Helpful Tips for Making your Owl Pellet Poster

OWLS R US

What to use:

Plain old ordinary posterboard – any color you like!

Hmmm… What color

should I choose?

WHAT NOT TO USE!

tri-fold stand-up display boards

foam core boards

Required Components:1. Interesting and attractive title.2. Your full name in upper left corner.3. Period & Science code in upper right corner.4. Prey Skeleton, labeled with type of animal, and mounted to construction paper.5. Data Tables 1 – 6, plus data table for comparative question.6. Two Bar Graphs (Use data from Tables 4 & 5)7. Graph illustrating the results of your comparative question.8. Rest of Lab Report.9. Your rubric, with heading filled in, paperclipped to the poster. 10. For more points, add something extra, such as a Food Web for Barn Owl and all the prey we found.

How to put your name and science code on your poster:

Buzz Lightyear Period 10 - #8

Very neat! Very SMALL!

Examples of Some Nice Titles:

The Prey Skeleton:• You need to have all bones in

proper position, plus a label with the prey name, and some kind of backing to get 10 points!

• It’s okay if bones are broken!• If you don’t get 10 points on

your skeleton, you can still get an A+ on your project, so get yourself too crazed about those missing toes and the ever-elusive scapulae!

DATA TABLES

• Neat!• Complete!• Filled in with pencil!

(or typed & printed out!)• All math is accurate!• No scribbles or stray marks!• A paper backing makes them look extra nice!• You may cut them apart if you want to, but keep them

in the correct order.

An example of Data Tables not cut apart, with some added pictures and a nice backing.

Note: The tables were numbered differentlyThe year this is from!

In this example, the data tables are cut apart, which is fine, BUT they are filled in with pen and are very messy! NOT fine!

You should also notice there is no logical order to the way the data tables and parts of the lab report are attached to the poster. Not good!

In this poster the data tables are stapled together within the lab report. This is also acceptable! If you do it this way, be sure to

put them in the correct place – right after the Methods section.

BAR GRAPHS!1. Type of prey in Pellet(Use data from table 4.) 2. Number of prey animals per pellet.

(Use data from table 5.)

Num

ber o

f pre

y an

imal

s

Type of prey Animal

Num

ber o

f Pel

lets

Number of prey animals

Print out the graphs from Google Drive and attach them into your lab report or onto

your poster.

• Descriptive and specific title• Both axes labeled thoroughly:

– For the first one, the x-axis should include “type of prey animal” and also label each bar: vole, mice, etc. The y-axis should be “number of animals.”

– For the second one, the x-axis should include “Number of prey animals” and also label each bar: one, two, three, etc. The y-axis should be labeled, “number of pellets”

Comparative Question

1. A table showing the data you used.

Note: If you used data other than Brookside School data, you need to indicate where you got it!

Carolina Owl App

OR

Use the citation from the data I provided.

2. A graph illustrating your results.

~ This year the FOOD WEB is optional ~

• You must make it! Don’t just find one on the computer and copy and paste it!

• You may draw the organisms yourself or print out pictures.• Include all prey animals found this year plus the barn owl, one

other predator, and an energy source for all your prey. To be complete, every organism in a food web must have an energy source!

• Showing the sun is optional.• Make sure you include arrows that indicate energy transfer.

(Make sure they point in the right direction!)• Label all organisms!• Give your food web a title.

Example of a hand-drawn food web.

Example of a food

web with

pictures printed

from the Internet.

If you print pictures, be careful!! Make sure they are of the correct animal! Google Images doesn’t always

identify animals properly!

Elephant shrews are NOT eaten by barn owls in Washington State!

Neither are Tree Shrews

This is the kind of shrew our guys eat!

You may cut out the sections of your lab report and attach them to your poster separately, like this student did:

Just make sure they are in the correct order!Notice this student put the conclusion before the discussion questions!That’s not good!

Or you can staple the pages of the lab report together and attach them to the poster like these people did:

Here are some more completed posters to inspire you:

The End!

Finally! Now let’s have some pie!