{"id":5389,"date":"2016-04-19T17:04:14","date_gmt":"2016-04-19T22:04:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.kabt.org\/?p=5389"},"modified":"2016-04-19T17:04:14","modified_gmt":"2016-04-19T22:04:14","slug":"in-my-classroom-14-building-a-wetland-filter-lab","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kabt.org\/?p=5389","title":{"rendered":"In My Classroom #14 – Building a Wetland Filter Lab"},"content":{"rendered":"

Welcome to the KABT blog segment, \u201cIn My Classroom\u201d. This is a segment that will post about every two weeks from a different member. In 250 words or less, share one thing that you are currently doing in your classroom. That\u2019s it.<\/p>\n

The idea is that we all do cool stuff in our rooms and to some people there have been cool things so long that it feels like they are old news. However, there are new teachers that may be hearing things for the first time and veterans that benefit from reminders. So let\u2019s share things, new and old alike. When you\u2019re tagged you have two weeks to post the next entry. Your established staple of a lab or idea might be just what someone needs. So be brief, be timely and share it out! Here we go:<\/p>\n

Hello! It’s been a while since we’ve had a post like this. Thought I’d share something I’ve done recently in my class!<\/p>\n

\"2016-04-18<\/a>Right now I\u2019m smack-dab in the middle of my biodiversity unit in my Environmental Science course. I like to save this unit for the spring so we can take advantage of the beautiful weather. We\u2019ve been learning about methods for sampling biodiversity (quadrats), but today we focused on the question: Why should I care? I use this lab to model ecosystem services, such as water purification, to show students what conserving biodiversity can do for us. It involves using common classroom items to build a wetland filter to clean \u201cpolluted\u201d water. If you\u2019re not overly familiar with how wetlands function as natural filters, you can read more about it\u00a0here.<\/a><\/p>\n

The filters are just 2-liter bottles with the bottoms cut off. I use a small piece of cheesecloth to cover the top to help keep the filter components inside. I supply the students with materials that function similarly to natural wetland components \u2013 cotton batting to act as roots, a variety of gravel sizes, soil, and sand. \"2016-04-18<\/a>You could also add materials, such as clay, charcoal, or sphagnum moss. I have my students think about what each material might represent in real life and instruct them to build a filter that they think might resemble a typical wetland. The \u201cpolluted\u201d water that the filter needs to clean is just a mixture of whatever I have laying around. Today it was soil, sand, diatomaceous earth, and canola oil. \"2016-04-18<\/a>It looked gross when all mixed together and was made of materials that don\u2019t dissolve in water, making them relatively easy to filter out.<\/p>\n

To save some time, we just compared the murkiness of the water after running the polluted water through their filters. You could get a little more involved and do some turbidity tests, if you really wanted.<\/p>\n

Peggy Porter – I’m lucky enough to see the cool things you do. You should share with the group!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Welcome to the KABT blog segment, \u201cIn My Classroom\u201d. This is a segment that will post about every two weeks from a different member. In 250 words or less, share one thing that you are currently doing in your classroom. That\u2019s it. The idea is that we all do cool stuff in our rooms and
+ Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5598,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_s2mail":"yes","_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5389","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-kabt-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t