Glimpse of the Garden: Week 5, Perennials Popping Up

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It has been fun to clear out the garden beds and see the green shoots beginning to pop up!

Lily shoots ©SBF

     When we bought our house we were very lucky to inherit some great flower beds with the property. The first growing season was an exercise in patience. Although I love plants, I didn't know where to begin. I didn't want to dig anything up until I knew what it was, and often that meant waiting for it to bloom. 

     I purchased The Perennial Care Manual: A Plant-by-Plant Guide: What to Do & When to Do It by Nancy J. Ondra to help me navigate my new plants. I found it indispensable during those first growing seasons. From placing new plants to troubleshooting there are lots of easy to understand tips and tricks, illustrated with wonderful photographs. Additionally the book highlights 125 common perennials, including: seasonal care, propagation and troubleshooting. It is extremely helpful, and if you have perennials and aren't quite sure of how to maintain them, I'd highly recommend this book. With its help I will be tackling the long overdue task of thinning and dividing some overgrown lilies, irises and astilbe this weekend.

     Once divided I will be giving some of the leftover plants away and donating others to my school's annual plant sale. In the next few weeks plant sales will be popping up all over the place. You might want to see if your local library, school or community center is having one soon as a fundraiser. These plants are often heartier and healthier than those you'll find at a big box store.

     My strawberries are starting to grow! I need to get these beauties into the ground. Add fixing the new strawberry bed to the weekend list!

The first strawberry! ©SBF

What gardening tasks are you tackling this week? Comment below!

 

Cookies: A Delicious Way to Develop Science Skills

 

When it comes to learning, it is always more fun, and often more effective, when a treat to eat is involved. I have been following Bethany Brookshire's series Cookie Science on the Eureka! Lab blog. Brookshire has been posting step-by-step updates of her process of science investigation surrounding the perfect gluten free chocolate chip cookie recipe. What is great about these posts is that they are taking a fun subject- baking cookies- and really outlining the important steps in designing and carrying out an experiment. Each post is geared toward students. Any testable question for a science fair or even professional research goes through the process that has been taking shape on Eureka! Lab.

 
The series begins with developing a testable hypothesis: "Substituting gluten-free flour alone will not make a cookie that is comparable to my original recipe". This is followed by directions for the use of a lab notebook. Other topics covered throughout the series are: ethics and protocol review boards, how to run a "blind" trial and using the Likert scale,  controlling variables, etc.

 
Throughout each post Brookshire does an excellent job of explaining the reasoning and her thought process for each method she is using. An upper middle school or high school student could easily use this series to plan their own scientific experiment, or it could be used in its original form as a way to teach a group of students the steps of creating and carrying out a scientific investigation.

 
This is just one example of using a cookie as a means to learn science. So much science can be learned in the kitchen. Baking is one way to teach and learn about chemical reactions. Check out Stephanie Warren's TED-Ed video lesson about chemical reactions in cookies.

In "The Case of the Cookie Mystery" a 5th grade level STEM investigation, students consider physical and chemical reactions as they have to determine the properties of all of the ingredients in a cookie recipe.

For a younger audience making observations of sweet treats as they are being made can lead to scientific questions. How do the ingredients feel or smell as you are mixing them together? When does the dough change from dry to moist? How does the cookie look when it is only halfway baked? How does it look when it is finished?

For some great baking investigations geared for preschool and elementary visit "Bake a Chemistry Cake" at Education.com, or "Pancake Science"at PBS Parents. 

Here are some other great activities and lesson plans that teach science principles using cookies!

• "Chips" off the old block? (Genetics Lesson)
• Cookie Subduction (Earth Science Lesson)
• Edible Model of the Sun (NASA Astronomy Lesson)
• Dragonfly TV: Surface Area
• Oreo Phases of the Moon (Astronomy Lesson)
• Chocolate Chip Cookie Constellations (Astronomy Lesson)

Check out this great infographic from Shari's Berries that explains the science of baking:

Provided by berries.com

Who says learning can't be delicious? Do you have some great ideas for using cookies to teach and learn? Leave a comment or e-mail me at shareitscience@gmail.com

Read more:

• Society for Science: "Bake Your Way to Your Next Science Project"
• National Geographic- The Plate: "The Experimental Cookie- Teaching Kids Science Through Baking" (if this link takes you to the National Geographic store instead, click refresh and it should take you to the right place. An irritating issue with National Geographic links!)
• NSTA Blog: "The STEM in Food Science"

Check out some other great kitchen fun links: