Blue Mud Shrimp Mystery

Jennifer SekiLesson Evaluation

E.A.R.T.H. Workshop 2014Monterey, CA

Blue Water Shrimp Mystery

Science Research Elective ClassEight 10th grade studentsMarine Science last yearWorking on symposium papers

and science fair projects most of the year

Strengths

Lesson format (mystery) and topic (shrimp) were very engaging to all of my students

Together we were able to hit all of the content objectives in our discussion without any additional resources

Mini project was fun for the students

Letter from a fisherman

Letter from a fisherman

Weaknesses

More background information for teachers, especially on food webs and ecosystems would be helpful

More specific guidelines for for the mini-project would also be great

Modifications

Added a step in the procedure that asked the students to draw the marine food web that is discussed in the lesson to help them think about the relationships between the organisms and the impacts of invasive species on the web

Students loved the “mystery”

Great “hook” to get students engaged

Easily adaptable to other topics

Mini Project: Wanted Poster

Students worked in pairs and chose an invasive species to look up information onWanted poster included:Scientific & common names“Crimes” committedPort of entry + last known

whereabouts

Students’ choices

Asian mongoose Herpestes javanicusBird slaughter, steals eggsOriginally brought in to kill

rats but ran amuck

Students’ choices

Green crab Carcinus maenasFrom Europe Maine,

MassachusettsEats soft shell crab and other

crustaceansFound on the west coast in late

1900s, possibly stowed away on ships with algae

Extensions

“Research” courseStudents were asked to describe

an experiment they could do to actually study the blue mud shrimp problem

Other Resources

education.nationalgeographic.com/education/encyclopedia/food-web/?ar_a=1

topics.nytimes.com/top/news/science/topics/invasive_species/index.html