Contact Jayme Parrish

JParrish@helenaschools.org

+1-406-324-1000Helena Middle

Schedule

• Monday Schedule
• First Period 8:05-8:51 7th Grade Life Science
• Second Period 8:55-9:41 7th Grade Life Science
• Third Period 9:45-10:31 7th Grade Life Science
• Fourth Period 10:35-11:21 Prep Period
• Fifth Period 11:25-12:11 7th Grade Life Science
• 7th Grade Lunch 12:11-12:51 Lunch
• Sixth Period 12:55-1:41 7th Grade Life Science
• Seventh Period 1:45-2:05 Advisor
• Tuesday - Friday Schedule
• First Period 8:05-8:56 7th Grade Life Science
• Second Period 9:00-9:51 7th Grade Life Science
• Third Period 9:55-10:49 7th Grade Life Science
• Fourth Period 10:53-11:44 Prep Period
• 7th Grade Lunch 11:44-12:24 Lunch
• Fifth Period 12:28-1:19 7th Grade Life Science
• Sixth Period 1:23-2:14 7th Grade Life Science
• Seventh Period 2:18-2:50 Advisor

Basic Class Information

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Parrish Science Syllabus 22-23.pdf

Substitue PowerPoints

Amplify Science Life Science Unit Overviews

All of the information provided below is from each of the unit overview sections from the Amplify Science Life Science webpages that each student will have access to. 

