Week 12 - Day 57

i thought i'd do something different today besides a lab. the lesson today was a combo of history and science. the students were studying the salem witch trials and the role of ergot in them. ergot is a fungus that infects rye grains. it's believed that during a wet and humid summer that the rye grains got infected with the fungus. the symptoms included hallucinations, delirium, convulsions, unintelligible speech, etc. we read a background on salem and the trials...discussed...watched short video clips on the trials from the history channel...discussed...and then they worked on questions. the students were very willing to participate and asked a lot of questions. we all agreed that the fungus couldn't explain everything that happened during the trials, but definitely contributed. some of the students even noted that the hallucinations, etc., had stopped after the following summer which was dry and fungus free.

i would definitely keep this lesson, however, i would make it into two days instead of one so that we could watch a few more clips and investigate the fungus a little more with pictures. i would also include live specimens of fungus or pictures and have the students compare and contrast them.