Teaching the nitrogen cycle and human health interactions
Summary
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Context
Audience
Skills and concepts that students must have mastered
1. Know about cycles - water cycle or rock cycle so the concept is not entirely new.
2. Have some knowledge of what nitrogen is (an essential element for life and where it comes from).
3. Have ability to match ideas with visual pictures.
4. Have conceptual idea of how a cycle is conveyed on paper.
5. Have been exposed to poetry. The type of poetry is not as important as the idea of rhyming and description of a concept in a minimum number of words.
How the activity is situated in the course
Goals
Content/concepts goals for this activity
1. Understanding the nitrogen cycle and the components that fit into that cycle.
2. Understanding the impacts of excess nitrogen on the environment.
3. Learning the useful role of nitrogen in terms of human needs and environmental survival.
4. Learning sources of nitrogen from both natural and human resources.
Higher order thinking skills goals for this activity
1. Synthesis of ideas to form the nitrogen cycle from the matching components.
2. Use of language through poetry to define a scientific concept
3. Learn the components of the nitrogen cycle and the resulting interrelationships.
Other skills goals for this activity
1. Writing poetry to reinforce concepts learned in the exercise.
2. Using the web to search for information on the nitrogen cycle.
Description of the activity/assignment
Before engaging in lessons, students attempt to draw a diagram of a nitrogen cycle and add as many components as they can. This allows them to self-assess (and the teacher to assess) what they know about the nitrogen cycle.
Students research some of the nitrogen cycle components online at various websites or read printouts from websites provided by the teacher. They choose three or four facts of interest about their component and report to the rest of the class.
Each small group of students is given a set of materials including 20 objects, 20 picture-cards, 20 nitrogen cycle component explanation cards, 20 title cards for each nitrogen cycle component, heading cards for different environments such as the atmosphere, soil, water, etc., and many small arrows. The students work together to pair each object with its corresponding title card, description card, and picture card. Then these are all arranged to form a possible nitrogen cycle with various components clustered around heading cards and arrows used to show movement of nitrogen from one object to another.
Students then write humorous (limerick, couplet) poems or more serious poems (haiku) or structured poems (cinquain, diamante) to tell several facts about a component of the nitrogen cycle. They share their poems with the class.
Students may also engage in experiments with nitrogen fertilizer.
Determining whether students have met the goals
Teaching materials and tips
- Activity Description/Assignment (Acrobat (PDF) 17kB Jan30 08)
- Instructors Notes (Acrobat (PDF) 181kB Jan30 08)
- Solution Set (Acrobat (PDF) 1.1MB Jan30 08)
Other Materials
- Card in format for cutting out after laminating (Acrobat (PDF) 623kB Jan30 08)
- Pretest posttest for use with exercise (Acrobat (PDF) 65kB Jan30 08)
Supporting references/URLs
Harman, P.E. and Rule, A.C., 2006, High-school students' mnemonic devices for Mohs hardness scale: Journal of Geoscience Education, v. 54, no. 1, p. 69-73 http://www.nagt.org/files/nagt/jge/abstracts/rule-v54n1.v2.pdf
Rule, A. C., 2003, The Rhyming Peg Mnemonic Device Applied to Learning the Mohs Scale of Hardness: Journal of Geoscience Education, v. 51, no. 5, p. 465-473. http://www.nagt.org/files/nagt/jge/abstracts/Rule_v51n5.pdf
Rule, A.C., Carnicelli, L.A., and Kane, S.S, Using poetry to teach about minerals in earth-science class: Journal of Geoscience Education, v. 52, no. 1, p. 10-14. http://www.nagt.org/files/nagt/jge/abstracts/Rule_v52n1p10.pdf