OpenSciEd 7.4, Lesson 10: Leaves in the Dark Investigation
Task
Use this Tuva Investigation with the OpenSciEd Grade 7 curriculum, Unit 7.4, Lesson 10. Tuva has digitized the Data Table for Leaves in the Dark handout so students can immediately use the Tuva Tools to explore the data they collect. Another Plant Experiment in the Dark, and Secondhand Data for Leaves in the Dark have also been digitized, transforming the static tables and graphs into interactive datasets. This is not a standalone lesson. Use it in tandem with the OpenSciEd Teacher Edition to guide overall instruction and collaborative sensemaking. Where This Investigation Fits into the Storyline Students just built a model predicting when plants stop making food. Here, they test that model in the dark and use secondhand data to check whether oxygen changes too — setting up cellular respiration in Lesson 11. When to Use Tuva Day 1 Complete Part 1, Navigation, outside of Tuva. (Use the OpenSciEd Teacher Edition pages 7–9.) Have students open Tuva before beginning Part 2. Students will make predictions and record class carbon dioxide and humidity readings. (Use pages 9–14 for additional guidance.) The beginning of Part 3, the small group work, should be completed in Tuva as well. Students will graph their results and compare them to their results from Lesson 4. End the day by having students share their ideas in a Building Understandings Discussion. (Use slide I and Teacher Edition pages 15–16.) Day 2 Use Tuva for Part 4, Analyze Secondhand Data. Students will read about the experiment and interact with the secondhand dataset using the Tuva Tools. (Teacher Edition pages 15–18 provide useful facilitation tips.) Parts 5 and 6 should be conducted off of Tuva. What Happens Next In the next lesson, the class will plan and carry out an investigation to see whether plants without leaves (sprouting seeds) do cellular respiration.
Our model predicts that plants would stop making food molecules when there is no light, water, carbon dioxide, or chloroplasts. We think plants might need food molecules to grow and survive. However, we also know from our experience that plants don’t die at night, they don’t die immediately when they don’t have water, and they don’t die without leaves, like in the maple tree. So, why not? In this investigation, we will be answering: Why don’t plants die at night? [--- Talk with a partner and share your ideas with the class. How could we test what is happening with photosynthesis at night? Have we done any investigations in the past where we monitored what was going into or out of leaves? ---] {alert-discuss} Click Next to get started.
Topics and standards: Life Science, MS-LS1-2, MS-LS1-6, MS-LS2-3, Grade 7, MS-PS1-3, OpenSciEd, 3.1.6-8.B, 3.1.6-8.F, 3.1.6-8.K, 3.2.6-8.C