Birdie's Journal

Monday 12/3/07: Our teacher assigned us a wonderful project dedicated to the helpful bacteria, the BIFIDOBACTERIUM! Taylor is my partner we are beginning to set up our website for the first time. Ms. Jansen came and taught us how to make our wiki webpage. Taylor and I set up some of the links on our webpage and changed the format. I began researching the basics on Bifidobacterium and Taylor set up the website in general by adding titles, pages, and links. At home, I began to work on finding information of Bifidobacterium.

Tuesday 12/4/07: I found the some interesting info on Bifidobacteria which will be added to my notes page. Taylor changed the color of the website. We researched more about the bacteria and are beginning to add more links to our page. We finished our timeline today and thought about ideas for how we are going to present our website.

Wednesday 12/5/07: Ms. Jansen returned today and taught us how to sort out websites with bad information. We found a really funny website about a rare tree octopus… and mountain walruses and stuff. This really helped me learn how websites can be helpful or... not. I found all the information on the classification of bifidobacterium from the most helpful website in the world. Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bifidobacteria Check it out. It is super duper exciting.

Thursday 12/6/07: We realized that our presentation information is easier than it seemed. We just need to think of ideas for how we are going to present our website. Yep. Also I added a lovely picture of a Bifidobacterium. I went to Brittancia online which proved to have little information on Bifidobacteria. Taylor and I began looking for videos of our bacteria. Sure enough! There were two videos that contained Bifidobacterium. Neither of which contributed to our research or our webpage.

Friday 12/7/07- So... today. I researched to habitat and living conditions of the bifidobacterium. I actually looked through the Biology book, but there was nothing in it about the habitat. So... I went back to the wikipedia site. The information was right there! I found out the habitat, more about the discovery of bifidobacteria, and its role in the world. I also searched through some of the books at my house that had to do with Bifidobacteria. My dad had some science books... I don't know why... but he did. And though I looked through most of the books, I found little information on the bifidobacteria. All the info I found had to do with the info I had already found.

Saturday and Sunday 12/8/07-12/9/07- Since it was the weekend, I had more things to do; this left me little time to research my bacteria. But! I did it anyway. I am ahead according to the timeline. I have already found the information on habitat and classification. So I looked for more basic information on the bifidobacterium. I put the information I found into a word document and it was posted on the page. After returning from a friends house on sunday, I checked up on the website and changed some of the information I had previously posted.

Monday 12/10/07- I found all the information on the habitat of the Bifidobacteria and emailed it to Taylor, who made it a page. I added more information to my notes. I added the page on Reproduction, but without any information. The info will come soon!

Tuesday 12/11/07- I have been keeping this journal as a word document, so I took it, and pasted all the information since friday. I went back to the lovely wikipedia site and got the information on the gram stain and such. All of that information I found is located on the homepage. Go. Look now. It is mind blowing.

Wednesday 12/12/07- Awesome. So I was looking through Taylor's Journal... and the website she found of today is so helpful! I was supposed to look up the beneficial properties of the bifidobacterium, and I found the mother load of information! They help keep away pathogens, destroys harmful E. Coli strains, and help treat Irritable Bowel syndrome! Yippee! I will put this all into my notes later but thanks to Taylor, I found the necessary information for the things I needed accomplished.

Thursday 12/13/07- Timeline says: Birdie will be starting on reproduction of Bifidobacteria. So! That's what I did. I went to the databases... Gale Group in particular. It is so bizarre! There is absolutely no information of the Bifidobacterium ANYWHERE on the databases. About an hour of searching later... and still no results. For some reason, it is impossible for anyone to add information about Bifidobacterium to anything. Thank goodness anybody who wants to learn about it can come to our marvelous website.

Friday 12/14/07- Mrs. Rasmussen, after we turned in our lab reports, told us all about our website evaluation. This is to be anwsered by us and by the class. We need to make questions to give to the class after we presented our website and we need to fill out one aswell. After she finished talking, I began writing some questions with Taylor and I also set up my notes page.

Saturday 12/15/07 and Sunday 12/16/07- These are the last two days we have to work on our site!! On Saturday, I went through my notes and set up the Reproduction page, the Helpfulness page, and finished up my notes page. I went through, added information to all of those pages, and checked the other pages for good information. On Sunday, I finished adding information to all the pages. I went back, checked through all of them again, and am writing my last journal. I am on a hurried schedule because the website is due... at 5:00 SHARP! I emailed out website evaluation questions to Taylor and signed off of the website... for the last time!

I hope our website was helpful to you in learning about Bifidobacteria! Come back soon!

Sources:

Wikipedia Article on Bifidobacterium: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bifidobacteria (Björkstén B, Sepp E, Julge K, Voor T, and Mikelsaar M. 2001. Allergy development and the intestinal microflora during the first year of life. Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology, Volume 108, Issue 4, Pages 516-520. Abstract available.

Guarner F and Malagelada JR. 2003. Gut flora in health and disease. The Lancet, Volume 361, Issue 9356, 8 February 2003, Pages 512-519. Abstract available.It helps your stomach absorb food.

Ishibashi, N., Yaeshima, T., Hayasawa, H. (1997). Bifidobacteria: their significance in human intestinal health. Malaysian Journal of Nutrition 3, 149–159.)