In addition...

Just to add to what Joanne said about the fieldtrip, we learnt about buttress roots and parasitic plants too. Moreover, we learnt about rosette structures. The buttress roots are huge and they ensure a firmer grip to the loose forest soil. Parasitic plants are like ferns and moss. They are dependent on other plants for their survival and the other plant dies when it survives after it gets all the nutrients from it. A rosette structure is arranged in circle, with all the leaves at a single height. Their main purpose is to protect the plant from getting destroyed as they are difficult to pluck from the ground. However, what people do not know is that they are also structured in this way to be able to capture the falling leaves to provide them with nutrients when they decompose. There are also drip-tips on leaves. These plants are usually found in tropical countries as there is more rainfall. They allow the water to "slide" down their surface so they can receive the maximum amount of sunlight. Plants also have waxy leaves to reduce their water loss. The temperature is quite high in tropical countries.

Temperature and The Wind Rose

Temperature: the degree of hotness and coldness in the air

How do we read a thermometer? Simple. According to

http://www.reachoutmichigan.org/funexperiments/agesubject/lessons/caps/thermometer.html it says that your eyes should be level with the top of the liquid in the tube to read it accurately. The reading is not the same when you look down or up onto the degree lines on the tube.

The formulas that help you find the mean temperatures of daily, monthly and annually can be found in our geography textbook. One question: How do they come up with these calculations? Is it because of some pattern the inventor of these formulas saw?

Wind rose was tested in the common test, but some of us weren't familiar with it and thus we wrote down wild guesses. I thought it was meant to tell people how strong the wind is due to the numbers on it. Little did I know or expect it was, according to a friend, the dates. Question: Who invented this and why? Was it because of some incident or because of curiosity? How is it different from the wind vane?

Can you answer them? :)

Maps, maps more maps!

Maps are used to locate a certain place in a particular location. Apart from that, maps are also used for creating a plan to organise a particular city. It creates structure. They are used by a few categories of people. They include: scientists, tourists, sailors, pilots and urban city planners. There are different types of maps which usually fall into two main categories: digital and physical maps. Can you think of an example of a digital map? One of the popular ones will be Google Earth. It is electronic which gives a three dimensional view of the whole Earth and enables us to zoom and focus into a certain state or city or even road. This will be what is called a satellite view. Next up, comes the physical maps. They include: Tourist maps, Information maps and lastly, Topographical maps. They give a bird's eye view of the certain place and is unable to zoom in or identify another location. In total, there are three types of perspectives: Satellite view, Aerial view and Landscape view(from your eye level).Miss J emphasised on topographical maps during our lessons. She went through the elements of this types of maps. A topographical map has grid patterns and grid references, which are numbers at the sides of the map. There is also a colour bar at the top of the map to check if a person is colour blind as the legends that are located at the bottom of the map require a person to identify certain colours to locate his or hers destination. There is a degree at the top of the map to identify the place showed by the map. There are lines on the map called Northings and Eastings. What do you think are they? They Northings are the lines that run vertically down on the map while the Eastings are the horizontal lines that run on the map. We also need scales to measure the actual distance in the real world using the scale on the map. Example, 1 cm in the map could mean 50000 cm in the real world.

Field Trip to Bukit Timah Nature Reserve

On 28 July 2011, we, the Secondary 1 ACE Geography girls together with Ms J and Ms Lie, went on one of the most exciting event of the year: a field trip to Bukit Timah Nature Reserve! It certainly was a totally new experience for most (if not, all) of the Secondary 1 girls. It was both interesting and fun, the best combination for the perfect lesson! Through this field trip we learnt so much easier, with the use of 4 of our senses: seeing, hearing, touching and smelling.

We had to climb a steep slope in order to get to see the plants. We were encouraged to see all of the nature through a geographer's eye. Seeing it through that perspective helped us to learn and understand what we saw more easily. We saw, with our 'geographer's eyes', many different plants that look so much more appealing than those in our textbook. It helped us to come up with new questions that we have never thought of before. We saw lianas and buttress roots. They looked like as if they came out of the textbook, only in 3D!

Scaling was another thing we learnt too. For example, we compared the size of a broad leaf to a 50 cents coin. For things that are thick and big, we use the human body to compare it. For example, the big and thick tree was compared to Nicole and the thick lianas were compared to Matthea and Mildred. For the incredibly thin stems we used a pen.

Going there with a heart to learn is much more important than just going there to get good grades for that project (or for Geography, although that is also important). We share wonderful memories of not just learning more about the environment but also of a time forging not just new but good friends that we can go to for help and support. We will cherish that memory, that’s for sure!

Natural Vegetation 2: Temperate

This blogpost is on the lesson conducted on 27 July.

This is Ms Lie's last lesson with us, and she taught us on the Natural Vegetation Types: Temperate Deciduous Forests and Temperate Coniferous forests. Let's do a recap:

Difference between temperate and tropical:

1. Temperature

• Temperate: Not so hot all year round, experiences the 4 seasons
• Tropical: High temperature all year round

2. Rainfall

• There is more rainfall in the tropical climate than the temperate climate.