1. Microbiome
   • Findings about the human microbiome are all over the news and are attracting the attention of scientists from many different fields—for good reason! There is evidence to suggest that the approximately 100 trillion bacteria living on and in the human body may correlate to many different health conditions. Further, altering one’s microbiome can result in altering one’s health, for better or worse. Most notably, a treatment known as a fecal transplant—a transplant that involves using microorganisms from one person’s healthy gut microbiome to cure another person who is suffering from a potentially deadly infection—has been under review. These developments have sent many from the scientific community to further investigate the human microbiome. In this unit, students take on the role of student researchers as they work out and explain the anchor phenomenon for the unit—a fecal transplant cured a patient suffering from a potentially deadly C. difficile infection. They make arguments that justify continued research of this new treatment. By engaging in sense-making about the same types of data that professional scientists use, they work to understand how having 100 trillion microorganisms on and in the human body can keep a person healthy. In the process, they learn to examine living things at multiple scales, from molecules to single-celled organisms to the overall human body. 
2. Metabolism
   • Through inhabiting the role of medical students in a hospital, students—as they first diagnose a patient and then analyze the metabolism of world-class athletes—are able to draw the connections between the large-scale, macro-level experiences of the body and the micro-level processes that make the body function. By investigating the anchor phenomenon—a patient whose body systems are not working properly, students learn how body systems work together to provide the trillions of cells in the human body with the molecules they need. By exploring how athletic training improves the body’s function, students learn how energy is released in the cells through cellular respiration and how that energy supports movement and cellular growth and repair. In the final chapter of the unit, your students will consider a new anchor phenomenon to apply what they have learned to determine whether an athlete’s improved performance from increasing cellular respiration could have been the result of blood doping. 
3. Metabolism Engineering Internship
   • Futura Engineering has been hired to design a series of health bars that will feed people in regions affected by natural disasters, with a particular emphasis on two populations who have health needs beyond what can be provided by emergency meals: patients and rescue workers. Can we develop nutrition bars that will provide the proper balance of protein and carbohydrates for these target populations? Students work as food engineer interns at Futura Engineering and apply their understanding of metabolism in designing recipes for bars that balance three criteria: the metabolic needs of a target population, taste, and cost. In order to address metabolic needs, interns look at protein, carbohydrates, and the glycemic index of different ingredients. Protein is broken down into amino acids, which are made into new protein molecules that aid in cellular growth and repair—how effective the body is at making these protein molecules can be measured using a Growth and Repair Test. Carbohydrates are broken down into glucose, which the body uses for energy to do all the things it needs to do. Glycemic index is a measure of how quickly these carbohydrates can be broken down. In order for the body to release energy from glucose, the glucose must be combined with oxygen in the cells; the level of oxygen available to the body affects how well the cells are able to perform this process of cellular respiration. 
   • Students design a recipe for a health bar (FuturaBar) that addresses the needs of their target population by balancing the protein composition, carbohydrates, and glycemic index while maximizing the taste score and minimizing cost. Students complete several tests and tasks using Futura RecipeTest, a digital design tool, to collect data. They analyze this data and run iterative tests of their recipes, preparing a final proposal that justifies the choices they made relative to the criteria. This 10-day immersive Engineering Internship is intended to follow the Metabolism unit. 
4. Traits and Reproduction
   • Inside virtually every cell in every organism on Earth, genes provide instructions for making proteins that govern all the functions of an organism’s body. An organism inherits its genes from its parent or parents, but different combinations of genes can lead to striking variation even among closely related organisms. Understanding the role of genes and the process of inheritance has allowed researchers to explain variation in life on Earth, breed plants and animals with new traits, and develop cures for devastating diseases. In the Traits and Reproduction unit, students take on the role of student genetic researchers, working with the fictional bioengineering firm, Bay Medical Company. Bay Medical Company is attempting to breed spiders with the type of silk that can be used for medical applications (e.g., to create artificial tendons). The student genetic researchers are faced with the challenge of explaining how the silk flexibility traits of closely related spiders can vary, which serves as the anchor phenomenon for the unit. To explain this mystery, students create physical models, read articles, and observe genetics in action, using the Traits and Reproduction Simulation. This powerful and engaging digital tool allows students to observe and breed spiders, making connections between what happens inside cells and how this affects the traits of an organism. Through their research, students learn about the role proteins, genes, and sexual reproduction play in trait variation. They are able to apply what they have learned about spiders to a human context. 
5. Populations and Resources
   • Ecosystems are complex systems; determining what might have caused a change in the size of a particular population is not a straightforward question, but is an important one as population sizes are changing more than ever due to human activities. A population’s size can be determined by the availability of its resources, whether it be food, water, habitat, or something else. In this unit, we focus mainly on eating relationships and reproduction as factors that affect a population’s size. Understanding how different populations are connected to one another as part of a food web is one key to understanding how changes in one population may affect change in another. 
