Word of the Day
Bats
Science Camps

2007

Week of April 16 - 20

Day Word Definition
16 melting point Temperature at which a solid changes to a liquid.
17 larva An early stage in the life cycle of an insect.
18 pupa The stage of metamorphosis in which an insect changes from a larva to an adult
19 nymph The young form of some insects that look similar to the adult form.
20 molecule When two or more atoms are joined together by chemical bonds. Water is made up of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom.

 

Week of April 9 - 13

Day Word Definition
9 organism Any living thing. People, plants, and animals are all living organisms.
10 decibel A unit to measure the loudness of sound.
11 boiling point The temperature at which a liquid changes to a gas.
12 ploem Tissue in a plant that transports food
13 spores single-celled reproductive structures found in fungi and simple plants.

 

Week of April 2 - 5

Day Word Definition
2 model A model is a smaller example of a real-life object. A globe is a model of the Earth.
3 microscope An instrument that uses lenses to make small objects look larger.
4 balance scale A tool used to compare the masses of two objects.
5 graduated cylinder A container marked with a graded scale and used to measure the volume of liquids.

Week of Mar 26 - 30

Day Word Definition
26 phototropism Plants grow toward light. This response to light is called phototropism. It is caused by chemicals that direct the growth of a plant's stem.
27 cell The cell is the basic unit of structure and function of all living things.
28 tissue In an organism made up of many cells, similar cells work together. Cells that work together to perform a specific function form a tissue. There are four kinds of tissues in humans.
29 organ Tissues work together to form an organ. Each organ in an animal's body is made of severl kinds of tissues.
30 system Organs that work together to perfrom a function form a system. A human has ten major body systems.

Week of Mar 19 - 23

Day Word Definition
19 deciduous forests Trees that lose and regrow their leaves each year are called deciduous trees.
20 glaciers Erosion can also be caused by moving ice. Glaciers are huge sheets of ice. They move downhill, but very slowly. They travel less than 30 cm (about 1 foot) each day.
21 photosynthesis The food making process of plants
22 chlorophyll Leaves get their green color from chlorophyll. It helps the plant use energy from the sun to make food.
23 transpiration Plants and animals put water back into the environment. Plants give off water therough their stomata. This is transpiration.

Week of Mar 5 - 9

Day Word Definition
5 amphibians Animals that begin life in the water and move onto land as adults. Frogs are amphibians.
6 fish Animals that live their whole lives in water. Like young amphibians, fish have gills.
7 roots Hold a plant in the ground. They take in water and minerals from the soil. The roots of a plant are underground, where you often don't see them.
8 stem The stem carries water from the roots to other parts of the plaA stem connects the roots with the leaves of a plant and support the plant above the ground.
9 leaves Leaves take in the air and light a plant needs. Leaves are plant parts that grow out of the stem. Most plants have leaves.

Week of Feb 26 - Mar 2

Day Word Definition
26 continental drift A theory of how Earth's continents move
27 vibration The rapid back-and-forth movement that produces sound. Sound is a wave which is created by vibrating objects.
28 mimicry An organism's ability to look like another kind of oranism in its environment so it can escape predators or catch prey.
1 mammals Animals that have fur or hair. Horses, cows, and dogs are all mammals.
2 birds Animals that have feathers, two legs, and wings. Most birds use their wings for flying. Some birds, such as penguins, cannot fly.

Week of Feb 19 - 23

Day Word Definition
19 environment The surroundings of an organism
20 fault A crack in the crust of the Earth along which there has been movement of the rocks on either side of the crack
21 metamorphosis Changes that some insects go through druing their life cycle.
22 germination Sprouting of a plant from a seed
23 hardness Ability of a mineral to resist being scratched. Talc is one of the softest minerals, while diamond is the hardest.

Week of Feb 12 - 16

Day Word Definition
12 mixture A combination of two or more substances that do not form a new substance.
13 learned behavior a behavior that an animal develops by observing other animals or by being taught.
14 inherited trait A characteristic that is passed from parent to offspring. Ex. eye color, leaf shape, spots, etc.
15 seed A structure produced by a plant that contains a tiny undeveloped plant

Week of Feb 5 - 9

Day Word Definition
5 instinct A behavior that an animal inherits from its parents
6 reptile An animal that has a backbone and dry, leathery skin or scales. Iguanas, lizards, and snakes are examples.
7 burrow Tunnels that some animal dig. many animals live underground in burrows. The groundhog lives in a burrow.
8 interdependence The inablitiy of organisms to eist or sruvive without each other.
9 energy pyramid A diagram that passes on at each level of the food chain. A small amount of energy is stored in plants, passes into herbivores as they feed, and a smilar small percentage of the energy in herbivores then passes into carnivores.

Week of Jan 29 - Feb 2

Day Word Definition
29 predator An animal that hunts, catches, and eats another animal.
30 prey An animal that is hunted, caught, and eaten by another animal.
31 zoologist Someone who works with animals and studies living organisms.
1 adaptation Change to your environment. An organism adaps to their enivronment by developing physical and behavorial characteristics that allow organisms to survive and have offspring.
2 camouflage shape, color, or pattern of an animal that helps it blend in with its surroundings.

Week of Jan 22 - 26

Day Word Definition
22 water cycle The water cycle is the change of water from one state to anotehr as it moves between Earth's surface and the atmosphere.
23 nitrogen cycle The nitrogen cycle is the movement of nitrogen between organisms and their surroundings.
24 carnivore Carnivores are animals that eat meat. They usually have sharp teeth and powerful jaws.
25 herbivore An herviore is an animal that eats only plants or plant products. Cows and mice are examples of herbivores.
26 omnivore An omnivore is an animal that eats both plants and animals.

Week of Jan 16 - 19

Day Word Definition
16 niche An organism's niche is their role in the ecosystem. A niche is defined by the way the organizm interacts with the living and nonliving components of its ecosystem - what it eats and the habitat it prefers.
17 biome A biome is a natural place in a particular climate where many plants and animals live. Some biomes include the rainforest, taiga, tundra and desert.
18 endangered species An endangered species is a species whose numbers are so small that they are at risk of becoming extinct. The grey wolf, giant panda, and snow leopard are examples of endangered species.
19 extinct When there are no more members of a living species, they are extinct. For example, dinosaurs are extinct.

Week of Jan. 8 - 12

Day Word Definition
8 consumers Consumers are organisms that cannot produce their own food, so they must eat other organisms. There are the three groups of consumers; carnivores, herbivores, and omnivores.
9 decomposers Decomposers are organisms like fungi and some bacteria that break down and digest dead materials and wastes.
10 ecosystem An ecosystem is a piece of nature. Nature with plants, animals, mircororganisms, water, wind, minerals, and more. An ecosystem can consist of land, water, and air.
11 habitat A habitat is the set of physical and environmental conditions that determines where an organism or group of organisms can live mose comfortably. Habitat factors include climate, amount of rainfall, and amount of sunlight.
12 population A population is a group of organisms of the same species that live together.