Scientific Aquariophilia, an eTwinning project

General details  

Name of project: Scientific aquariophilia
For:

• 4 ESO (age 15-16)
• Groups of 15-30 students
• Work teams of 4-6 students from 2 or 3of the partner schools participants
• No limit of total partners participants (the more, the best). 

Curricula subjects:

Biology: ecosystems, biotic and abiotic components and factors, energy and biomass flow.
Mathematics: statistics

Objectives

• Learn about ecosystem ecology through an aquiarium maintenance
• Use the scientific method and propose hypothesis  
• Let students get control of their own learning process.
• Get involved and cowork in citizen science projects.

Process 

Students will maintain an aquiarium and recolect data from survival, grouth and various factors mesures (hours of light, temperature, pH of water, food given, ...) to study their ecology.
Teachers will decide the species to use, in order to use common species and have data from each partner concerning the same species. Any aquarium and any number of species used could be usefull, from the simplest (copepoda in a bottle) to the more complex and biggest aquarium with fish, invertebrates and algae species.
All data will be upload to a common data base.
Students will use the data base to work with figures, search correlations and make hypothesis.

Activity 1: setting the plan.

Teachers of each partner school will introduce the project to their pupils.
In class group they will decide temporary which species will get on their aquarium and which factors could they control and note. Biology teachers will guide this discussion to avoid making decitions difficult or impossible to  implement.

Class group will choose one of the students as spokesperson. Teachers and student spokepersons of all the partner schools taking part in the project  will agree for good and for all the partners the species and factors to use in the project, using the "Chat room" or the "Video Conference" tool of their TwinSpace, trying to unify the species used more than the factors chosen.
This commision of students and teachers will also agree a hashtag of the project which will be used to share their progress in the social networks.

After that, spokespersons will communicate all the decisions taken to their classes.

Finally each class group of each partner school will organise in groups of four students. Each four-student group, following the common decisions taken, will write a plan to obtain the specimens, maintain their aquiarium and recolect data from survival, grouth and the factors chosen.
Finally students, with the supervision of Biology teachers, will choose the better plan.

Evaluation of activity 1

Teachers will use the next evaluation rubric, using the values "improvable", "good" and "excellent":

• Quality and clarity of the plan wrote
• Involvement in group decisions

In the delay asigned all student teams will be able to improve their plans in order to get better values.

Share it! (Activity 1)

Teachers and students will use social networks of their election to share their ideas and progress in the activity, and the plan finally chosen, using the project hashtag.

Activity 2: Data collect

Following their own plan, students of each partner school will organise to maintain their aquiarium and recolect data from survival, grouth and the factors chosen.
They will organise in groups of three studets.

Each three-student group will keep a lab notebook where they will record data, observations or any other notes, and a diary of activities, described in sufficient detail to allow another student group to replicate the steps.

All the data will be upload to a common data base using an on line form of Google Forms, set by their teachers.

Evaluation of activity 2

Teachers will use the next evaluation rubric, using the values "improvable", "good" and "excellent":

• Quality and clarity of the lab notebook
• Detail of the descriptions of the activities recorded in the lab notebook
• Accuracy of the data provided
• Involvement in group work and maintenance of the aquarium
• Collaborative work with the other students

Share it! (Activity 2)

Teachers and students will use social networks of their election to share their ideas, progress of the activity and pictures of their aquarium and the specimens, using the project hashtag.

Activity 3: Thinking about results.

Teachers will set the students in teams of 4 from 2 different partner schools.
Each team will be asigned with an enviromental factor (hours of light, temperature, pH of water, food given, ...) and one or more of the species used in the schools aquariums in previous fases of the project.
The number of species asigned will depend on the number of total species used, the number of pupils and the number of partner schools involved.

Teachers will provide the "Materials" section of the TwinSpace of each team with a database file with all the data collected in the previous activity concerning the grouth and survival of the specie/s and factor of breeding asigned.

Student teams have to study their data, using Google Spreadsheet to make charts and statistical calculations of their election in order to find any correlation among the figures. Students will talk each other and make decisions about their work using the "Chat room" or the "Video Conference" tool of their TwinSpace.
This work will be done under the supervision of Mathematics teachers, although the students should feel free to work with their data as they would prefer.

After that, students teams will discuss and make together hypothesis that may explain the results and charts, using as well the "Chat room" or the "Video Conference" tool of their TwinSpace.
This work will be done under the supervision of Biology teachers, although the students should be encouraged to be creative.

Finally students teams will use Google Docs to write a collaborative paper explaining their results, adding their charts and presenting their hypothesis.

Evaluation of activity 3

Teachers will use the next evaluation rubric, using the values "improvable", "good" and "excellent":

• Quality and clarity of the charts
• Coherence of the charts and staticstic results
• Coherence of the hypothesis
• Power of the hypothesis to explain the results
• Quality and clarity of the paper
• Collaborative work with the other partner school students

In the delay asigned all student teams will be able to improve their works in order to get better values.

Share it! (Activity 3)

Teachers and students will use social networks of their election to share their ideas, hypothesis and their conclusions of the project, using the project hashtag.

Final products:

• Plans to obtain the specimens, maintain their aquiarium and recolect data from survival, grouth and the emviroment factors.
• Lab notebooks.
• Charts and statistical calculations based on data recolected.
• Hypothesis explaining the results and charts.
• Papers explaining their results, adding their charts and presenting their hypothesis.
• Progress and conclutions of the project shared in the social networks using the hashtag of the project.