Overview
The migration rate is a standard unit of measurement. The rate is a measure of monarchs per hour (or monarchs per minute). To find the migration rate we need know two things:
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Migration Rate Activities | |||||
Try these migration rate activities, and encourage students to use standard units when they make their own monarch migration observations. | |||||
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Online Challenge |
Practice Activity |
Data Sheet |
Data Sheet |
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Follow these steps to introduce students to the concept of migration rates: 1. Consider the number of monarchs observed.
Ask students, Which observer saw more monarch butterflies? (Observer A.) 2.
Consider the length of the observation period.
Ask students, Describe the new information that was added. Ask, What do we know that we did not know before? (We know how long each observer was watching, the observation period.) Why is this new information important? What does it tell you about the migration in each place? (This is important because only if we know how much time a person was watching can we compare migration sightings from one time to the next and from one place to the next in a standardized way.) 3.
Calculate the length of each observation.
4.
Explore the term, migration rate. What words could we use to make the two observations easier to compare? Give students time to develop the concept of “monarchs per hour.” If they need help, give them a sentence starter such as: Observer A saw ___ in ___ but Observer B saw ___ in ___. 5. Calculate the migration rate (in monarchs per minute or hour).
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Continued Practice | |||||
The following two activities give students a chance to practice calculating the migration rate.
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Real-world Applications | |||||
Who Will See the Record Flight This Fall?
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Data Analysis | |||||
Challenge students to look at data carefully.
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