Keeping Parents/Guardians Informed

You can assist parents’ understanding of the Tomatosphere Project by keeping them informed. Tomatosphere is committed to the improvement of students’ scientific literacy and their acquisition of knowledge about space and agriculture, and practical experiences in hypothesis testing, data collection and decision-making. The Project Team encourages you to communicate with the parents through your normal school communications methods – a letter to the home, electronic mail or as part of the school website or newsletter. The information below can be used/modified to fit your needs. Some schools have developed blogs to record and communicate results.

Tomatosphere is a Canadian-based research project involving more than 12, 500 classrooms of Grades 2 to grade 10 students ("Tomatonauts") across Canada and the United States. Tomatosphere is part of Canada’s contribution to long-term space travel in association with several other space agencies from around the world including NASA and the European Space Agency.

The project is directly connected to the science curriculum in Canada through the Pan-Canadian Science Protocol used as a model for science curriculum by most provinces. The project enables students to make a contribution to a real science experiment involving research related to the development of seeds with a high germination rate for prolonged space travel.

Insert a statement such as "This year, your student in Ms X's class will have the opportunity to contribute to this project by incorporating the Tomatosphere experiment into the regular science curriculum.

Food availability and life support are major limiting factors in extended space exploration. Plants will be needed to provide a source of fresh, nutritious food and to produce a vital life support system - including oxygen, fresh water and carbon dioxide uptake. Scientists need to know if space travel affects plant germination and plant growth, before these extended missions can take place.

The tomato seeds used in the experiment are a plum tomato seed from traditional, conventional sources and have not been altered through any means (including biotechnology). They are a variety of seed from H.J. Heinz Canada - H9478 F1.

For 2011, students will use seeds that have been exposed to a simulated space environment at the University of Guelph. The exposure simulates what would happen to seeds if a breach in the storage system of the space vehicle took place as it was heading to the planet, Mars. This is the “non-control” group of seeds; students will also be planting a “control” group of seeds with no influence from other forces. The space environment simulator at the University of Guelph has temperatures of -90oC and almost vacuum-like conditions. Although radiation levels would be higher in space, these seeds were NOT exposed to higher levels of radiation.

The students will observe:

Students will learn about the exciting world of science, space exploration, food and nutrition. The emphasis is on the life support environment that is required in space. However, applications are also made to the sustainability of life here on earth.

You may want to insert a section here relating the experiment to curriculum. For example, "The curriculum focus is related to the Pan-Canadian Science Protocol. For grades 3 and 4, the emphasis is on the plants, for grades 5 and 6, the focus is on space and living in space, and for grades 8-10, the central themes relate to energy and the environment."

Parents who are interested in finding out more about the Tomatosphere Project can visit the project website – www.tomatosphere.org - for more detailed information about the project which has been in operation now for 10 years.

Alternatively, you could send home a "skills" list as was done in one school in Alberta.

Click here to see the letter sent home to the parents of a grade 5 class by their teacher, Bev Thirsk.