Okay. Here we come to the temperate deciduous forest. They can be found in countries that experience all 4 seasons (duh, it's in the temperate climate!). Its characteristics are linked to the weather and climate, just like its name. Deciduous mean to fall off. I'm sure it is referring to its leaves. Its leaves fall off during autumn. Here are some photos of the trees during different seasons:

Autumn

Summer

Winter

Spring

Beautiful, aren't they? Okay, as I was saying,the deciduous trees drop their leaves to prevent transpiration ( to minimize water loss. During winter there isn't much water.) Thus, the trees are NOT evergreen, which means that their leaves fall off.

Next up, we have the coniferous forests. These forests are full of what we call 'Christmas Trees'. If you realize, whenever you put up your Christmas trees, they are full of needle-like leaves. This is to minimize water loss due to transpiration. They have supple (flexible) branches, too, so that any snow that is collected can just slide off without the branches snapping. This is also the reason why the trees are cone shaped. The trees are evergreen too. Some of the beautiful trees:

See you soon, Ms Lie!

Natural Vegetation: Temperate forests

This blogpost is based on the lesson we had on the 27 July 2011.

Miss J went through the temperate forests with us as we have covered the tropical rainforest. There are basically two types of temperate forests: the coniferous forest and the deciduous forest. Now, lets see the differences between the tropical rainforests and the temperate deciduous forests. It is not so hot all-year round in temperate forests. They experiences the four seasons, has lesser rainfall and are located in the Northern hemisphere. They are widely found in Japan, China, Europe, North America and New Zealand. They are on the higher latitudes of 60 to 70 degrees North and South of the equator. Some examples of their leaves will be: the oak leaves, sycamore leaves and the maple leaves. However, the tropical rainforests have more rainfall, does not experience four seasons and are located in countries nearer to the equator, like Singapore. They are 23.5 degrees North and South of the equator.

Deciduous leaves fall on in the seasons of winter and autumn. Do you know why? It is due to their adaptation to the climate where they shed their leaves to prevent water loss due to transpiration. They also have very large, broad leaves(large surface area) to get more sunlight in summer and spring. Moreover, we also learnt a new term called "evergreen". It denotes a plant that retains its green leaves throughout the year. Then, Miss J asked us for the meaning of density. It is about the amount of trees that are growing and how close they are from each other(packed). And when we talk about "diversity", the first thing that will most likely come to your mind will be types or variety. Next, we came to the difference between coniferous forests and tropical rainforests. They reach higher altitudes of 70 to 80 degrees North and South of the equator. It usually contains cone-shaped trees so that the snow will slide easily so it does not cover the trees. They also have needle-like leaves(small surface area)

and supple branches for flexibility so the pressure of the snow will not cause it to break or collapse. Furthemore, they are evergreen. They are only three or four varieties in an area.

Natural Vegetation

This blogpost is on the geography lesson on 21 July.

This lesson on Natural Vegetation was taught by Ms Lim. This was the first time teaching us. However, she was very clear in her teaching and we understood her every word.



The examples of natural vegetation in the world would be:

• The Amazon rainforest

The Amazon Rainforest is located in South America and (according to Wikipedia) encompasses seven million square kilometers (Singapore is 693 sq km!). This rainforest,which is located in South America, is also known as 'The Lungs Of Our Planet'. Why? It is quite obvious. Because the Amazon rainforest has a lot of trees, which create lots of oxygen for our planet. However, in one website, I found that they also consider the rainforests the 'heart' of our planet too. The website, http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/04/rainforests-lungs-and-heart-of-the-planet.php, contains why it is considered the heart. I've never thought of it before. Check it out!

• Chek Jawa

A mangrove in Singapore! This mangrove is not alone. There is also the more well-known 'Sungi Buloh Wetland Reserve'. According to http://www.sbwr.org.sg/,Sungi Buloh Wetland Reserve is located at 301 Neo Tiew CrescentSingapore 718925. I have been there before, but when I went there it started to pour so my class and I couldn't go for a tour there. However when my sister went there it was cool and windy, thus she and her class had a tour there. She said that it was incredible with so many animals to see. What a pity I could not see them for myself!

• Muir Woods

According to http://www.muirwoodsnationalpark.com/, Muir Woods is a scenic national park in USA. It was declared a national monument in 1908. It is home to many birds and other forms of wildlife. It is dense and dark, thus it is hard to spot animals, most of whcih are nocturnal. The pictures shown in the website shows of a serene park with so many kinds of plants that I have never seen before.

We come to the different types of natural vegetation. Let's see some of them...

• Tropical Rainforest

Tropical Rainforests are dense and have many varities of plants, for example, the Buttress Roots. Buttress Roots are very thick and big roots. Why? According to http://www.answers.com/topic/buttress-root, they are found in 'nutrient-poor rainforest soil and do not penetrate to deeper layers. They prevent the tree from falling over (hence the name buttress, which means any prop or support ) while also gathering more nutrients.' 'They can grow up to 15 feet tall and spread for 30 metres above the soil then for another 30 metres below. When the roots spread horizontally, they are able to cover a wider area for collecting nutrients. They stay near the upper soil layer because all the main nutrients are found there.'

• The desert

Guess what climate does this one fall under? Yup, Wikipedia teels us that it falls under the desert climate, also known as the arid climate. This is a climate that does not meet the criteria to be classified as a polar climate, and in which precipitation is too low to sustain any vegetation at all, or at most a very scanty scrub.

Yep, that sums up most of the interesting lesson. God bless and see you soon!