Info
| Explore | Hello, I’m Luke, I’m not very fond of planting. Some plants are tasty and some make me breathe so I'm ok with plants. Hello, I’m Jazzlyn, I have a good amount of experience with planting. My family and I don’t exactly have a farm but you could consider it. We have multiple vegetable... |
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| Research Question | Can corn grow if watered with water that has salt dissolved in it? We are interested to help agriculture in areas with less rainwater and more brackish water. We hope to figure out a solution for this problem by asking this question and testing it. |
| Predictions | We think that the roots will shrivel up and rot in the 0.8g salt concentration, it will not grow as big or as fast as it would in the 0.4g salt concentration, and it will grow pretty well in the .1g salt concentration. We think that the control with no salt will grow the best. These... |
| Experimental Design | Materials: Salt: .8 times three=2.4 .4 times three=1.2 .1times three=.3 12 pots ¾ cup of soil per pot (times twelve)=nine cups sixty corn seeds-five per pot 39 grams of salt Steps: Step 1: Put 3/4 of a cup of soil into a pot and plant 5 corn seeds 2 inches down, spread 2 centimeters... |
| Conclusion | The data we collected partially supports our prediction. We thought that the roots would shrivel up and rot in the 0.8 g salt concentration, it would not grow as big or as fast as it would in the 0.4 g salt concentration, and it will grow pretty well in the .1 g salt concentration. We think that... |
| About this Project |
The students was passionate about their experiment. The students and mentor discussed about their experiment everyday. The students asked questions and updated their progress daily to their mentor. This team made great communication with the mentor by updating their work process and data.... |
Updates
Dear Dragon Blood Trees -
Please give yourselves a round of high fives for bringing your project to a successful conclusion. You overcame some difficult initial problems and decisions and then really got busy figuring things out as you went through the experiment. I was impressed with your postings to this website, which were among the most literate I have seen in years. I greatly enjoyed meeting you by Zoom, and I wish there had been more time to have additional meetings towards the middle and end of the project.
Best wishes for a happy Thanksgiving and a successful completion of this first half of the school year.
Yours sincerely,
Andrew Schnabel
Farewell and Best Wishes
As this research project is now in the final stages of wrapping-up, we wish to thank everyone who participated in this inquiry; the students, mentors, teachers and others behind the scenes. We appreciate all of your efforts and contributions to this online learning community.
Scientific exploration is a process of discovery that can be fun! There are many unanswered questions about plants just waiting for new scientists to consider, investigate, and share.
After the end of the session, we will be updating the platform and archiving groups and projects, after which time new updates/posts will not be able to be added to projects or groups. You have until Friday, November 19, 2021, to post ALL of your updates, comments, and goodbyes. Please come back and visit the PlantingScience Project Gallery anytime to view this project in the future. You can search the Gallery by keyword, team name, topic, or school name.
Good bye for now.
Warm regards,
The PlantingScience Team
Hello, thank you so much for your help and advice. P.S we are making a presentation next week. From the Dragon Blood Tree's
Dear DBTs -
Thanks for uploading those photos of your graphs. I have three suggestions/questions:
1) For the height data, I think the line graph is more successful than the bar graph. It's easier to read - to see the differences between treatments.
2) Also for the height data, is there a way in your graphing program to make the x-axis give the number of days after planting rather than the date. For example, if you planted on 10/8 and took your first data on 10/14, then you could call 10/8 day 0 and 10/14 day 6. Then you would count the days from day 0 and plot your x-axis a continuous variable between 0 and 21 (three weeks from planting). I'm suggesting this, because the measurements were not evenly spaced in time - some were two days in row and some were a week apart. The plants have more time to change in a week than in a day.
3) On all graphs, I suggest adding units of measure to the y-axis label, such as "Height of plant (cm)".
4) For the data on plant weight, are the data shown in the graph the averages for each concentration, or did you put all the plants together from one treatment and get a total weight? I think the correct way to collect and analyze these data would be this: a) measure the weight of all plants in each pot to get 2-3 measurements for each salt treatment; b) divide those weights by the number of plants in each pot to get a weight per plant, because some pots had 4 plants and some had 5; c) take the average weight for each salt treatment.
I'm going to try to upload the graph I made of your data. This may or may not work. I included only 6 of your measurement days in the graph - I think I'm missing one week of data.
Best regards,
Andrew Schnabel
Hi Team,
I noticed that your experimental design is still in draft form. Please update that today. Make sure your salt to water ratio is clear - I see .8 salt but no explanation of units of measurement and how much water you were dissolving the salt into.
Journals: Make sure you are writing about your conclusions as you discuss the results with each other. I should see updated journals posted from everyone. Luke's is missing. Post your graphs, too.
Next, go to this Planting Science resource page . Your group needs to answer these questions - in writing. Post your answers here on the blog so your mentor can give you feedback.
Keep up the good work!
