Thursday, August 7

Tension was building this morning as the students began their last day of work on their projects before the presentation day tomorrow. When the Med group was asked if more time would be helpful they responded "...a little." As time grows near, the excitement is building. As they returned from lunch the students knew that time was drawing close. The food chain group thought they were prepared, and when I was showed the Java model, I had reason to believe they were right. Their model showed the food chain in Yellowstone Park, for instance how wolves ate deer, etc. At the end, a graph showed how different populations rose and fell with the food chain. Not all groups were sure they had enough time, though. Many of the groups asked said that they could use a little more time. There were many different types of projects ranging from the food chain, of course, to the evolution of a star to deep sea diving. The Stellar model explained the evolution of a star, which was very interesting. Although everyone was excited, some were a little nervous as well. One group, assembling a project on heart monitors, said they were very excited, but were somewhat nervous. They thought some more time could help them overcome that. The deep-sea diving group explained that their model showed how the pressure builds when you get deeper and about more technical characteristics of diving. The fifth group's project involved planetary capture, which is how the gravity of one planet might affect another. The final group explained how pesticides can be harmful to the environment. Overall, the TIPsters can't wait until the final projects tomorrow!