Fast Plants conference booth with hedi dan jackson

Fast Plants Conferences 2023 NABT CAST ACTE Booth Resources

It’s the season of professional development conferences for teachers, educators, and our Fast Plants Team! Come visit our booths in the exhibit halls, they’re always packed with living Fast Plants, recommended resources, and good conversation. Jackson is attending NABT in Baltimore; Hedi and Dan are attending CAST in Houston and ACTE in Phoenix! This blog post summarizes what you’ll find …

New DIY Grow Lights for Fast Plants

Superior Grow Lights: Easy build your own What grow lights do I need for growing Fast Plants? That’s an important question. However, it also may be the start of a missed learning opportunity, if we’re not mindful. Consider for comparison your reaction when a student asks: “What do I need to know for the test?” Likely, your response includes hoping this …

Conceptual flow ecosystem dynamics investigation

Ecosystem dynamics investigations

Why hands-on ecosystem investigations? Ecosystems are highly complex systems; how can we support learners to grasp the effects on populations when one component of an ecosystem changes? Using a model ecosystem and model population in a hands-on investigation is an effective teaching strategy. In addition to making abstract ecosystem concepts more concrete, using Fast Plants as a model organism in …

Fast Plants investigation

Investigations with Wisconsin Fast Plants lead to powerful learning

Teaching and Learning with Fast Plants Investigations We know it is important to “help students make sense of the natural world by designing and carrying out authentic, student driven investigations (Wingert & Bell, 2015).” Compared to other living organisms, Wisconsin Fast Plants are easy to manage and very responsive to factors in their environment. In addition, many easy-to-observe Fast Plant phenotypes …

Flowering and the Role of Vernalization

A plant’s transition from vegetative growth to reproductive/flowering growth is a complicated process. In order for a plant to complete its life cycle and produce viable seeds, flowering must occur under conditions that encourage seed production. Plants are able to detect a variety of internal and environmental signals that influence floral development. Internal signaling is via production and diffusion of …

Flowering Wisconsin Fast Plants

Three mistakes to avoid for growing healthy Fast Plants

Maybe you’ve grown Wisconsin Fast Plants before, or perhaps you’re just getting started–either way, we all want to grow strong, healthy Fast Plants. Nobody wants tall, spindly plants that need support or sickly plants that barely flower. No problem! Read on, and we’ll explain three common pitfalls to avoid when setting up growing conditions that support healthy Fast Plant growth. 1. Not …

Chemical Environment: Growing Healthy Fast Plants

Growing healthy Fast Plants is easy if you understand how the environment can affect growth and development. Three broad categories of environmental factors influence how an individual plant matures through its life cycle: 1) the physical environment, 2) the chemical environment, 3) the biological environment. This post is part of a series explaining how key chemical environmental factors can impact plants, Wisconsin Fast Plants in particular. Our website describes …

Biological Environment: Growing Healthy Fast Plants

Environment plays a key role in how your Fast Plants grow and develop through their life cycle. Classifying environmental factors into three broad groups can be useful for studying their effects: 1) the physical environment, 2) the chemical environment, 3) the biological environment. This post is part of a series that explains how key environmental factors can impact plants. We focus here on biological factors and Wisconsin Fast Plants. Our website …

Physical environment factors, along with chemical and biological factors, affect Fast Plants systems and life processes

Physical Environment: Growing Healthy Fast Plants

Growing healthy Fast Plants is easy if you understand how the environment can affect growth and development. Three broad categories of environmental factors influence how an individual plant matures through its life cycle: 1) the physical environment, 2) the chemical environment, 3) the biological environment. This post is part of a series explaining how key environmental factors–physical, chemical, and biological–can impact plants, Wisconsin Fast Plants in particular. Our …