Exploring Trees - Playing with Science

Hello and welcome to Playing with Science. Today we're looking all about trees. You can see some behind me here. Now normally when we do Playing with Science we're looking at an experiment where we can change something. However today the trees are going to change things for us. So we're going to look at different things that the trees are changing about the trees and see what we can observe and what we can learn. Now observation is a really important science skill and it's a really good one to develop especially when looking at things like trees to look closely and see what you can really notice to see what you can learn about them. Take a look at this picture for example. Did you notice anything odd? Well now take another look and see if you can see anything further. This just shows that when you observe something you can really, the more you look the more you might notice things and that's exactly what scientists do. The more they observe then they can learn more about. And trees are so important in our world. They help turn all the carbon dioxide into oxygen for us with photosynthesis and they're really important habitats for animals and so many other things as well. Maybe you could find out some things that are important about trees. Today with the trees we're going to look at these different things that they could change. They could change the parts of the tree we're looking at. We could change the type of the tree we're looking at and we could change the age of the tree and then we can make observations of all of those different things. It's always good to only change one thing. So we're going to start just by looking at the parts of the tree and see if we can make some good observations about them. When making observations you might like to think about ways you can record your results. So you could take some paper out with you and do some rubbings such as leaf rubbings or bark rubbings but you could also take a ruler and measure the different areas of the leaves and the tree. You can take a notebook to record your results. So we're going to start just by looking at the parts of the tree and see if we can make some good observations about them. There is a twinkle worksheet with the parts of the tree where you can fill in the labels and add your observations in. And there's also some lovely twinkle worksheets with adjectives on them that you might like to use. So let's have a look at some of the parts of the tree now and see what adjectives you can use and how you describe them. Did you notice anything when we had a quick look at the different parts of the tree? Remember you go out and do this at home as well. See what trees you can find and see what you can notice and you can observe. You can just take a notebook with you. Now I've got my little microscope with me so let's have a closer look at some of the parts of the tree too. Did you spot anything? Perhaps you might be able to go and find out more if you go and have a look at trees yourself. I couldn't believe when we dug up the roots how many little tiny roots there were. I've always thought they're exactly the same as branches and look exactly the same but even under the microscope you can see there are loads and loads of roots. And this is so the tree is not only stable in the ground but also can absorb loads of water to keep it healthy. Next we're going to have a look at different types of trees. Let's see if we can have a look at some of the leaves of different types of trees and see what you can observe. This I really like doing with my children because we couldn't believe actually when you start looking the differences in the types of leaves whether they're spiky or smooth, maybe you're describing some of the textures how shiny some of the leaves were, how many leaves, so we even counted how many leaves and how many bumps the leaves had. It's really, really fascinating. And even trying to describe the colour green of the leaves was really quite interesting because actually, although we might say all trees are green, can you use other colours to describe them? There isn't even a Twinkle worksheet with names of colours on so you could try taking that out with you to see if you can find names of the greens of the leaves of the trees. So what did we observe in this? Well we observed that some leaves are actually quite spiky and we learned that all trees have completely different leaves. So another thing we could change is the age of the tree. We've got a really big oak tree here behind me and I've got a little one that's only just started growing from an acorn. If you look carefully around some trees you might actually spot some growing from the seeds that have been planted so you can still do this experiment and have a look at some of the differences and similarities between them. So let's have a closer look at our older tree compared to our younger tree and see if we can notice anything different. What observations can we make? Let's start with the leaves. So these leaves have flown down from our big oak tree and these are growing from our acorn so they're only a year old and if we hold them up, can you see any differences between them? Think about all those things we spoke about earlier. Are they the same size? Are they the same shape? Have a good look because I find this fascinating that actually this is from a very old tree and this is a brand new tree and they're almost identical. So actually leaves don't give any indication to the age of the tree. If we're then to look at the trunk of the tree hold on up close I can fit this in between my fingers and the bark is really smooth because I'm not even sure if it's got any bark on it yet. Have a look at that. However if we look at our old tree, just to show you how big it is I can't even fit my arms around it. So this might be a better indicator of how old a tree is by how big the trunk is rather than looking at the size of the leaves. That's a really fascinating observation. You can also look at the bark as well and how bumpy it is compared to how smooth it is. I wonder if this is different as trees get older. We have found another tree in our garden. So you can actually look at the roots which we've dug up so you can see the roots in this as well as the leaves. And then if you look at the bigger tree in our garden where it came from because we found it in our garden you can actually see they've got the same leaves and some similar observations. So what have we observed? Well I've actually observed that the leaves are completely the same no matter how old the tree is and the trunk is very very different. So leaves give no indication as to how old the tree is. Thank you so much for joining me again for another Playing With Science. We have loved looking at trees today and I hope you did too. There is so much to learn about trees and there is so much you can learn just by observing. So think about what it is you're looking at in the trees and how these are different when you look at different parts of the tree, different types of trees, different ages of trees. They are just brilliant. Don't forget to check out our other videos as well all over our Twinkle Home Education channel designed specifically for home educators just like this one. Thanks for watching and we look forward to seeing you again soon.