Report However, these deal with mechanics and process of writing, without first setting up what a Report.  It is like telling someone "How to build a car" without first ensuring they know what a car is, transportsystems and how the car fits in verses bike, buses, walking etc.

Examples of Reports:

School Reports - Features: Formal authorative record, a fair measure of performance, expert interperation, clearly identified who and when, details on author.

Termite Report - Formal authorative record, a measurement performed to a standard, and expert interpretation, clearly identified property and time, details of the reporter and certification.

Telephone Bill - Formal authorative record, verifiable record of calls and charge, result and call for action and options to clearly identified audiance, indication of the authenicity of reporting body

Blood Report - Formal record, Expert interpretation, details supporting the authority, date and patient identified.

Other Reports: Weather, Financial, Car roadworthy

Summary:
Reports have a message required by an audiance that can authorative interpetation, and often justified options to follow.

So how do reports fit into current society?

Reports have become really imbedded in Commerce and the Rule of Law. Companies have strict reporting requirements to the stock market.  The rule of law means that people in society are committed to follow and be protected by laws. A traffic fine is a type of report woven in with the law. A murder will be sent to prison based of forensic reports generated by police. In the middle ages witches were thrown in the water to prove if they were authetic.

How do reports fit in the practice of Science?

Reports are quality Science communications used by Scientists and society to function.  There are really three levels of communication.
1) Logs, these are traceble,testable records, relating to a specified procedure.
2) Reports, interpret logs using accepted Scientific Explanations
3) Research Papers, seek to advance Scientific Explanations by describing new answers.

Logs are automatic and the output of experiments.
Reports Scientifically interpret Logs, and may look at experiments.
Research Paper report or comment on new knowledge, and only at this level is there a "Hypothesis". In this style of Research Paper a situation is descrbed, a questioned asked, a test able answer is proposed, and a report written on Experiments carried out.

In the Year 8 experiment you built a ECO house and subjected this to several tests.  A basic report would explain the cost and time to build it, in addition how it performed under conditions. The report you have been asked produce has been given an education outcome marking scheme.  It is a report not on the ECO house but on the building and learning process. The marking scheme is a report on your report!

Lets look at some of the marking guidelines

4.2 uses examples to illustrate how models. theories and laws contribute to and understanding of phenomina.
Translation: "Describes how their model contributes to an understanding of phenomina."

4.2 really refers to a conceptual model, like the particle model for gases.  The model in the translation refers to the small scale model that the student built. To answer this you would have to, for example, how building you model better able you to understand how window size effects heating of a real house.

4.3 requires you to link and everyday life effect that has been affected by everyday developments.  It might be the ability to build more unusual houses using computer design.

4.12.requires you to explain how your house has been built around ideas bases on our modern technology or requiring technological knowhow.

and so forth

of note for 4.20 and 4.40 you have to talk about your strategies, and why you chose some.

ESSA test at PHS

ESSA stands for:

Essential Secondary Science Assessment (ESSA)

and has been running for a number of years in NSW public schools. It tests the syllabus and by having a graded marking system looks at the depth of Science learning and quality teaching across the state.

In WEEK 1A term 4 all year 8 Students will have a practice test in computer labs.  They will watch a short flash video of an experiment and conduct scientific analysis. 

For this you will require:
1) a Ear Bud as used in Ipods to hear the audio from the computer.
2) pencil, rulers and calculators as they would use in a school laboratory.

You will have a USERNAME and Password.

In WEEK 2A Thursday 21 October Term 4 you will conduct the actual test.

As this is the first year the test is conducted wholely online, only a select number of schools across the state will participate in the pilot

kwESSA