Our group just discussed the article because our sub told us to. Let us know if we needed to answer the questions either way.
Thanks!
Jazzlyn
Hi Everyone,
You have been working hard with documenting your experiments, so please make sure that your most recent journal has been uploaded to your Planting Science Files tab. The file name cannot contain your last name, and it needs to be downloaded as a pdf. Please do not attach Google docs!!
Good morning Quinn and team -
Yes, I've made a line graph for the height data as well. If you can upload your graph - either a screen shot of the graph or perhaps the actual file you used to create the graph - then I'd be happy to compare mine to yours to see if we agree.
Best regards,
A. Schnabel
Hi,
We did line graphs for our height data, and I think that we are doing bar graphs for the total weight.
Dear DBTs -
Very cool photos of those roots. Did you measure them? If you did, what were the procedures you followed? If you are going to do a presentation, perhaps you could include those photos and label them with their treatment, as they show multiple differences in plant size and other features.
Best regards,
A. Schnabel
Hi Team -
Congratulations on getting those final data recorded. I'll have a look at your journal entries over the weekend. Next week you put together a presentation about your project? I'd like to hear your ideas for the best way to present the data as a graph.
Best regards,
Andrew Schnabel
Our Final Mass Weight- average (grams):
Control- .8
.4- 1.2
.8- 1.2
.1- .3
This is what our plants looked like on October 17th for comparison.
Hello, here are today's measurements.
| 10/29/2021 | ||||||
| Control 1 | 28.4 | 15 | 28.8 | 22.1 | fell out | 23.6 |
| Control 2 | 26.8 | 22 | fell out | fell out | fell out | 24.4 |
| Control 3 | 23 | 23.7 | 12.8 | 20.7 | 11.5 | 18.3 |
| .8 Salt Concentration | 6 | 10 | 12 | 11.1 | fell out | 9.8 |
| .8 Salt Concentration | 12 | 15 | 13.2 | 14.9 | 6.7 | 12.7 |
| .8 Salt Concentration | 14.1 | 16 | fell out | 17.4 | 14.5 | 15.5 |
| .4 Salt Concentration | 21.5 | 27 | 15.5 | 19.5 | 15.5 | 19.8 |
| .4 Salt Concentration | 19 | 15.5 | 21.5 | 0 | 0 | 18.7 |
| .4 Salt Concentration | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| .1 Salt Concentration | 14.5 | 17 | 23 | fell out | 0 | 18.2 |
| .1 Salt Concentration | 25 | 18 | 23.5 | fell out | 0 | 22.2 |
| .1 Salt Concentration | 24 | fell out | fell out | fell out | 0 | 24 |
Here is what I put in my journal today:
Comparing the control to the .4 concentration I can see that the tips are full brown and some of them are all shriveled up. I can conclude that we over-watered them and there wasn't enough sunlight. The control is doing better than the others but not by much. The controls seem in better shape as of height and how green they are.. The control showed some signs of dying but not as much as the .8 or the .4 concentration. Otherwise the plants are doing the same as they have been. I think the turning point in this experiment is 10.19.21 that is when things started to go downhill. That's all for now.
I hope this is helpful!
Here are today's measurements.
| 10.28.21 | Observation 1 (cm) | Observation 2 (cm) | Observation 3 (cm) | Observation 4 (cm) | Observation 5 (cm) | Average (cm) |
| Control 1 | 28.8 | 24.5 | 22 | 29 | 27.2 | 26.3 |
| Control 2 | 29.5 | 22 | 20.4 | fell out | fell out | 24 |
| Control 3 | 23.4 | 27.8 | 12 | 20 | 21 | 20.8 |
| .8 Salt Concentration | 16 | 12 | 15.6 | 13 | fell out | 14.2 |
| .8 Salt Concentration | 7 | 12.6 | 6 | fell out | 12 | 9.4 |
| .8 Salt Concentration | 13 | 5 | 11 | fell out | fell out | 9.7 |
| .4 Salt Concentration | 16 | 25 | 18.5 | 15 | 11 | 17.1 |
| .4 Salt Concentration | fell out | fell out | fell out | fell out | fell out | fell out |
| .4 Salt Concentration | 15.3 | 13 | 16 | 12 | 0 | 14.1 |
| .1 Salt Concentration | 16.5 | 25.5 | 21.5 | 15.5 | 0 | 19.8 |
| .1 Salt Concentration | 20 | 19.5 | 25 | 11.5 | 0 | 19 |
| .1 Salt Concentration | 19.5 | 28.5 | 26.5 | 24.5 | 0 | 24.8 |
Hi Professor Schnable, here are the measurement from Tuesday.