   • In the role of student ecologists at a research center near the fictional Glacier Sea, students investigate what may have caused a puzzling increase in the size of the moon jelly population there, which serves as the anchor phenomenon for the unit. Using a fictional scenario, based on real jelly increases all over the world, students are motivated to find out more about how the ecosystem is connected, and how changes to one population in the food web might cause changes to another population. Using the Populations and Resources Simulation to gather evidence about how ecosystems work, students learn how different populations affect each other, both directly and indirectly. Students use this newfound knowledge and data from Glacier Sea to determine the most likely cause of the moon jelly population increase as well as engage in scientific argumentation as they model and explain their claim. 
6. Matter and Energy in Ecosystems
   • The Matter and Energy in Ecosystems unit builds on the understanding developed in the Populations and Resources unit where students learned that the transfer of energy storage molecules, such as starches and fats, is determined by the interactions between consumer and resource populations. While the previous focus was on consumers, this unit expands students’ understanding of ecosystems by considering both living and nonliving components—how its producers, consumers, and decomposers meet their energy needs through the processes of photosynthesis and cellular respiration; how carbon, a key component of those processes, moves between nonliving and living matter; and how sunlight and the atmosphere function within the overall system. 
   • In the role of student ecologists, your students will investigate a fictional failed biodome, which serves as the anchor phenomenon for the unit. The fictional biodome was constructed by a local group of individuals who are not astronauts or scientists, just space fans who hope to live in space someday. The Econauts hired expert ecologists to advise them on the types of plants and animals to include in their biodome. With the advice of these ecologists, the group members hoped their sealed ecosystem would be self-sustaining—plenty of plants for the animals to eat, plenty of sunlight and water for the plants, and plenty of air for both. However, five years into the project, the group noticed that the plants and animals in the biodome were not getting the resources they needed to release energy, and the ecosystem appeared to be failing. The occupants were safely removed from the biodome, but the cause of the ecosystem crash remains a mystery. 
7. Natural Selection
   • In 1979, friends dared a 29-year-old man in Oregon to swallow a living, rough-skinned newt. What the man did not know is that rough-skinned newts can be extremely poisonous. A lethal, fast-acting poison called tetrodotoxin (TTX) oozes from their skin. The man swallowed the newt whole and started feeling weak a few minutes later. He described a numb feeling all over his body. His friends tried to take him to a hospital, but he refused. Just 20 minutes later, the man was dead. In the role of student biologists, students investigate what caused this newt population to become more poisonous—which serves as the anchor phenomenon for the unit. Using the Natural Selection Simulation, students investigate how the population of newts changed over time. Over the course of the unit, they gather evidence from the Simulation, hands-on activities, and texts to construct their own explanations of how the newts came to be so poisonous. 
8. Natural Selection Engineering Internship
   • Malaria infects millions and kills hundreds of thousands of people every year, making it one of the world’s largest public health problems. Even more concerning is the malaria-causing parasite’s ability to develop resistance to the drugs we use to treat it, which is foiling efforts to eradicate the disease. Part of the threat stems from the rapid life cycle of the Plasmodium parasite that causes the disease, allowing natural selection to quickly select for adaptive traits in the parasite population—in this case, drug resistance. Monotherapy (or single-drug treatments) has acted as a strong selection pressure, shifting the distribution of traits towards drug resistance for the particular drug used. In fact, many parasites today have multiple, existing resistances to available antimalarial drugs. Combination therapy (using two or more drugs) is currently the recommended course of action by the World Health Organization. In this Engineering Internship, students will explore the effects of various combinations of antimalarial drugs, carefully monitoring the type of drug, number of treatment days, and the dosage size in order to minimize drug resistance in the overall parasite population. 
   • The Natural Selection Engineering Internship asks students to design a treatment that does not cause an increase in the malaria parasite population while considering three criteria: minimizing drug resistance in the malaria parasite population; minimizing patient side effects; and keeping costs low. Students use the MalariaMed Design Tool to collect and analyze data, complete iterative tests, and learn about optimizing designs. By the end of this unit, students can describe engineering practices and compose a written proposal that supports their optimal design for making a safe and effective malaria treatment, one that also manages trade-offs between the project criteria. This 10-day immersive Engineering Internship is intended to follow the Natural Selection unit. 
9. Evolutionary History
   • Fossils are millions—even billions—of years old. New fossil discoveries can provide cutting-edge evidence about the history of life on Earth. In fact, in addition to fossils of other early species, paleontologists discover about 14 full dinosaur specimens every year. 
   • In the Evolutionary History unit, students will take on the role of student paleontologists investigating a Mystery Fossil, which serves as the anchor phenomenon for the unit. This fossil is based on a real cetacean (whale) fossil excavated in Pakistan in 2000. The students’ task is to determine the Mystery Fossil’s evolutionary history so that they can accurately place the specimen in a museum exhibit. To gain an understanding of how paleontologists determine relationships between species, students use the Evolutionary History Simulation to analyze real fossil evidence and explore relationships on an interactive evolutionary tree. With a fossil collection at their fingertips, students identify similarities and differences among the skeletal structures of both extinct and living species. Students also use the Natural Selection Simulation to revisit principles of natural selection, applying this concept to understanding how one species becomes two. They read several articles about evolution, speciation, and natural selection, and they create models to show their thinking. By the end of the unit, students can use their analysis of skeletal structures to determine where they should place the Mystery Fossil in the museum, according to what type of organism the evidence shows it to be most closely related to—whales or wolves.