Blog 3 - Post 3 - Reflections on the term’s work

1.    Was the eco-column a success or not as an ecosystem? 

From the results of our research and discoveries within our eco-column, I(Matt Clayton) and most likely the other members as well, think our eco-column was partly a success as an ecosystem as we had new organisms being formed and growing in our decomp and aqua zone and in the terra zone the plants survived the holidays, besides for one. During the respiration stage and photosynthesis they were able to give off water vapour. The small amount that condensed on the plastic in the terra zone made its way through and down the eco-column into the decomp and then the aqua zone. Every zone had an effect on the other zones and worked together like the circle of life through all the interactions between biotic and abiotic factors.

2. To what extent do you have a better understanding of ecology 

Matt- I always used to think that ecology was just the basic food change but from this project and the lessons I now have a broader understanding of ecology, now knowing that it is also about the nature, the natural effects and the animals that work in unison to keep the wild life self sustaining, which I find very interesting and would like to get to know better and learn more about it and get deeper into the knowledge of ecology.

Chris- I always you used to think that the ecosystem was the basic interaction between non living and living features and that it was easy to create a self sustaining ecosystem.I now know that you need to get the right amount of producers and consumers in order to create a food chain where it is self sustaining. and the interactions between the biotic and abiotic features with in our ecosystem and that they all work together for survival.I hope to further increase my knowledge of ecology in future years.

Luke- I have a much better understanding of ecology and what is required to make an ecosystem self-sustaining. I fully understand that organisms interact with each other and with their non-living physical environment and how the abiotic and biotic resources function together. I have a much better understanding of the flow of energy between organisms and food chains. I also fully understand that organisms compete for food, water, light and shelter and that this may result in death of some organisms.

3.1 Did our group work well together or not?

Matt- I think we worked well together in the beginning, as in making the stand and the actual eco-column. We all did what we had to do and it worked out well but unluckily Chris was away most of the time as he had two rowing tours. He was unable to access blogger for a period of time but he did post from Luke's laptop and in the end it all came togther and it worked out well, so I think we did work well together and we were able to adapt to the situations and complete every task to the best of our ability.

Chris-I think that we worked well together in the creation and gathering of the materials but then it all fell apart as I had to go on rowing tour for posts one an two.In the end it all came together and in post three we all did our fair share of work and contributed equally.

Luke- It was not easy to work together all of the time - in the beginning it was easy but as it progressed it became harder caused by the absence of group members. I felt that sometimes I had to keep the group together (as they asked me to delegate work) and to ensure that the work was being done, but everyone did their fair share of work and it all worked out very well as we were all happy with the final product. All projects need someone to distribute the work which made it more efficient with no confusion so that everyone knew what they were doing!

3.2 Was our blog an accurate reflection of what we learnt and how we worked together?

Matt-I think that our blog was an accurate reflection and well done. It was good and simple and very easy to understand. All our posts had their own title such as the dates and what was written in the post. We all worked on this blog : one taking the photo's and getting the evidence, one getting the information and the other typing it out and putting it all in an ordinary fashion. The pictures were labelled or given a title making it easy to understand. I think our blog was attractive and effective. It all came together showing that we worked well together and learnt a lot.


 Chris- Yes, our blog was an accurate reflection of what we learnt and how we worked together. We shared all our knowledge so that the posts could be of the best of our ability. We understood what was happening in the ecosystem and we recorded our observations on the blog. 

Luke- Yes the blog was an accurate reflection of what we learnt and how we worked together. All the knowledge we gathered and our observations were posted on the blog. We could make sense of what was happening in our ecosystem, every step of the way and mentioned this in our blog.