Ecology outing

Hey team! 👋 Ready to become real-life ecologists? Today we’ll explore Saint-Cloud Park and see how a new road might affect its biodiversity!

• Here is the overall schedule:

  • 9:00 – 12:30: ID card completion & field data hunt

  • 12:30 – 13:30: Picnic 🧺

  • 13:30 – 16:00: Video creation 🎬

• Goal: Gather data, make a snazzy graph, & film a video answering our big question!

M. Scansetti

​🌿 Today’s Adventure!

Open Ended

How do you feel this morning? Let me know if you're in a good mood to do some ecology work! 😎

🍃 Why We’re Here

The Saint-Cloud municipality is planning on restructuring the park!

They called you for an ecology consulting! Read and understand the field trip study case and answer to the following questions!

Multiple Choice

What exactly is the municipality planning to do in Saint-Cloud Park?

• Plant extra trees along existing trails.

• Create larger ponds to improve animal habitats.

• Add walking paths and more benches without changing planting areas.

• Build a new road that will slice the park into two separate zones.

Multiple Choice

Why might this road project affect biodiversity?

• It increases the number of edge habitats changing the characteristics of the current habitat

• It connects two ecosystems, potentially allowing all species to mix freely.

• It adds more space, so species richness can increase

• It brings more visitors, who will plant new species by transferring seeds by walking around.

🤝Who Does What?

To succed in this challenge, you will have to engage actively in your group and collaborate with your team leader. Here are the roles:

• Field Researchers: Make the ground labor: Create the ID pics, lay quadrats, count plants, take measurements and make the final video.

• Leaders: Guide though the process, come ask me for questions, check data, make mini-lessons and supervise and co-star in the video.

🤝Who Does What?

• Groups of field researchers: we can make 4 teams (so 3 groups of 4 students and 1 group of 5 students).

• Leaders per Teams: Since you're 7, it's either 2 per group and one of you leads alone, or you can make 1 group of 3 that supervises 2 groups of field researchers at the same time so every group has its guiding light.

Once the groups are decided, you can create the first post on the padlet with your names! QR Code is on the booklet!

Poll

Did you, as a group, upload a post on the padlet with names? The groups are named 17-18-19-20 because of all the groups present this morning (but ours are the bests!).

Pick the one available! It will indicate on which transect you will work and which quadrats you will have to make!

• Yes

• No

🔎Transects and quadrats

The main activity that you will have to do is collecting data along a transects and by gathering data in your quadrat.

Check the booklet and ask your team leader for help to answer to the following question! You don't have the same booklet... Leaders know more and you can find an icon whenever it's the case!

I made this for you to clearly understand what you will be doing! Check what transect and which quadrat you will work on, on the padlet!

Which transect and which quadrat?

To make a quadrat, you will have 2 options, depending on the material given in your working bag: either a rope with stakes, or a decameter.
If you get the decameter, you will need 4m of it to make a 4x4 square!

Which transect and which quadrat?

In the bags, you will have also what you need to get the abiotic measurements, but this is shared among the whole transect groups. So use them and put them back.

Let's all share and respect the material! ;)

Which transect and which quadrat?

Multiple Choice

A transect is:…

• A technique to recognise plants in a given area

• A squared area of 1 m² you place on the ground to count plants

• A straight, measured line used to sample in an organised way a given parameter

• A path you wander to find plants to count

Multiple Choice

Why do we use a transect in this outing?

• To create our video storyboard on site

• To avoid having to record physico-chemical data

• To compare changes in species and conditions along a straight gradient

• To quickly find the single most abundant species

Multiple Choice

A quadrat is:…

• A technique used to know the changes of a given parameter along a given fixed path

• A way ecologists use to count species in an entire ecosystem

• A 20 m rope you use to measure distance and set a fixed path to get measurable results

• A square frame (1 m²) you place at fixed points on the transect.

Multiple Choice

How should you deploy and use your quadrats?

• In a circle around the picnic area to compare foot-traffic effects.

• Only where you see lots of flowers.

• You place them at a given point along the transect and record all species and measurements inside.

• Randomly anywhere in the park to get varied samples.

🎥 Video & Submission

Once you have all the data, you have to answer to the scientific problem using the common graph and including one point from each S7 mini-lesson.

Then post the final video on Padlet! Check the marking scheme!

✅ Quick Task Recap

1. ID Cards: Snap & upload 1 pic of each species.

2. Data Collection: collect on your worksheet, then fill & submit form.

3. Picnic Break! 🥪

4. Video Time: Film, edit & share.

Let’s do this—can’t wait to see your discoveries! 🌳🎥

✅ Quick Task Recap

Ready to start? The first thing to do is now to find in your surrounding a species of each of the 9 species that we will want to count.

So get your team ready and go catch them all!