Connected on 2010-03-19 15:00:00 from Culver City, CA, US
- 2:52pm
- Bugscope Team session is locked and loaded
- 2:58pm
- Bugscope Team hi ronit
- Bugscope Team welcome to bugscope
- Teacher Hi My name is Ronit and I am the first grade teacher for this class at the Willows Community School. Currently the class is running late. They should be here soon
- Teacher Hi cate
- Teacher I am new to this. It is my first time
- Bugscope Team ok well you have control of the microscope
- Bugscope Team you can click on a preset to the lower right if you want to move the microscope to a certain insect
- Teacher I will practice until the class comes in.
- Bugscope Team yeah Welcome to Bugscope!
- Bugscope Team you can also drive around and change the magnification. with the navigation tools, you will have more control with the click to center
- Teacher how do I stop it
- Bugscope Team if you click to drive, you need to click to stop
- Teacher or reset
- Bugscope Team if you get lost, click on a preset
- Bugscope Team that's why it is sometimes easier to use click to center to get around
- Bugscope Team the edge of the world
- Bugscope Team that is a screw in the stage
- Teacher I clicked on the preset but it keeps coming to this
- Teacher the class has just arrived and sat down
- 3:05pm
- Teacher What is that the class wants to know
Bugscope Team it's a caterpillar. we don't know what kind though.
- Bugscope Team it's upside down, the bottom is the head
- Teacher How big is it really
- Bugscope Team you can tell they are insects because they have six legs
- Bugscope Team it'
- Bugscope Team s a few mm long
- Bugscope Team see the micron bar in the lower left corner of the screen? that is 0.7 mm
- Teacher Does the caterpillar have hair all over
Bugscope Team yes, you will find that all insects have hair on them, some more than others. The hair on insects are called setae, since they arent mammals
- Bugscope Team Please try another preset when you want, and let us know which one keeps taking you off the stage.
- Bugscope Team see the answer to the left?
- Bugscope Team the setae are useful in giving the insects information on what is going on around it, like taste/smell and touch
- Bugscope Team which preset was that?
- Teacher what part is that
- Teacher the class wants it to stop so they can see
- 3:10pm
- Bugscope Team that was the antenna of the beetle
- Bugscope Team and this is the underside of its head
- Teacher So now we are lloking at beetles?
- Teacher looking
- Teacher What kind of beetle?
Bugscope Team I think this is a ground beetle of some sort- basically a black beetle
- Teacher We have been studying mealworms. They turn into beetles. We tasted mealworms today, different flavors
Bugscope Team wow were any of them good?
- Teacher Is it the bottom side?
- Bugscope Team really they come in flavors?
- Bugscope Team yes this is the underside of the head
- Teacher We tried cheddar cheese, BBQ and Mexican spice
- Teacher Yes they enjoyed tasting them
- Bugscope Team we put most insects on the backs, because usually the backs are just smooth and uninteresting
- Bugscope Team Cate would like the BBQ ones.
- Bugscope Team yeah probably :) as long as they arent squirming
- Bugscope Team Is this something your school district is trying out?
- Bugscope Team and i cant tell what they are haha
- Bugscope Team good protein
- Teacher WE ordered them from a special place that sells edible insect snacks
- Bugscope Team wow
- Teacher What are the feathery parts next to the legs of this beetle
Bugscope Team those are accessory mouthparts
- Bugscope Team the things that look like legs are palps
- 3:15pm
- Bugscope Team 'cause this is just the head! it is a large beetle
- Bugscope Team the jointed things are the antennae
- Teacher What do the palps do?
Bugscope Team they taste and move around the beetle's food
- Bugscope Team they have little taste buds at the tips, and the taste buds let the beetle know if it would like to eat that particular thing
- Bugscope Team palps are legs, in a way -- they are modified legs, but way back in time so we don't think of them as legs
- Teacher We have never seen palps or heard of them from all our books that we have read so far
- Bugscope Team see the jaws -- also called mandibles?
- Teacher We know they have mandibles to grab
- Teacher Does this beetle have wings?
Bugscope Team use click to center to drive down the body and see if we see any wings
- Bugscope Team the two sharp-looking crossed things beneath the palps (from our perspective) are the mandibles
- Bugscope Team cool!
- 3:20pm
- Bugscope Team now we see the thorax
- Bugscope Team and the edge of one of the legs!
- Bugscope Team there are little scales, it looks like, on the surface of the thorax
- Bugscope Team if they are scales, they are not from the beetle but likely from a moth or butterfly
- Teacher Colin wants to know what the big round thing in the middle of the thorax is?
Bugscope Team yeah we got some of these insects from a collection that an entomologist had
- Bugscope Team you can drive down a little more and you will see!
- Bugscope Team The base of the leg is called a 'condyle.'
- Bugscope Team now we can see that the body of this beetle is jointed, almost like that of a click beetle
- Teacher It looks like a jointed thorax, is that correct?
- Bugscope Team yes!
- Bugscope Team uh oh!
- Teacher We are heading down to see the last set of legs
- Bugscope Team you can sort of guess where that hole came from
- Teacher WE are just discussing it but can you fill us in?
- Teacher Some of us think that you drilled a hole and took the insides out
- Bugscope Team it's from a pin that went through the body
- Bugscope Team so in a way it was a drilled hole
- 3:25pm
- Teacher Before they pin an insect do they need to drain the inside of an insect?
Bugscope Team they usually just poke it and don't bother to drain it
- Bugscope Team if you wanted you could follow one of the legs out to the claws
- Bugscope Team when we prepare insects that are alive, we freeze them, then we just let them dry out on their own
- Teacher We are trying to make our way to the end of the legs to see the claws
- Teacher Can you help us get there and we will wait
- Teacher Thank you
- Bugscope Team the arms/legs are sort of the same, and they have a condyle, a femur like we do, a tibia like we do (but not a fibula), and then the forearm segments are called 'tarsi.'
- 3:30pm
- Bugscope Team there can be four or five tarsi, and at the end is the claw
- Teacher Thank you Scot and Cate. This was a lot of fun and very informative. We have to go to our All School Meeting but we will visit again. Can we come and see another class doing their session?
- Teacher This is really cool
- Bugscope Team thanks for using bugscope
- Bugscope Team we don't have any other classes today... ;(
- Teacher Are the legs made from bone
Bugscope Team the legs are made of chitin, on the outside
- Teacher But we can look on the schedule and see what is coming up, right?
- Bugscope Team you can come and log in whenever we have another session and check out what's going on. the upcoming sessions can be seen from the main bugscope page
- Teacher thank you again, hope to see you soon. bye
- Bugscope Team insects do not have bone, so even though I told you the segments have names like human bones, they are not bones
- Bugscope Team Thank You!
