Antler Lamp Art

We have started our class art project, which will be auctioned off at the Fund the Arts Auction. We are making an antler lamp. First, we had to figure out how to attach 3 antlers in a way that it will support a lamp shade. We drilled holes and glued in some nails. Next, we had to figure out how to get the electrical cord through the antlers, so it looks more professional. We are still working on that, but think we have the holes drilled through 2 antlers, we just can't get the cord up...yet. Below you can see one student pose with the drill that we had to use. The teacher braced the antlers as different students carefully drilled hole to hole.

Paper Rockets

Today we continued our exploring science that deal's with earth's gravity on pulling things towards earth's center. We shot our paper rockets and analyzed their flight and collected some quantitative data. This will help us redesign new rockets for, hopefully, even better flight that tries to counter-act gravity as best they can.

Discovery Museum Visit

We had a great educational visit to the Discovery Museum today. We had the opportunity to explore the museum in small groups for almost and hour. Following this, we had a hands-on lab dealing with "survival of the fittest".

Straw Rockets

We started out rocket unit in science. This week we are making straw rockets and collecting data on a variety of different aspects regarding forces during the flight. We have one more day of collecting data and then discussions based upon student data that was collected.

The Speed Trap

We have now conducted half of our science investigation in determining what percent of cars speed over the 15 mph speed limit on Plumb Lane outside our school. Using a borrowed radar gun, we collected data this morning for almost 30 minutes. The most interested was a vehicle that was exceeding 40 mph! We will head out one more time before school lets out to collect data of afternoon drivers and then use the data during math tomorrow.

Jr. Achievement

We are now into week 3 of Jr. Achievement. This week's lesson focused on the importance of communication, written or spoken. Students played "game" that didn't provide all the directions before playing to help them come to understand the importance of clear communication. Key concepts this week included: supply, demand, engineering, and skills.

Winning Videos

We had two student groups from our class that placed in the state competition for the energy saving videos we made back in November. Congratulations to both groups, who were honored in an awards ceremony on Saturday and who will also be splitting award money between each member of the group. One group took 1st place and the other group took 2nd place. Nice job! The winning videos can be seen at http://greenchips.org/energy-smart-video-contest-winners/