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What's Wrong with the Plants?

Overview

This unit/lesson is designed for first year Biology students who have a working knowledge of plant anatomy and physiology. It can be taught as an entire unit or as a part of a ‘Plant Study’ unit.

Students will initially describe differences between plants which seem healthy and those which appear unhealthy. They will examine the plants and use various techniques to attempt to identify what is causing the unhealthy symptoms. As a result of their preliminary observations, students will propose a hypothesis and design an experiment to investigate the possible cause of the unhealthy plant. An optional activity is provided for students to actually perform their experiment.

As an extension activity students can do a library research report and presentation on a selected topic dealing with an aspect of plant disease. After discussing the experimental results of the student investigations, the teacher will introduce concepts of plant disease, specifically the role of root-knot nematodes as the cause of the unhealthy plants.

Objectives

1. To investigate the possible causes of the symptoms of an unhealthy plant.
2. To propose and test a hypothesis that explains the cause of an unhealthy plant.
3. To investigate the nature and impact of plant disease.

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