Prerequisite skills:
Materials needed:
Time estimates
Target group
Prerequisite skills:
Weighing a tree
Measuring in inches,
If fraction of inches are used they need to be converted
to decimal form in the web page calculators and the Excel spreadsheet.
Pace off a distance and convert it to feet.
Read tables
Modeling a forest
Cutting and pasting data to an spreadsheet and graphing the results.
Averaging columns of data in a spreadsheet.
Using spreadsheet formulas to reference cells and find the difference between
them.
Materials needed:
String to measure circumference of a tree
Ruler or yard stick
Computer with internet access or downloaded and saved models and tables.
A local tree which you can identify and measure.
Time estimates
Weighing your tree
20 minutes to measure your tree and find its height and
diameter.
40 minutes to understand the algorithm for finding the green
weight of the tree. This can be skipped if you go directly to the Excel
spreadsheet and just use the model to calculate the weights.
40 minutes to collect data and relate your tree to school or
home production of CO2.
Exploring the forest model
30 minutes to learn how to explore the model and graph the
relationships via Excel.
The exploration of the model and the societal issues posed are open-ended. The preliminary investigation outlined in this lesson could be
done in an hour or two depending on student skills and how much you use answers
to spur on the exploration.
Target group
Elementary students could measure and weigh a tree using the
Excel spreadsheet.
Middle and High school students can do the entire lesson. Politicians
might need more help.
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