How does water travel through a plant? How do desert characteristics, such as extreme temperature fluctuations, high rates of evaporation and limited rain, affect transpiration? Students will discover the answers to these questions, using challenging experiments and field study. Students will learn how plant roots collect (absorb) water by a process called osmosis. Students will see how some desert plants are able to contain (store) water in stems and leaves. Students will explore the properties of leaves many plants have developed to conserve water by slowing the transpiration process.
- Use a Data Journal to record observations, experiments, predictions and outcomes
- Set up experiments to compare transpiration rates of desert and non-desert plants
- Use the scientific process to make discoveries about water efficiency in desert plants
- Complete a diagram illustrating the movement of water in plants
- Answer challenge questions concerning the impact of outside influences on plants
- Draw a Venn diagram showing similarities and differences between cross-sections
- Understand desert plant adaptations for collecting, containing, and conserving water
- Recognize similar adaptations among diverse desert plant species
- Use the scientific process to gain an understanding of how plants live in the desert
- Explain the process of osmosis and how water moves through a plant
- Appreciate the uniqueness of our desert plants and the desert habitat
- Data Journal
- Experiment with centrifuge tubes and Hydrogel crystals
- Desert plant specimen (creosote, mesquite, or palo verde)
- Non-desert plant specimen (fig tree or yerba mansa)
