Tsinghua University Press Information Technology Grade 5 Textbook — Aquaponics Open-Source System Unit (2024)

Summary

The 2024 Tsinghua University Press (清华大学出版社) edition of the compulsory-education textbook 《信息科技》五年级上册 (Information Technology, Grade 5, Volume 1) devotes its entire Unit 2 to aquaponics under the title "鱼菜共生开源系统——系统的反馈与优化" (The Fish-Vegetable Symbiosis Open-Source System — System Feedback and Optimization). Lesson 1, "了解开源文化——参与开源社区" (Understanding Open-Source Culture — Joining the Open-Source Community), introduces open-source concepts through the aquaponics example; Lesson 3, "搭建鱼菜共生开源系统——把反馈引入控制系统" (Building the Aquaponics Open-Source System — Introducing Feedback into the Control System), has students construct and program a working feedback-controlled system; Lesson 4, "鱼菜共生小实验——从数据提炼知识与观点" (Aquaponics Mini-Experiment — Extracting Knowledge and Opinions from Data), covers data collection and analysis. The unit is aligned with China's 2022 compulsory-education Information Technology curriculum standard (过程与控制 / "process and control" module) and targets core competencies of information awareness, computational thinking, digital learning and innovation, and information social responsibility. The edition is in classroom use (documented in Guizhou province adoption lists) with a large ecosystem of teacher-made slide decks and lesson plans on Chinese resource-sharing platforms.

Guiding Principles

• Open Source — the unit explicitly teaches open-source culture and community participation as its entry lesson, framing the aquaponics controller as an open-source system students can study, modify, and share.
• STEM Integration — one living system carries information technology (sensors, control, data), biology (fish-plant-nitrogen cycle), and engineering (system build).
• Sustainability Literacy (learning outcome) — the textbook's stated competency goals include understanding the relationship between ecological environment and agricultural production through the aquaponics experiment.

Learning Outcomes & Transferable Skills

Students gain Systems Thinking (feedback loops, closed-loop control), introductory Coding (programming the controller), Data Literacy (collecting and reasoning from system data in Lesson 4), Biology fundamentals (the nitrogen cycle linking fish and plants), and Sustainability Literacy. Because it is a nationally adopted textbook unit, the skills are benchmarked to official curriculum-standard competencies, making them directly transferable to other project-based STEM work.

How to Replicate or Build On It

1. Obtain the textbook 《信息科技》五年级上册, 清华大学出版社 2024 edition (adopted at least in Guizhou; check provincial textbook catalogs).
2. Teacher communities share free slide decks and lesson plans for every lesson of Unit 2 on platforms such as 学科网 (zxxk.com) and 21世纪教育网 (21cnjy.com) — search "清华版2024 鱼菜共生开源系统".
3. Recreate the build with any micro:bit/Arduino-class controller, a small pump, and a desktop fish tank with grow bed; the pedagogy (feedback → optimization → data) transfers to any hardware.
4. Connect to the maker pipeline in nanning-youth-3d-printing and the policy mandate in seven-ministry-stem-education-guidelines-2025.

Considerations & Constraints

• Cost: Textbook is a low-cost state-priced schoolbook (provincial price lists show comparable 信息科技 volumes at roughly 8–12 RMB); a physical aquaponics build adds hardware cost (~100–500 RMB for a classroom desktop system).
• Skill Level: Beginner — designed for Grade 5 students with no prior programming.
• Space/Climate: Classroom-based; a desktop tank suffices, climate-irrelevant.
• Tools Required: Textbook, computer, open-source hardware controller (micro:bit/Arduino class), small pump, tank, and grow bed for the hands-on build.
• Ongoing Maintenance: Low for the lessons themselves; the living system needs routine feeding and water checks.
• Access Barriers: Chinese-language only; no translation. The publisher's catalog page for this specific volume could not be located on tup.com.cn, so primary_source is marked unknown; third-party teacher-platform pages confirm the unit's contents but are not primary sources. Teacher-shared materials on resource platforms may require paid memberships.

Prerequisites

None. Sits naturally alongside seven-ministry-stem-education-guidelines-2025 as an implementation-ready curriculum.

Primary Source

unknown — the Tsinghua University Press catalog page for this specific volume was not found on 2026-09-12 (the press website indexes higher-education titles but not this K-12 textbook). Existence and unit contents are corroborated by multiple teacher-resource platforms hosting the textbook's own lesson slides, e.g. 21世纪教育网 https://www.21cnjy.com/14/274525_6 and 学科网 https://xx.zxxk.com/p/books-catalog271216/ (both live as of 2026-09-12; third-party, not primary). Logged for the gaps file.