The purpose of this resource is to observe budburst on selected trees at a Land Cover or Phenology Site. All students will learn about hummingbird natural history and ecology. Students will learn how to identify and age male and female Ruby-throated Hummingbirds and to observe migration and feeding behavior. Students will learn how to make connections among hummingbird behavior and weather, climate, food availability, seasonality, photoperiod (day length), and other environmental factors.

Students are presented with a graph of atmospheric becomes CO² values from Mauna Loa Observatory, and are asked to explore the data by creating a trend line using the linear equation, and then use the equation to predict future becomes CO² levels. Students are asked to describe qualitatively what they have determined mathematically, and suggest reasons for the patterns they observe in the data. A clue to the reason for the data patterning can be deduced by students by following up this activity with the resource, Seasonal Vegetation Changes. The data graph and a student worksheet is included with this activity. This is an activity from Space Update, a collection of resources and activities provided to teach about Earth and space. Summary background information, data and images supporting the activity are available on the Earth Update data site.

In this 8th grade humanities lesson, students roast fall vegetables and explore how roasting enhances flavor through caramelization. Students eat the roasted vegetables with a Middle Eastern Chermoula sauce and lavash.

In this 8th grade humanities lesson, students prepare Quick Tomato Dinner while refining their tasting skills. Students use sensory vocabulary to make observations about the ingredients in the recipe before, during, and after cooking.

The purpose of this resource is to observe seasonal migration patterns, feeding habits, and nesting behavior of Ruby-throated Hummingbirds (Archilochus colubris) in North and Central America. All students will learn about hummingbird natural history and ecology. Students will learn how to identify and age male and female Ruby-throated Hummingbirds and to observe migration and feeding behavior. Students will learn how to make connections among hummingbird behavior and weather, climate, food availability, seasonality, photoperiod (day length), and other environmental factors.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Obtaining sufficient nutrients is a fundamental challenge for most animals. The availability and nutritional content of food can vary in response to changes in climate and geography, and nutritional demands can vary during life events such as growth and reproduction. Of the many ways that animals have evolved to cope with these demands, one has gained increasing attention. The gut microbiome helps to break down and ferment plant carbohydrates, making it a potentially important player in nutrient availability. A new study sought to evaluate the environmental drivers of gut microbial diversity by generating the largest wild nonhuman primate gut microbiome dataset. Using 758 samples from wild Ethiopian geladas, which live in an extreme environment with limited food quality, researchers tested how proxies of food availability (rainfall) and thermoregulatory stress (temperature) affected the gut microbiome..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Housemates, science shows, share more than just space. The types of microbes that colonize the gut tend to be similar among members of the same family or household. But where does the sharing begin: through contact, environment, or diet? And do more social factors like status play a role? To find out, researchers recently examined the microbiomes of seven neighboring groups of wild Verreaux’s sifakas in Madagascar. Sifakas in the same group tended to have more similar microbiomes, but differences between groups weren’t explained by differences in diet, home range, or habitat. Maternal lineage was an important driver of similarity within groups and may also explain why adult group members, which are generally less related, shared the least similar gut microbiota. In addition, dominant males had different microbiomes than their group-mates, possibly because of rank-related differences in physiology and scent-marking behaviors..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.