Tomatosphere

Post date: Jan 5, 2016 3:18:06 PM

I LOVE the Tomatosphere project! A number of years ago I went to a session at GETCA all about what's happening in Canadian Space and this particular activity drew my attention. The Canadian Space Agency, Let's Talk Science and a number of other agencies have come together to bring Tomatosphere to the classroom. Classes receive two packets of seeds labeled with letters - one is a control and one is a test packet but we don't know which is which until results are submitted. The first couple of years I planted in May and the students could take home their seedlings but when I started at my current school I ran out of time in the spring, forcing me to plant seeds in the fall. Let me tell you, I will ALWAYS plant in the fall from now on! The plants grow all year, we transplant them into larger pots, pollinate them once flowers bloom and harvest the tomatoes to use in my Foods classes! So many teachable moments come from this experience.

This year we got a later start because we were waiting for supplies to arrive for planting. There were some interesting results - usually the test and control seeds are pretty close together but, as you can see, this was not the case this year! I use this activity to review scientific method with my grade 9 students, as well as to give them an idea of "real" science which doesn't necessarily involve a linear experiment that begins and ends in one hour or even one day. We keep track of germination numbers until we see no change for an entire week, then we call it complete and the students get to transplant the seedlings and they have to write a complete scientific report about the experiment. Can't wait to see flowers bloom!