The project “Educar para conhecer, proteger e monitorizar os castanheiros através da tecnologia IoT”, co-financed by Fundo Ambiental, was presented last week to 12th graders from Agrupamento de Escolas do Sabugal.
Approximately 50 students in Biology, Technology and Tourism spent part of the morning and the afternoon of November 4th with the InnovPlantProtect (InPP) team, to understand the importance of protecting trees, and in particular chestnuts, which are a local natural heritage. The project, led by InPP, is conducted by Sabugal Municipality (SM).
The day was an Education 4.0 experience, where traditional disciplines such as Biology and Ecology were integrated with a description and explanation of the application of IoT technolgy to tree monitoring. By chance, the presentation coincided with the COP 26 Climate Summit, linking perfectly which the topics discussed in Glasgow, Scotland.
In the afternoon, the students were taken to a chestnut grove (souto, in Portuguese) used as an area of study by the InPP and SM team. Here, they could see and understand directly how the IoT sensors work. The visit to the souto was an opportunity for them to be involved in practical exercises and learn how to measure some physical parameters of the trees, such as the height, diameter and width of the canopy, using traditional methods, as well as seeing some of the more modern tools in action.
The students visited a chestnut grove… …for an in loco and hands-on and learning experience