Wisconsin Fast Plants
Plant Nutrition Kit

These guidelines have been compiled by the Science Faculty at Ft. Richmond Collegiate, a public high school in Winnipeg, Manitoba. They are offered as helpful supplemental guidelines and directions to the Wisconsin Fast Plants Plant Nutrition Kit, as the Faculty has adopted it for use with the GENB1000 plant growth chamber in the classroom.  

Supplemental Guidelines and Directions

First ensure that you have the two workbooks/instruction booklets:

  1. Wisconsin Fast Plants Growing Instructions
  2. Wisconsin Fast Plants Plant Nutrition Kit (Teacher’s Manual and Student Guide)

We suggest using a highlighter marker to keep track of each step that you are taking. It is important to note that the entire life cycle for this kit will take you between 35 to 40 days. Any shorter or longer and one is likely missing a step.

Wisconsin Fast Plants Growing Instructions (teachers should be aware of these steps and the days that students need to physically work with their plants.)

This booklet gives you a quick overview of the process including the number of days for each step (as Wisconsin fast Plants may update their instructions from time to time, the pages referenced below may not exactly correspond)

  • Day One – Planting (pages 8 – 10) – Ensure that the soil in the quad is moist prior to planting. You may wish to add a bit of water to the soil prior to placing into the quad.
  • Day Four / Five – Thinning (Page 11) Note that we have found that transplanting the seedlings is not always successful. When thinning be careful not to dislodge the seedling that you plan on saving. We would suggest using your finger to hold the soil in the cell in place while removing the excess seedlings
  • Day Twelve – (page 11) We have found the bees to be quite brittle so do not force and make sure that you use a drop of white glue on the tip of the toothpick and then allow them to dry overnight before use.
  • Day Thirteen to Sixteen – (page 12) These are the pollinating days when the flowers are present. Note that the Brassica rapa do not self-pollinate so each flower has to be touched with a bee as a pollinator.
  • Day Seventeen to Thirty-five – (page 13) Seedpods will develop over this time and remember to allow for 20 days after final pollination to complete their development
  • Day Thirty-five to Forty – (page 13) Remove the plants from the water but keep them in the chamber to dry.
  • Day Forty – (page 13) This is the harvest day. Make sure you roll the pod over a piece of paper to collect the seeds. You should count both the number of seed pods produced by each plant in the quad as well as the number of seeds for your data records. These seeds may be kept for a future experiment so store in a ziplock bag or sealed Tupperware container and keep in a cool dry place.

Wisconsin Fast Plants Plant Nutrition Kit (this is both a teacher and student guide and workbook)

This booklet has student pages that NEED to be photocopied (pages S-1 to S-6) prior to the first class. It is recommended that each student has a copy and that if students are working in groups, that one copy needs to be completed in such a way that is ready to be handed in for assessment purposes.

The Styrofoam can be separated into the quads so each group has a minimum of one quad to work with. Depending on the size of the class and groups, students may work with more than one quad.

Note that the booklet on Page S-1 and outlined in Step 1 asks you to label the cells within the quad as per the number of fertilizer pellets being used – (0, 4, 8, 12). As you may wish to use the quads for different activities at a later date that does not use this numbering system the suggestion is to label the cells as 1, 2, 3, 4.  DO NOT put your name directly on the Styrofoam as these quads will be used again. As per the guidebook, label the planting stake with your initials and place in one of the cells.

Planting Instructions – (page S-1) We would provide each student with a small beaker of potting soil as well as the quad, planting stick, four wicks, and eyedropper. We would also provide each group the number of seeds they need to put into their quad – if 3 seeds per cell then each group needs to have 12 seeds in a test tube or small beaker. The same applies for the fertilizer seeds. Each group should be provided 24 pellets in a small container.

The key here is that the cells need to be wet but not soaked! You are supposed to see water drip out the bottom of the quad where the wicks protrude.

The booklet has a table that the students can use to track their plant growth.  (pages S-5 & S-6)

We would also include in the table that the booklet has the number of seeds per pod.

Another table that can be adapted for this activity follows. This table relates plant height on three specific days for measurement.

Download the table here