Week 2

Week 2

 1.) This week in lab, we continued learning about the 8 characteristics of life. In order to do this, my table partners Avery, Hannah, and I created an anchor chart. I had a lot of fun with this activity, and our beautiful drawings will help me to remember the 8 characteristics. We also discussed the differentiating characteristics between living and non-living. Building off of this, we learned that some things that have the potential to be living can be in a dormant state. Finally we learned about germination, which is the process of a seed becoming a seeding. Some of the requirements for germination are water, nutrients, and warms/light. 

3.) For the most part, I feel pretty confident over the content we learned this week. However, I thought that are debate over a virus being living or non-living was a little confusing. Before this discussion, I thought that there was clear-cut criteria for what is living or non-living. So I thought that is was pretty black and white when determining if something was one or the other. This was not the case for viruses… At the beginning of the discussion, I was pretty confident that viruses were non-living, but now I really don’t know what I think. I am still confused about this, but I thought that the discussion was interesting. I understand why there is ongoing debate. 

4.) I took a lot from this lab meeting that I will be able to take with me into my future classroom. I learned that some things can be living or non-living in different situations. For example, branch is living when it is still connected to the tree, but its non-living when its laying on the ground. Or a seed is living when you plant it, but dormant until it’s planted. Some of these concepts can be confusing for kids, so now I know to make sure that I make these differentiations are clear. I also really enjoyed all of the hands on activities. It helped to engage me with the content and cement it to my brain. I would like to have as many hands on activities as possible in my future classroom to give my future students this same luxury.