Science Methods

 Lab This week in lab we discussed the following big questions: What type of data do we have that supports that climate change is happening? What questions did you derive from the data shared? What answers did you find? Using SPECIFIC data, make a climate statement based on DATA. My group came up with: Based on the Annual State-Wide Average Number of Frost-Free Days, we can tell based on the inconsistency, that the frost is in inconsistent and overall has less frost days. Gradually throughout the years the days are increasing without frost. Snow fall has decreased overtime, and the growing season ahas gradually increased (along with allergies). Temperature, habitat, precipitation, weather are all changing throughout the time allotted. Iowa has seen this change with longer growing seasons, wetter springs and summers, more summer precipitation, higher humidity, and drier autumns. This will be a direct impact Iowa economy which is based on agriculture since it allows more crops to be ...

 Lab In lab climate change was talked about, I was not here for the lab so the information and understanding I am gaining from the slideshow. It looks like they investigated why the Goldfinch the Iowa state bird is in danger due to climate change, to my understanding of the slideshow data the Goldfinch is becoming extinct due to heavy rainfall. When the rain is heavy it causes humidity and moisture which increases precipitation and temperature. I also heard from my other classmates that they got to look at the eclipse! The BIG QUESTION in the lab today is: What is climate change?  lecture   We did not talk about anything in lecture this week because we took an exam! I did okay I honestly did better than I thought I would do, and that is because I think I read the pressbook multiple times and I also took the practice quizzes multiple times.  Pressbook Because I was not here for the lab I found the section explaining the difference in Climate Vs Weather to be very help...

 Lab  Today in the lab, we dove into the different layers of rock formations, exploring the sequence of their formation based on rock types and layer positioning. Transitioning from theory to practice, we examined diverse unidentified sands under a microscope, within our table groups to try and identify where the sand originated This week's big question is how does weathering and erosion help us identify where rocks originate and how they are formed. Lecture Today in the lecture we did a lab, we began the lab by talking about buoyancy which is the process by which something floats or sinks. There is a relationship between how dense something is compared to water, if something is dense then water sinks if there is something less than water it floats. We read a book called Archimedes, the purpose of this book was to teach us about how we could use water displacement to understand if something will sink or float. We talked about how the water that is displaced shows the amount of...

  Lab  In the lab we used a torch to melt starburst to represent the melting together of rocks, we also classified the types of rocks based on the melting pattern created with the starburst. We also talked about how seeing improvements and understanding in students is ten times more important than a letter grade because our whole goal as a teacher is to teach and help students learn. The big question this week is, "How and why are certain rocks formed?"  Lecture  In the lecture today we learned what makes a rock a rock, a rock is only a rock it was naturally made by the Earth for example cement is not a rock because it is man-made. We also learned that sand came from distant mountains and landforms, not from the ocean. In the lecture, Allison talked about the different layers of the Earth: crust, mantle, outer core, and inner core. Once we found the basis of what the layers of the Earth are we talked about continental plates and oceanic plates, continental plates are...

  Lab  In lab today we learned about geologic time and how time stamps and important events were spread through the creation of the earth to when humans were created. The big question we were looking to answer in lab today was "What is the geologic time stamp of all things?" Discussion  This Thursday we did not have a discussion we took an exam, which I studied hard for and did not get the result I wanted so I am quite disappointed.  Pressbook  From the online textbook, I learned the order in which things supposedly appeared on Earth, prokaryotic bacteria, animals/plants, diversity/evolution, evolution of plants/animals, dinosaurs, and then humans. In the textbook they had this information spread out in time stamps and this was super interesting to see, because when I think of things evolving I think of them being super far apart but in reality, on a timeline (like in the lab) things are closer or farther then they seem. I also found this timeline to be most hel...

 In Lab  In the lab this week my table group and I presented our slideshow on the past, present, and future of space travel. We also learned from other groups about the origin of the universe, the lifecycle of a star, galaxies, the origin of the earth, and black holes. All of these sections we learned about from different groups were the big questions for this week in lab.   https://iowa-my.sharepoint.com/:p:/r/personal/olmayer_uiowa_edu/Documents/Space%20Travel%20-%20lesson.pptx?d=w23027ebf9c6943e88a6b1ff7f5b1c3b3&csf=1&web=1&e=geGb6Y Thursdays Lecture  In Thursday's lecture, we talked about how the universe was theoretically created through expansion and not an explosion, subatomic particles inflated to an extremely large size in a fraction of a second and that is what caused our universe to form. We also discussed the topic of nuclear fusion and through this process, stars can make up to iron on the table of elements, we also dove deeper into the ...