| Explore | There are many types of plants and many species of plants that live and adapt in different environments for example deserts, woodlands, forests, lakes, and rain forests. A plant’s genetic makeup influences when it reproduces, germinates, and how it responds to temperature. Also, when doing scientific experiments you use inquiry witch is study the natural world and propose explanations based on the evidence derived from your work. To help you can ask questions with but how, what, when, and where during scientific inquiry. Next to make things easier you can write things in a journal so u can see the changes that happened, record changes, data, and measurements, and ask questions and write things down. All of these are very helpful in many science situations. we know that plants need water and sun except cacti they need a little bit of water and they get lots of sun. can plants grow in a dark room? can plants grow upside down? |
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| Research Question | Will the plants mature and grow faster in a tower garden or with natural sunlight? |
| Predictions | We think that the plants will grow and mature faster in the tower. We think that the light will affect the growth of the plants because having it on 24 hours a day will help it grow faster. |
| Experimental Design | Materials: 16 nasturtium seeds 4 plastic cups 4 cups of tower garden 1/2 cup of soil 50 ml of water every other day We are planting 16 nasturtium seeds 8 in the tower garden and 8 at the window with 2 in each in a cup. We will have four cups used to plant the seeds that are growing in sunlight. We will plant them 1/2 inch deep with two in each cup. We are using potting soil for the window plants and watering the plants with 50 ml of water every other day. The tower garden has a built-in aquaponics system so we don't need to water it but we do need to check the nutrients levels and also has grown lights that are on 24 hours a day. To measure how the plants are growing we will look at the height, the color, amount of leaves, and color on the leaves. |
| Conclusion | Our prediction was supported! Our prediction was that the plants in the grow tower will grow and mature faster than the control. The plants in the grow tower did grow and mature faster by 1.125 cm. Also, the plants in the grow tower started to sprout first. Lastly, we had no problems in the experiment except one of the plants were knocked over. |
| Investigation Theme | WOS |
| Grade Level | Middle School Students (grades 6,7,8) |
| School Name | Nottingham Elementary |
| Session | Spring 2018 |
| About this Project | This group has a student who has really blossomed and shown an interest in plants and science since we started this project. He was the first one over to his group's plants with his ruler and chromebook - ready to observe and measure. The Orange Pineapples were interested in seeing the difference between how plants grow in natural sunlight vs plants grown in an aquaponics tower. This team did a great job of documenting their project. They were careful with their plants when they took measurements, and they all were diligent about recording their observations and quantitative data in their journals. The group shared responsibilities and worked well together. They have also taken a lot of photos to document plant growth, which will be very helpful as they analyze the data they collected in order to write their conclusion. |