| 10/26/2021 | ||||||
| Control 1 | 10.1 | 16.6 | 21.3 | 12.3 | 23.5 | 16.8 |
| Control 2 | 30 | 23 | 21 | 23 | 0 | 24.3 |
| Control 3 | 28.5 | 23 | 23.4 | 22 | 27 | 24.8 |
| .8 Salt Concentration | 12 | 15 | 17.5 | 12 | 13 | 13.9 |
| .8 Salt Concentration | 11 | 6 | 14 | 13.3 | 9 | 10.7 |
| .8 Salt Concentration | 15 | 7 | 10 | 12.5 | 14.5 | 11.8 |
| .4 Salt Concentration | 12 | 16 | 14 | 16.7 | 18 | 15.3 |
| .4 Salt Concentration | 5 | 7 | 13 | 4 | 12 | 8.2 |
| .4 Salt Concentration | 3 | 18 | 17 | 12.4 | 25.5 | 15.2 |
| .1 Salt Concentration | 17.5 | 22 | 23.5 | 16.5 | 26.5 | 21.2 |
| .1 Salt Concentration | 14.5 | 27.5 | 26.5 | 25 | 0 | 23.4 |
| .1 Salt Concentration | 28.5 | 26.5 | 20.5 | 27 | 0 | 25.6 |
Hi, we don't have any data for yesterday, because we didn't have school.
Hi Everyone -
It's troubling that ALL of your plants are unhappy. You might think that at least the control plants would still be healthy, although perhaps a little bit spindly due to low light levels. I see that Jazzlyn may have tried to upload a couple of photos, but those have not come through for me. It would be good to have a look at these unhappy plants.
Looking forward to seeing the next set of measurements as well -
Andrew Schnabel
Hi Professor Schnabel,
We will be finished with collecting data by the end of this week. We moved the plants to grow lights.
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Our plants are all practically dead. Sorry for the bad news.
It also seems that they are shrinking... somehow.
Hello, this week our plants aren't looking very good. Most of them are shriveling up and dying in all of the pots. The pipe cleaners aren't working very well, so we have decided to just let the plants be. We are planning on doing root length but we will not be doing dry weight. At the end of this week, we are most likely going to be done collecting data.
Dear DBTs -
How are your plants looking this week? Are the props working? I'd be eager to see more data and more photos, as I hear from your teacher that this might be the final week of data collection.
I've been keeping a graph of the data as you send it to me, and I'd like to see in the end, if my graph looks like your graph and whether we reach the same conclusions about your experiment.
Also, I recall that you were going to collect data on final dry weight and root length of each plant. Are you still planning for that? If so, and you aren't sure just how to go about that data collection, we can discuss it through these posts.
Best regards,
Andrew Schnabel
Hi, for lighting, we just have the classroom lights. The yellow color is most likely from the salt.
Hi, thanks for letting us know. This is the correct data. The top one is the first .8 pot and the bottom one is the second. We think that our plants need support, so maybe we could stick a pencil in the pot and lightly use string to tie it around the plants?
| 14.5 | 15.5 | 13 | 16.5 | 14 | 14.7 |
| 18 | 15 | 15 | 16.5 | 15 | 15.9 |
Hello Dragon Blood Trees -
Continued growth - that's great. Differences between treatments are becoming even easier to see!
Three quick notes:
1) It looks like you have accidentally repeated the data for your third control pot in the first 0.8 pot.
2) You have started including your zero numbers in your averages, but that's not correct. If a seed has not germinated, then there is no measurement to make. It's not a zero - it's just no measurement. So for example, the second control pot has four plants, and heights of only those plants would be included in the average.
3) I'm going to continue to assert that your third control pot will not be usable, because it got a much later start than all the other pots. Thus, that pot has not received the same growing conditions as the other two pots, and so it violates the design of your experiment. Leaving it in will mess things up; taking it out is the correct move.
Best regards,
Andrew Schnabel
After I checked in with the group today, they are going to exclude the slow starting control pot, but they are curious to see if it catches up with the rest of the plants, so they are going to check on it, but not include the average growth in their experiment.
As for the zeros in the data table, I have asked students to put the zeros in to show that there was no growth to record, so that I know that they checked, and their tables are current. The zero growth would not be added into the average height they are recording. Total height / total number of plants for each group.
Good day Team -
Excellent observations about color, wilting, stem thickness, and other features! Those are all important observations in helping you round out your explanation of the effects your treatments are having. Let's try to understand what's happening to your plants right now:
1) You have some changes in color (yellowing, red pigment). What might the causes be? I'm not convinced by the hypothesis that the red color signals a build-up of sugars. Sugars are not red. Could the color changes be due to too much or too little light? How much light are you giving them? What's the lighting set-up you are using?
2) You are seeing some wilting and leaning. What might the causes be? What hypotheses can you come up with to explain these observations?
Let's get a discussion going about the possible causes of these new developments.
Last, thanks for the data, but the data you uploaded are the same as the data you previously posted for the second 0.8 pot. Thus, you are still missing the data for the first 0.8 pot.
Best regards,
Andrew Schnabel