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Welcome to the March 2014 newsletter from Science and Plants for Schools.
As always, it’s packed with science animations, amazing facts, new teaching resources, and free CPD opportunities - plus new grass varieties that stop sheep farting. There's something to tell your students about next time you're talking about the plant cell wall!
Plus, coming next term - 'how to' videos for our most popular practicals, and a student competition with prizes of £200 / £100 for your students and your department.
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New animation for GCSE and post-16 - Photosynthesis and respiration
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Tackle misconceptions around photosynthesis and respiration
Here's the second in our series of animations covering key topics in plant biology - this one focusing on photosynthesis and respiration.
We've worked with experienced teacher Richard Needham and with the Department of Plant Sciences at Cambridge University to make sure that these animations are as accurate as possible, and that they contain all the material needed for teaching the topics at GCSE and equivalent, and at post-16. In particular, we've worked to tackle the common misconception that respiration in plants does not take place at the same time as photosynthesis.
Please try them out with your classes and email in your feedback.
View the animation (Flash version, not suitable for iPads and iPhones)
View the video version on YouTube (suitable for iPads and iPhones)
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Amazing fact - Trees get thinner during the day... and fatter at night
Challenge your students to work out why!
So why does this happen? Water is drawn from the roots of a plant up to the leaves in the xylem in a continuous column. The water column is under tension as water vapour is lost from the leaves. This tension draws more water up from the roots of the plants, a bit like sucking on a straw. The reason why water can be placed under this tension is because it is a polar
molecule, so the opposite partial-charges are attracted to each other (called 'cohesion').
Water molecules don't just stick to each other, they also stick to the sides of the xylem vessel itself - this is called 'adhesion'. On sunny days, the rate of transpiration is high and the water column in the xylem is under such high tension that adhesion forces pull the sides of the xylem vessels inwards, making them narrower. Since wood has some degree of elasticity, the entire tree becomes thinner during the day by several hundredths of a mm. At night, when transpiration stops the xylem tension is reduced and the tree expands again. (Thanks to Dr Beccy Wilebore of Cambridge University for contributing this piece.)
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Post-16 / GCSE resource - How healthy are your trees?
Get your students thinking about plants as living organisms that have to survive, breed and defend themselves against disease.
This new resource fits with the current A-level ecology units, raising awareness of plants and using plant diseases as a tool to practise statistical tests. It will also be an engaging practical for the new GCSE topics on plant disease.
Get the resource
This resource was developed by Julie Bourne of King Edward VII School, Sheffield, after attending the 2013 SAPS Gatsby Science Summer School.
To find out more and join the Summer School yourself, see below
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In the news - New grass varieties that stop sheep farting
Believe it or not, high methane emissions from sheep and cows are a serious issue. Not because they’re smelly, but because livestock account for approximately 37% of all emissions of methane (CH4), which has 20-25 times the global warming potential of CO2.
So Welsh plant breeders were delighted when they realised that their new grass varieties – specially selected over 20 years to produce more of the carbohydrates that sheep and cattle can digest – not only increased the amount of milk that cows could produce, and how fast lambs grow, but actually cut down the amount of methane they emitted by one fifth.
About 425,000 acres of these seeds are now growing across the UK – that’s more than 240,000 football pitches of fart-reducing grass!
Find out more
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In the news - Bionic superpowered photosynthesis
Photosynthesis makes life as we know it possible. But why not give it a boost? In fact, why not create a new generation of hybrid biomaterials for harnessing solar energy?
A team of biochemists from MIT did just that, embedding single-walled carbon nanotubes — microscopic tubes thinner than a human hair that can also absorb sunlight and convert it to electron flow — in living chloroplasts. After six hours chloroplasts with carbon nanotubes in them had photosynthesis rates three times higher than untreated chloroplasts.
The researchers don't yet know exactly how this is working, or whether this will
indeed produce increased levels of the products of photosynthesis. They now plan to investigate whether similar techniques could create biochemical detectors for monitoring environmental conditions.
Find out more
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Free CPD - Inspiring contemporary CPD opportunity Once again, the Science Summer School will be offering inspiring CPD for post-16 biology teachers, over 3 days in early July.
This is your chance to hear some of the UK's leading scientists talk about their work, take part in inspiring practicals and exchange ideas with colleagues, all funded by a generous ENTHUSE bursary for eligible schools. You'll come away invigorated and inspired, and having developed a new teaching resource to share via the SAPS website.
Find out more and join us
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“Tea’s on us” winner – Plant Transport Circus
Find out what other departments' top plant biology lessons are
The February winners of our ‘Tea’s on us’ competition are the Biology department at Bournemouth School for Girls. Their students favourite plant practical is a circus of experiments all relating to water uptake in plants. The department find it’s a really stimulating way to investigate the topic within the course of a lesson, plus the students love the range of skills they draw up..
If you’d like to win a tea break kit for your department, just let us know your students’ favourite plant-related lesson
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Science on Stage
Share your innovative teaching ideas
Since 2000, teachers from 27 European countries and Canada have met every other year to participate in the international Science on Stage festival, showcasing innovative and inspirational teaching methods at a three-day fair. SAPS Associate Richard Spencer presented his resource 'Plants 'r' mint' in 2013, and heartily recommends the experience! The next festival will take place in June 2015 at Queen Mary University of London and the Society of Biology is are looking for innovative teaching ideas in science and mathematics that can be shared with colleagues.
Find out more
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Update to SAPS data protection policy
In order to make sure that we’re meeting your needs as teachers and technicians, and to help decide what to focus on next year, the SAPS team carry out regular evaluations of our work. This summer, we’re asking an external company to do an independent evaluation of the SAPS project, and so they may need to get in touch with members of the SAPS Associates scheme.
We’ve therefore updated our data protection policy to say that we may allow external companies to use the data we hold about you in order to evaluate our performance.
We will follow data protection guidelines in this, allowing them to see the minimum amount of data necessary to achieve the objective, that they use it only for the purposes of the evaluation, and ensuring that they delete all data from their systems after the evaluation is complete.
If you have any concerns about your data being used in this way, please email us at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
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Best wishes,
The Administratort, Dan Jenkins and Ginny Page
The Science and Plants for Schools team
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