In this part of the lesson, students will be researching one bacteria within the Kingdom Monera on the Internet. Students will begin to see just how many Bacteria are around them, and just how many of these bacteria will make you sick. This forms a connection as many of the the diseases researched will be familiar to the student. Prior to this lesson, students should be familiar with bacterial basics, such as proliferation within society, shapes of bacteria (usually covered in lecture or reading), etc. Here are some guiding questions that I use in class: 1.What do you know about bacteria ? (brainstorming) 2. How many bacteria do you think there are on earth ? 3. How big are bacteria ? 4. Where do you think we can find bacteria ? Where do they live ? 5. Are bacteria good, bad or both ? What makes you think so ? 6. Do you think bacteria are important ? Why ? 7. What, if anything, would happen if all the Earth’s bacteria were to disappear ?

Living organisms have the capacity to produce populations of infinite size, but environments and resources are finite. This fundamental tension has profound effects on the interactions between organisms. Human beings live within the world's ecosystems. Increasingly, humans modify ecosystems as a result of population growth, technology,and consumption. Human destruction of habitats through direct harvesting, pollution, atmospheric changes, and other factors isthreatening current global stability, and if not addressed, ecosystems will be irreversibly affected.

Students should be familiar with use of computers and have Internet research skills. They must also have some basic knowledge of Bacteria themselves. Limited typing & reading skil

Allowing students to research in pairs or groups is often a good idea, as they tend to get frustrated on their own. This also reduces the number of disease causing bacteria that you need to come up with to assign your students. Usually, I come up with a list of bacteria causing illnesses including: whooping cough, botulism, cholera, tooth decay, gonorrhea, lyme diseas, Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, Salmonella, Strep Throat, tetanus and tuberculosis. This list may include more or less, depending on the number you need for class. Bacteria are assigned at random to students or student groups. Doubling up the students may also solve a computer crisis if you have a limited number of computers to work with. The handout I use is included below in the Student Activity.

Assessment is 2 fold: They are graded on completeness of their research utilising the Internet and by answering the questions to the handout listed below.

Bacteria's Most Wanted! We’ve all seen America’s Most Wanted on t.v. and seen by letting people know there are dangerous criminals out there ! Well, today, as a member of the Bacteria Busters we are going to let the public know about some dangerous criminals out there known as bacteria. Your job today and in the next class period will be to research the criminal you are assigned. Use the encyclopedias and reference materials available in the Library to find out as much as you can about your bacteria. Things you should find out are: 1. What disease / sickness does your bacteria cause? 2. What shape is your bacteria? 3. Where do we find this bacteria? Does it have any favorite hide-outs we should look out for? 4. How does this bacteria attack / make us sick? What happens if you do get sick? 5. What is the best weapon (medicine) we can use against the bacteria? How can we avoid getting sick by this bacteria?

Enough computers to allow studnet access Internet connections Search Engines and/or Multimedia Encyclopedias At least one printer Disks for saving work (unless you have server access)