Bio-Diversity in Bio-Diversity in HomewoodHomewood

Citizenship Criteria

• Improving research skills

Role

• You are the Environmental Protection Officer for Homewood School

• In your pair come up with ideas to protect the school environment

Task• Mr. Adam wants a detailed report on the trees in

Homewood. You will go to the woods and carry out a survey of all the trees

• You will record the tree types and produce a short report with graphs on the types of trees we have

• You will comment on

how we use the

woods

Method• You will be given a laminated A3 sheet

with hints on identifying the common tree types

• You need a tape measure,

your tally charts, the

laminated sheet and

a pencil• Complete the following table as a tally

Tree types in Homewood

OtherSweet ChestnutPlaneOakLime

FirElmBirchBeechAlder

Tree size

• You also need to record data on the size of tree trunks and the length of leaves

Leaf data

• Measure the lengths of the tree leaves, making sure to include oak, beech or sweet chestnut leaves

Sweet Chestnut

BeechOak

Recap

• While doing the survey we will:• Make a tally chart of the different tree types• Measure the trunk sizes of each tree type• Measure the length of several leaves of each tree

type

• Collect one leaf from each tree type to bring back to the classroom

Survey time

• Now go with your teacher to carry out your survey

• If you cannot identify the tree in the field then bring a leaf back and we will try to identify it in the classroom

What did you find?

• Identification of trees is difficult, here is some help. Log on to the internet and try this link, you will need a leaf from the tree you want to identify

• http://www-saps.plantsci.cam.ac.uk/trees/

Findings

• In collecting our findings we will do the following tasks

1. Turn our tally chart into a bar graph

2. Note down and compare the tree trunk sizes

3. Approximate the area of each leaf type using squared paper

4. Approximate the perimeter of each leaf type using string

5. Calculate the average (mean and median) leaf lengths for each tree type

Maths Reminder

• “How do I calculate averages again?”

• As a reminder, let us imagine we had collected a list of leaf lengths as follows:

18.5cm, 19cm, 17.25cm, 12cm, 13.25cm

18.5cm, 19cm, 17.25cm, 12cm, 13.25cm

How to calculate the MedianFirst of all we must re-write the list in order:

12, 13.25, 17.25, 18.5, 19

Then we find the number which is placed in the middle of the list

12, 13.25, 17.25, 18.5, 19Median = 17.25cm

If there are two numbers in the middle then we should find the mean (average) of those two numbers

18.5cm, 19cm, 17.25cm, 12cm, 13.25cm

How to calculate the MeanFirstly, we need to add all of the numbers together

18.5 + 19 + 17.25 + 12 + 13.25 = 80

Then we should divide that total by however many numbers were in the list

80 ÷ 5 = 16

Mean = 16cm

Results• Collect all of your findings on the

worksheet• Write down your method (what you did).

You need to write it in a way so that somebody else can go and do exactly the same survey

• Make a neat table of your results

Graphs

• You need to make some graphs of your results, consider

• Bar graphs: these will show how many examples of each type of tree there are

• Pie Graph: this will show the proportions of trees there are

Conclusion

• This is an important part of the report. You must make a concluding comment about the woods and your survey for Mr. Adam

Final Questions

• Do we need to do more to look after the woods?

• Should we consider ways to get more students using the woods (would this be safe)?

• Should we add more woods?

• Should we cut them down for buildings or playing fields?