Seasonal Changes Through Our Eyes and Yours: An online collaborative investigation of seasonal changes Standards: Science K.

8 The student will investigate and understand simple patterns in his/her daily life. Key concepts include a) weather observations; b) the shapes and forms of many common natural objects including seeds, cones, and leaves; c) animal and plant growth; and d) home and school routines. Mathematics K.14 The student will display gathered data in object graphs, picture graphs, and tables, and will answer questions related to the data. Project Timeline: Data collection weeks February 6-10 March 12-15 April 23-27 Project objectives: Students will use a digital camera to photograph a selected tree during each of the data collection weeks and will keep a tree journal to record seasonal changes they notice in that tree. Daily, a student will read the temperature from a thermometer and add it to an Excel spreadsheet, which we will use as a class to create a line graph of seasonal temperature change. Monthly, students will draw a picture and write a description of themselves wearing weather-appropriate clothing and doing weather-appropriate activities to document human responses to seasonal changes. After analyzing our data and comparing it to data from other schools via the Seasonal Changes Through Our Eyes and Yours project page, students will identify that seasons are not the same everywhere, but in Virginia, the change from Winter to Spring occurs between February and April and is marked by warming temperatures and budding plants.

Project Implementation: 1. Register Register for Seasonal Changes Through Our Eyes and Yours by emailing the project coordinator, Linda Brandon at lbrandon@lakelandschools.org . 2. Introduce the project Ask the students what season it is now. Ask the students what season is coming next. Ask the students to describe what they know about Winter and Spring. Document their ideas on the board. Ask what changes they might expect to see over the next several weeks in plant life and temperature. Ask children how people might dress or act differently in response to those changes. Have the students brainstorm ways that they could measure seasonal changes. Explain that they will be participating in a very exciting project along with schools across the world. Show the students the project webpage at http://lakelandschools.us/do/lbrandon/Seasons/home.htm. Explain that they will be observing and recording changes in trees, changes in temperature, and changes in clothing over the next two months. Further explain that we will be sharing and comparing the data we collect with schools across the world so that we can see what seasons are like in other places too. 3. Temperature Collection Temperature collection will be ongoing throughout the project. One student each day will be designated as the Weather Helper. Each morning, the Weather Helper will read the temperature from a thermometer outside the classroom and the teacher will help the student add this temperature to a database in Excel. At the end of each of the data collection weeks, upload the temperatures for that week to the project page. Have the students compare the temperatures they recorded that week to the temperatures recorded by other classes on the project webpage. At the end of the final data collection period, the teacher will create a line graph from this data. The class will analyze the graph together. Ask students what they notice about the line. Ask the students to explain why the line changes the way it does. 4. Tree Journal Divide students into groups of three. During recess, have each group select a tree to study in the schoolyard. Explain that students will be visiting this tree once each month to see how the tree they selected changes from winter to Fall. Explain the students will have different tree jobs. They will take turns leaf observer, ground observer, and animal observer. Students will also rotate to have the additional job of tree photographer.

On Monday of the data collection weeks, the groups will visit their trees. Each student will have a sheet of paper and a pencil. The tree photographer will take a picture of the tree using the digital camera. The leaf collector will do a leaf rubbing and write a sentence about the changes they notice in the leaves. The ground observer will examine the ground around their tree, drawing a picture and writing sentence about what they observe. The animal observer will look for signs of animals around their tree, drawing a picture and writing a sentence to record what they observe. Each observation page and a print out of the digital photograph will be compiled into a group tree journal entry. At the end of each data collection period, the teacher will upload the digital photo and tree observations to the project webpage and students will compare their trees to the trees observed by other classes. At the end of the project, students will compile their tree journal entries into group books entitled Our Tree these books will be placed in the classroom library. 4. Me Throughout the Seasons On Wednesday of each data collection week, the students will draw a picture of themselves wearing weather-appropriate clothing and write 2-3 sentences about an activity they like to do in the current weather conditions. At the end of the last data collection period, the students will compile their drawings into a class book entitled Me Throughout the Seasons, which will be placed in the classroom library. The students will discuss how their clothing and activity choices changed to fit the weather. 5. Project Closure During the last week of the project, direct students to use their time at the computer station that picking one participating class from the project page and investigating how that class data was different from our own. At the end of the week, ask students how each of the components our class studied changed over time. Document their responses on the board. Ask them if the other classes they examined observed these same changes. Prompt them to explain why or why not. Ask them what our observations taught us about how weather, plants, animals, and people change from Winter to Spring. Prompt them to identify that seasons are not the same everywhere, but here, the transition from Winter to Spring is marked by warmer temperatures and budding plants. People and other animals respond to these changes by shedding coats and being more active outside their homes.