Related subject area: Science

Overall problem: Which activities (if any) around the coral reefs of Kailua Bay should be restricted to insure their lasting protection?

Relationship of the problem in this lesson to the overall problem: Students have been working through a process to identify issues, research information, explore new scientific concepts, gather and analyze data, and summarize findings. During this lesson, students complete the research cycle by drawing conclusions based on their assigned role. This session provides students with an opportunity to summarize and reflect on the work they have done in KaAMS and share it with others. At this point they can describe how they researched the issues, what they learned, and what conclusions they can draw about the overall problem.

Estimated time required: 2 to 3 class periods.

Student outcomes/objectives:

• Students will write a report for Congress that includes a) problem scenario and roles, b) methods used to study, c) images collected, and d) conclusions.
• Students will select which image is best for illustrating the conclusion they draw based on their assigned roles.
• Students will identify the value of the coral reef ecosystem to life.
• Students will know what recommendations and predictions are.

Note: Up to this point, students have been working in groups to document their investigations throughout the unit. It is your option to allow class time for students to create a poster, web site, multimedia project, or scientific report that presents their findings and the work they did to reach those conclusions or assign final project preparation as homework.

Prerequisite skills or knowledge:

• Basic internet skills
• Analysis of the remote sensing data
• Final project assessment rubrics
• Skills required to meet the project demands, e.g., visual design for posters, html skills for the web project, writing skills for scientific reports
• Basic presentation and explanation skills
  

Teacher preparation:

• Print Student Journal / Activity sheets for these activities.
• Provide appropriate materials for poster construction or to develop specified final product.
• Bookmark web sites with tips and suggestions from real-world presenters on making good posters for poster sessions.
• Print rubrics being used to assess projects and presentations.
• Schedule presentation session, space required, etc.
• Invite parents and guests to the presentation sessions
  

Student reflection and assessment: Student reflection activities  |  Assessment

Education standards supported by this lesson:   

National Science Education Standards | Project 2061 Benchmarks

National Standards for School Mathematics | National Technology Standards | National Geography Standards

Cross-curricular connections to National Education Standards for this lesson:

math | technology | geography

FRAME the lesson by explaining to students that they have completed their investigations and analyzed the NASA data. It is time for them to draw conclusions and present their results.

Ask students to think about the overall problem and processes that they have used in order to address the problem.

• What problem have we been studying?

• Why do we need to study this problem?

• Where is the study area?
  
  

• How did you study this problem?

• When were the data collected? Which data did you use to evaluate the state of coral reefs?
• What groups were concerned about this problem?
• What role did you take as an airborne scientists?

Prompt students to think about how their role can impact their conclusion to the coral reef problem?

• What is the overall problem?
  
  
• What conclusions did you draw?
  
  
• Which activities around the coral reefs of Kailua Bay should be restricted to insure their lasting protection? Do you expect that all concerned groups draw the same conclusions to the coral reefs problem? How can we draw our conclusions

Sample student answers:

• Evaluation of the state of coral reefs in the Kailua Bay.
• It was an mission request from a Government Agency.
• Kailua Bays on the island of Oahu in Hawaii.
  
  
• Based on available airborne remote sensing data, we evaluated the state of coral reefs in the Kailua Bay.
  
  
  
• October, 2001. We also used past data from years 1998 and 2000.
  
  
• Coastal developer, Fisherman, Tourist, Coral reefs expert, Government, etc
• Coastal developer, Fisherman, Tourist, Coral reefs expert.

• Which activities (if any) around the coral reefs of Kailua Bay should be restricted to insure their lasting protection?
  
  
• There should be a restrictions to the coral reefs of Kailua Bay to preserve the coral reefs.
  
  
• Each group may draw different conclusions because they have different concerns on the coral reefs problems.