I think that the packaging project was really cool, it showed a lot about all the trash and packaging in our food and it was fun and effective. It's quite amazing to think about all the packaging we use, and when we think of it we don't think of that many. Do we ever think of the tiny pieces of different metals and plastic inside a cell phone, or do we think of it as a whole? Packaging is a larger problem and it is still growing. It makes up the main compartments of all landfills. The problem is that recyclable materials are being thrown away, and we are gaining unnecessary waste. We could save thousands of landfill space a year if we only recycled all the waste out there. I thought this project was very interesting and it really showed us that this is a large problem and only looking at all the packaging that we used for our presentations I could tell that this is a large and important problem. During most of the presentations my classmates mentioned that the materials in their product could be recycled, just not in Serbia. Therefore, the fact that something is recyclable is invalid. My favorite presentation from another student was Dorotejas. She did her's on the iPhone. Basically it has a wood/cardboard box to keep it safe, with all tiny compartments and places for the iPhone to be. They really have to improve their packaging. My project, with the Gran Pavesi Olive Crackers, was all right. They didn't have as much packaging as the other materials, but they sure did waste a lot of 5PP plastic by giving each separate 5 crackers their own wrapper. They use cardboard, and 5PP plastic both for the separate wrappers and for the outer layer. That's a lot of packaging and an outer layer of 5PP wasted. However, when I did some research about the company, Gran Pavesi, it turned out that they made a line of products including the Barilla pasta, and that they don't have a website especially about the crackers. They didn't even give an email to contact them, or at least not that I found. Well, at least not in English. The same, I found it shocking that all this packaging goes into making 40 crackers.
Reflect on what has helped you in understanding the "big idea" of the unit.
(Big Idea: Students will understand the use and management of natural resources, the transformation of resources into human capital, goods, tools and machines as well as sustainable development of human society to maintain the delicate balance between man and the natural environment.)
Many things have helped me understand the big idea of this unit. When we studied organisms, population, communities and ecosystems I learned how all species have to live together and interact with each other to survive. When we studied ways organisms adapt to their environments I learned that there is a lot more than one way to survive, and that each animal is unique in its own way. Some main animal survival techniques include camouflage, swelling up to double size, bright colors, fake patterns, hiding, fake smells, and a lot more. My favorite animal was the fish with the fake eye. This fish has a small black eye at the front of his head and another larger pattern of circular twirls near his tail. When predators try to hunt the fish they try attacking the front, with the eye. However, the fake eye confuses them and they end up going for the wrong side. In this way, the fish can escape with only part of its tail missing. Another project that we did was when we presented a biome to the class. Blaise and I did the arctic biome, and we learned a lot about how animals interact with each other. It also showed us how the other animals would suffer if one species went extinct. That lead to my report about extinction, when my main focus was on making people understand why extinction is a big issue and how it affects the rest of the world. After that, we turned to learning about mass production, consumers, and the human foot print. We watched several videos and did some reflections. Some parts were extremely gruesome, but it really showed what we’re doing to the poor animals that get served on our thanksgiving tables. All of these things combined made me understand the big idea of the unit, sustainability, and how the human footprint is ruining our planet.
Reflect on the unit question (What is a necessity and how does an organism ensure survival of its species within its environment?) and how it relates to the unit title: Ultimate Survival.
A necessity is something that a species must have to survive. A species needs to be able to reproduce, needs to be able to excrete waste, needs a source of energy such as water, food, or sunlight. An organism is able to survive within its environment only if it has all of the following. Some organisms are very smart and save the species they need to survive on, so that they have more in the future. We had a case like this in our aquarium. We had this fish that ate live worms, and it would always keep some worms still alive so that they could keep on reproducing, and so that he could have more food. In this way the worm species didn’t become extinct, and the fish always had food. I think that this is a pretty god way of showing a way that organisms ensure the survival of their species. The way it relates to the unit title “Ultimate Survival” is that because of the fishes smartness both species survived, and both benefitted.
How did the unit question allow us to view survival through The Area of Interaction: Environments:(FOR EXAMPLE: The effects of one environment on another, the roles our environments play in the lives and well-being of humankind, and the effects of our actions, attitudes and constructs, such as sustainable development and conservation.)
Humans on Earth have started using more than our share of the planet allows, and we have started to deplete our resources. When we took the quiz online to see how many planets we would need if everyone lived like us I got 2.3, and the quiz is telling me that this is quite low. However, if all people on the planet lived like me we would need 2.3 planets, so the one earth we have wouldn’t be able to sustain us. Humans haven’t realized what we have done to ourselves. We have made a mess of resources, have polluted our home, have indirectly killed the species who share it with us and are now killing them directly by the thousands to be able to have a happy meal. We have destroyed our home and we have only started to realize. The humans on the planet will have to start taking action, or else we will turn earth into a garbage dump just like the packaging on the cereal boxes we throw away now.
What would you have liked to do more of? Less of?
I think that this project was great and that we covered everything we had to cover. We went over everything in detail and understood the main points. If was also really fun, and still we did tons of written parts, labs, reports, and super- academic stuff. Something I didn’t find too great was the lab we did with the plants in a closed ecosystem and they first died, then died again and at last survived in an open ecosystem. That lab was a little confusing, and it ruined the whole point of a closed ecosystem when all they did was dying. I would probably fix that up if I were to re- do this unit. Another thing I would have would be to share our favorite current event about animals, survival, ext to the class as n ending to show what we’ve been researching on. Then the people who have read and commented on your current event could help the class discuss. I think this would be fun to do and more effective than only having people comment on the current events on blogs.
In your point of view, how well did we investigate the unit question, concept, and area of interaction? Include this in your reflection as well and give specific examples to support your opinions.
I think that we really covered the unit question in depth and more. I liked how we first started learning about animals, and how they survive and then went to how humans affect the planet. The turning point was when we were meant to write a report about a problem animals are facing and then turn it into a presentation and present it to the class. With all the different topics and different information and ways humans impact the environment we really went deep and found about more about the unit question. The videos we watched were a great final touch to the whole unit.
