Please follow this page for updates regarding the MMS 8th grade Going Green with a Food Computer Project. Students and teachers involved in the project will also be posting on the MIT OpenAg Education Forum. Please feel free to check out our posts there as well!
Food Inquiry Project Kickoff! - March 17, 2017
8th graders at the Malone Middle School kicked off the 2017 food project in collaboration with MIT OpenAg Education BETA with a Google Hangout introduction from the Assistant Director of MIT OpenAg, Hildreth England and OpenAg Special Projects Manager, Paula Cerqueira. Students then took part in a team activity that focused on the decisions that societies make in the allocation of natural resources.
Food Computer - Build Day #1 - March 22, 2017
One class period of students were grouped in three groups today during Social Studies class to begin building and documenting our Going Green with a Food Computer project. Students started to build the frame, and a portion of the water manifold. Another group of students started to work on the documentation and communication of this project. Here are a few pictures from our first build-day! - Mrs. Hesseltine
Food Computer - Build Day #2 - March 30, 2017
On Thursday, March 30th, students were grouped based on their area of interest in the following project groups. Students worked to build the food computer, plan for special presenters, and work on the communication aspects of the project. Please see THIS LINK for pictures of our second day of building! To see a student-published blog post of our progress so far, please go to this link at the OpenAg Online Forum.
Student Groups: 1. Frame - build group 2. Power Module - build group 3. Light Panel - build group 4. Water Manifold - build group 5. The BRAIN - build group 6. Communication group 7. Special presentation group
Food Computer - Build Day #3 - April 6, 2017
Please see below for some pictures of today's build! The focus was on building the "brain" of the machine!
Welcoming Guests from MIT Open Agriculture (OpenAg) April 24th, 2017
After building each module for the food computer, we then welcomed two engineers from MIT OpenAg at the Malone Middle School. The engineers checked over our work and helped to assemble all of the parts that students built! They also took some time to talk to students in each of Mr. Botto's science classes - students asked questions about MIT OpenAg, the Food Computer, engineering, and more.
Time for Planting! May 2nd - May 17th
Image from First the Seed Foundation
During the week of May 2nd, students learned about the importance of Victory Gardens during World War I and World War II in Mrs. Hesseltine's Social Studies classes. Team 8-1 students spent time throughout the week planting lettuce and tomatoes in soil, as well as in horticubes (to be transplanted into hydroponic systems). Each student planted cherry tomato seeds in soil. Students also planted lettuce seeds in soil and lettuce seeds in horticubes.
In addition to planting regular lettuce and cherry tomato seeds, students also planted seeds provided by Tomatosphere & First the Seed Foundation - the seeds provided by these organizations traveled to the International Space Station. Team 8-1 students were sent two packages of tomato seeds. One package contained seeds that traveled to space and the other package contained control seeds, which were kept on Earth. Students will investigate the germination rate of each package of seeds while taking part in a "blind test." Neither the students, nor the teachers know which package of seeds went to space, and which stayed on Earth. We need to use our knowledge of space and seed germination to make a hypothesis! After we communicate our results to the folks at Tomatosphere they will let us know which package traveled to the ISS, and which did not.
On May 17th our lettuce seedlings were ready to be transplanted into the MIT OpenAg Food Computer! We set the climate recipe for lettuce and put the seedlings into the machine. As the plants grow, we will be able to witness the "ingredients" for lettuce - as we watch and adjust the levels of carbon dioxide, pH, nutrients, water, humidity, air temperature, and water temperature inside of the machine.