Peppered moth's Weekly Blog

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/76/Peppered_Moth._Biston_betularia_2_-_Flickr_-_gailhampshire.jpg

Summary:

A peppered moth is a moth that can be all black or is can be with with spots of black. The multi colored moths like on tree’s with light bark like birch tree’s and there is a thing called lichen (a fungus that can grow on trees) that the moth’s also blend well into. The black moth’s will usually live in a darker area and this is something that can help them to camouflage better than with the light tree’s. The moth’s are all nocturnal which also helps them to avoid predators that may hunt during the day. Flying around in the night also makes it so that it is harder for predators to spot them and makes sure that they can survive better. Their predators are birds like flycatchers, European robin, nuthatches, etc.

SP:3

To help illustrate the peppered moth’s example we played a game where the player would act as a bird and you would try to eat as many peppered moth’s as you can in a minute. You could chose if you wanted to play in a dark or light forest and there would be 50% dark moths and 50% light. Depending on which one you choose it will be easier to see the moth’s that stand out rather than the moths that blend in with the environment. In the end you would see which of the two there were more of and it would tell you why. This was something that was interesting to play and to see what it would be like in a bird's view to have to catch the moths.

Weekly blog evolution

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1d/Anatomy_and_physiology_of_animals_Various_vertebrate_limbs.jpg

Summary: 
        Evolution is when a species develops certain traits to live better in the certain environment it is in so when you look at certain animals from one environment it is. Evolution is the thing that made creatures look, like how people think that animals have a common ancestor, humans evolved from apes and things. The diagram or picture above is to show the similarities in arm bones off different animals vs. human, you can see that some look more similar then others and they all have the same function and this is showing proof of common ancestors. When something has a similar function to another in a different animals like arms, legs, eyes, noses, teeth, etc. it is called a Homologous structure.

SP3: Planning and carrying out investigations:
        This week we did a experiment where we would take a fork spoon or knife and some buttons and beans. Then we would have a timer for 20 seconds and we would have to pick up as much as we can with our tool, and if we had 20 or more we would stay alive but if you got under you went extinct. When you get extinct you get replaced and this was to show how in natural selection it is more random and it is something that is chosen based on their fitness in the environment. This experiment was something that helped as a visual and an example and it was something that seems fun to do with more friends.

Weekly blog 9/15/17 mutations

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/65/DNA_com_GGN.jpg/1280px-DNA_com_GGN.jpg

Summary:
        There are many kinds of mutations and most of the time they do not affect the look or anything about the organism. The bases are A, T, C and G, A is always paired with T and C is always paired with G. You can have insertions, deletions or substitution. An insertion is when you have an extra base added to your DNA, deletion is when you take away a base, and substitution is when you have the wrong base with the wrong base. Not all mutations are hidden and not shown by the person with it but in rare cases it  can help or harm the person.

SP3: Planning and carrying out investigations:
       This week we did a lab where we investigated mutations and how they survive. We got M&M's and tic-tac's, the tic tac's were the mutation and we had to have 5 of them mixed in with the 12 other M&M's. We had to blindly remove 5 each time and replace it with whatever we thought made sense according to our population. We were observing how mutations survive and what mutations would be good and bad. This ended up being a good and fun way to learn and represent mutation. We had a good visual of the tic- tac' and the M&M's to represent mutations.

Project Blog Geologic time scale

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/6e/Geologic_time_and_mass_extinctions.png

Summary:

The Paleozoic era was a time that had 6 different time periods in it called the Cambrian, Ordovician, Silurian, Devonian, Carboniferous, and the Permian time periods. Some interesting things about this era is that the continents had shallow water covering them, larger animals like 5.9 foot centipedes and things. In this time it had lots of marine life and the first jawed fish and the fish had certain body shapes and things for special tasks and fins for better swimming. There were 3 major mass extinctions, one of them was in the Ordovician time and the Silurian time where lots of the marine life was killed and reduced in numbers. Another one is in the late Devonian time 3/4 of life on earth died and it was not necessarily all at one time, it could have been over several years. The last mass extinction was the Permian mass extinction or the Great Dying where 96% of species went extinct and the 4% left is what all current life is descended from.  There were lots of crazy things that happened in this time that would be hard to imagine happening now.

Backward-looking: How much did you know about the subject before we started? 

I knew some basics about the dinosaurs that lived in the Mesozoic era and things like the meteor's but I did not know anything about the Paleozoic time or what it was. I have learned a lot of things from this project and I did not have any background on my era because I did not know about it. I am slightly happy that I did not know anything about it because it has taught me a lot and it is something that helped to keep me interested in it and something that was more fun and surprising. I did not know much so it was something that made me think more and was something that was cool and different to learn about. I did not know anything about this but it turned out fun and well in the end of it and I am happy with how it turned out.

Inward-looking: How do you feel about this piece of work? What parts of it do you particularly like? Dislike? Why? What did/do you enjoy about this piece or work?

I think that this project was a great and fun project and it was not too long for time and not too short of time and I think that it was one of my favorites. I like this project because it had lots of creativity and flexibility to the end product like how we could make it with flaps, 3-D, a poster, diorama and more but it was definitely fun. I liked almost everything but it was hard because our team would argue and it would create more stress for the project and getting it done. I think that I would love to do more projects like this because it had lots of flexibility because everyone's was unique and it was fun getting to come up with and be creative. Overall this was one of my favorite projects and I would love to do more like it.

Outward-looking: Did you do your work the way other people did theirs? In what ways did you do it differently? In what ways was your work or process similar? 
Ours was different then everyone else's because we had the giant flap for each era and the small flaps on the inside and even when people did flaps they did not have a giant flap with smaller ones inside. Every groups was unique and In some ways it was similar because we all had the same base with the information about the era's but everyone wrote different things even if it seemed similar. The process was that we had to do the research and that we had to create the project in the end. This process was similar to everyone else's and we all did things around the same time but it always ended up different. Everyone did a great job and everyone made theirs different and unique which I liked.

Forward-looking: What would you change if you had a chance to do this piece over again?
If I did this again I would make it so that we would have done a little bit more at our house or met up after school so that we would have had extra time to add more drawings. I think that we did pretty well and I am happy about the end result of our project. I would want to do another project in a similar manner with the fact that the project was flexible for everyone to make something different. I think that our project looks great and even if we wanted to change anything it is done now and I am happy that we have it done and I am happy that our whole group was happy. Everyone did equal work which was nice and no one had to do someone else part and when it came to supplies we did not have to by much and some of the stuff our team already had or we used from the maker lab. I would not want to change much but it is over now and it was a great project that I would like to have another project done in the same matter.