Too many and too few! Population Talks

STUDENTS- this is the posting that you need to comment on to try to win a prize!

 

Population:  Fishing for Answers

Today, students learned all about populations. We began by discussing world population and how it has increased from 1 billion to 7 billion people in just over 200 years. Students correctly identified China (1.3 billion) and India (1.2 billion) as the most populous countries in the world.

Students learned about two major concepts in population ecology – carrying capacity and the Tragedy of the Commons.  Carrying capacity is the maximum number of individuals that an area can support without exhausting or depleting the available resources.

We also explored the Tragedy of the Commons in a game where students grouped together in villages that survived by fishing. Inevitably, villagers who caught the maximum number of fish allowed each year ended up not leaving enough fish in the pond to reproduce to provide food for the next year. Villagers starved and villages collapsed until some students realized that if they fished enough to survive, but not enough to deplete the fish resource, the game could continue indefinitely – or as we say in ecology – sustainably – for many generations.

Additional Information:

Watch this short video to find out more about Tragedy of the Commons. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZDjPnzoge0

 

Ecología de Poblaciones: La Pesca de Respuestas

Hoy los estudiantes aprendieron sobre la Ecología de Poblaciones. La clase comenzó con una discusión de cómo la población mundial ha aumentado de mil millones a siete mil millones en solo 200 años. Los estudiantes identificaron que China (mil trescientos millones) e India (mil doscientos millones) son los países del mundo con la mayor cantidad de población.

Los alumnos también aprendieron sobre dos conceptos importantes: la capacidad de carga y la Tragedia de los Comunes. La capacidad de carga es el número máximo de individuos que un área puede soportar sin agotar los recursos disponibles.  Aprendimos sobre la Tragedia de los Comunes a través de un juego donde los estudiantes formaron grupos que representaban aldeas que viven de la pesca. De manera inevitable, los aldeanos que pescaron el número máximo  permitido de peces cada año, no dejaron suficientes peces en la laguna para que éstos se pudieran reproducir y por tanto se quedaron sin peces para el año siguiente. Los aldeanos se murieron de hambre y las aldeas colapsaron; hasta que algunos estudiantes se dieron cuenta que si pescaban con el fin de sobrevivir, sin agotar los recursos pesqueros, el juego podía continuar indefinidamente. Este concepto en ecología se conoce como sustentabilidad.

Información adicional:

 

Revisa este corto para informarte sobre la Tragedia de los Comunes https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZDjPnzoge0

 

6 Comments:

  • avatar
    Michael Duffy / Reply

    I like SfS because it gives us the chance to learn extra on science. Science is my favorite subject. I especially liked yesterday’s because it gave us an idea of what was happening in MA. I have a friend who actually went to the deer hunt with his bow and arrow. One thing I learned is that neither over- or underpopulation is a good thing. Also, I learned from another week that the lines on brains show what kind of thinkers the animals are. I think that every school should have SfS.

    • avatar
      Dr. Pearl / Reply

      Michael, thanks for sharing that about the deer hunt. It was great timing for us that we could have a lesson on something so relevant to Milton this week!

  • avatar

    I love SFS because we can do all sorts of new activities. The population experiment was especially fun because me and my classmates were abel to learn how we need to take the amount of fish we needed not to take the maximum amount or else our pond had no more fish and we would all die. the second round we took two fish each and there was almost an over population. THANK YOU SFS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  • avatar
    Noel Vega / Reply

    SFS is so fun because we can learn a lot from them. The last experiment we did was the population experiment. What we did was that we got a plate of tiny fish and chopsticks and we had to get as many fish as we can with our chopsticks to live. I learned that having an over or underpopulation is not good.

    • avatar

      SFS is so fun because they teach kids stuff OUT OF THIS WORLD!!! I personally like the population experiment because it taught me that under and over populated animals are not good. It also taught me how to use chopsticks. One of my most favored moment was sitting next to a classmate and watching her grossed out face as Dr. Bless showed us sheep brains. SFS has taught me lots of cool science facts. Thank you science from Scientists.

  • avatar

    SFS is so fun because they taught kids stuff OUT OF THIS WORLD!!! I personally liked the population experiment because it taught me that under and over populated animals are not good. They also taught me how to use chopsticks. One of my favorite moments was sitting next to my classmate and watching her grossed out face as Dr. Bless showed us sheep brains. SFS has taught me lots of cool science facts. Thank you science from scientist.

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