Knowplants.org

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Knowplants.org - your source for plant science education and outreach

 

This primary goal of this website is to act as a repository for on-line resources that can be used for plant science education or outreach. If you have developed a resource that could be used for this purpose or you know a webpage that needs to be included here, please feel free to email us


 

Find games, teaching aids, pictures and other tools to make plant science education a fun experience

 

The site (under continuous improvement) has categorized online resources that are available for any one interested in plants to use. More specifically teachers, students, scientists and public relations professionals can browse through and find some interesting web sites about plant biology.

 

Plant science web directories

 

 

Plant species databases 

 

Comprehensive databases

 

Specialized databases

 

Native / invasive plant databases

United States

Canada

Other

 

Weed Identification guides

 

 

Herbaria and Institutes

 

 

 

Careers in plant science

 

Teaching resources

 

K-12

 

Science Fair Projects

 

 

Undergraduate education

Arabidopsis teaching resources

  • PREP (Virginia Tech) - Online lab notebook, promotes communication between scientists and high school techers, students
  • Greenomes - Lab and bioinformatics exercises that introduce genetics and genome to students 
  • Arabidopsis.org - List of useful Arabidopsis teaching resources 
  • Enhancer trap lines - Different tissue-specific expression patterns useful for teaching (Geisler et al. 2002. Plant Physiology)
  • efp browser - Pictographic representation of gene expression data for Arabidopsis
  • Lehle  seeds - Arabidopsis/plant biology teaching resources
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    Seeds for teaching - Lehle, NASC
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    Multimedia

    Photos

    • Cells - a collection of high resolution images of plant cells and organelles from the Danforth Plant Science Center
    • Plant images - An organized collection of plant images from the Botanical Society of America
    • Noble foundation plant image gallery - searchable collection of images of plants and plant cells
    • Plant facts - collection of images searchable by keyword
    • Floral images - a collection of flowers in North-Western Europe, particularly the British Isles
    • Plant pictures - collection of plant images catergorised by families (mostly native wild plants)
    •  Plant image databases - Long list of plant image databases (some links are outdated/slow)
    • Image Bank - another list of plant image databases
    • Dennis Kunkel Microscopy - Nice collection of micrographs of plants (strictly requires written permission before use even for educational purposes)
    • Science Photo Library - Plant science related images searchable based on country
    • FotoSearch - A collection of searchable images (includes lots of non-scientific images which may be useful for a presentation)
    • CanStockPhoto - offers professional royalty free stock images starting at $1. might require free membership for lower price.
    • Flowerinfo - beautiful pictures of a number of flowers and background information about flower types/groups.
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      Videos

           

      • Plants in motion - a collection of video recordings of plant movements
      • PBS teacher source - Collection of videos and techer guides (Select age category and subject to see the list of materials)
      • Library video - a collection of plant science videos for purchase (different choices available for different age groups/purpose) 
      • Stock photography - collection of plant videos
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      Animations

           

      • Wisconsin on-line - collection of learning objecs (animations) that can be used for teaching (requires free registration and permission to use)
      • U Alberta Instructional multimedia - Animations about botany, cell biology, genetics, microbiology etc.
      • Educypedia - A long list of links to biology animations
      • Virtual plants - a neat resource from INRA, France and Univ of Queensland; has plant animations
      • Library of crop technology - some neat animated lessons on plant biology
      • Science animations - List of science animations useful for teaching (incl. plant biology)
      • Cells alive - a collection of interactive images, animations and videos of cells and microbes (includes a plant cell too)
      • Wiley Interscience - Interactive animations about cells
      • Science Learning Network - List of useful science learning links
      • Life cycle - Animations about life cycles of different organisms 
      • Edumedia - A few nice plant animations (free light version; full version needs subscription)
      • Micrometeorology - Animations about plant water relations
      • Science Optics - Zoom in from space to the nucleus of a carbon atom in the DNA of an oak tree's epidermal cell in Florida! (Cool?)
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      Games

           

      • Planet Biotech - a suite of three interactive games to learn about plant biotechnology (under development)
      • Ecokids - A few games about plants and ecology
      • Bet on the farm - Try virtual farming in Ohio, manage a farm and see how you fare!
      • Simfarm - manage a farm with crops and animals (from the makers of simcity)
      • JC-schools - a collection of games and teaching materials from various sources about plants
      • Wild kids - fun discovery about nature (UNDER CONSTRUCTION!)
      • picadome - Collection of educational activities and games about plants
      • Primary games - Few word and puzzle games about plants