I Wonder...

We have been in the Wonder Room a lot lately wondering about telescopes and the life of a water droplet as it goes through the water cycle. Here are some photos from our experiences:

Studying/Building Telescopes:

 

Traveling through the water cycle:

Solar System in Toilet Paper

We did our Toilet Tissue Solar System. We had to have a lot of tissue paper for that. Each 1 peace of toilet paper was 30 million miles. It took 2 rolls of toilet paper. Some toilet paper tarred apart so we had to tape it back. Neptune is far away from Uranus. Earth is about 90 million miles away from the Sun! We did not do Pluto because we did not have that much space in our hall to put 366 sheets. And Pluto is not a planet it’s a Dwarf Planet.                             

By: Nathan and Dmitriy

Phases of the Moon

Science

The moon phases are new moon, waxing crescent, first quarter, waxing gibbous, full moon, waning gibbous, last quarter, waning crescent, and new moon. The Northern hemisphere and the Southern hemisphere see the same side of the moon even though they are in different parts of the world because the Earth rotates.

By: Kayley Fowler

We have been learning the phases of the moon a variety of ways the past few weeks, including keeping a lunar log throughout the month where students have to record their observations of the moon nightly. We also made the moon phases out of Oreos. Yum!

-Miss Glay

Westward Ho!

This week our students took a journey west on Lewis and Clark's Corps of Discovery. Throughout the day Tuesday, they rotated to each classroom where they were immersed in different integrated activities that helped them understand the experiences and struggles faced by settlers moving west.

 

 

 

 

In the first station, students participated in three activities: 1) Building and using their own telescopes 2) Studying a real telescope, learning how a telescope works, and drawing a diagram of the telescope and  3) Reading an article to learn how Lewis & Clark used telescopes and similar tools on their journey!

 

 

 

 

 

In the second station, students learned how to design routes across mountains and streams that would have been fast, safe, and inexpensive for settlers. In order to do this, students learned to read and create topographic maps. Students were taught how to use contour lines to determine change in elevation.

 

 

Next, students created a 3-Dimensional map using play-dough. They plotted the Missouri and Missippi Rivers, the Rocky Mountains, and Lewis & Clark's journey. They also used a map scale to determine the distance of Lewis & Clark's route.

 

 

In the next stations, students used iPads and iPods to learn more about the motives pioneers had for traveling west, along with the struggles they faced.

 

 

 

This information came in handy in the next station, where students were taught how to keep a diary of their pretend journey out west! Students used information learned in the other stations to help them.

 

 

Finally, students got to meet John Colter, a mountain man, who is on his way out west with Lewis and Clark!! 

 

 

Thank you for joining us in our expedition west!

 

 

So, how big is the solar system?!

Solar System made out of Cereal

Every cheerio was 30,000,000 miles away. We put a fruit loop for Neptune and it was 33 cheerios on it [it was 900,000,000 miles.] Then we put a fruit loop on for Uranus and it was 30 cheerios [90,000,000 miles.] Then a fruit loop for Saturn and it was 14 cheerios [420,000,000.] Then a fruit loop for Jupiter and 12 cheerios [360,000,000.] Then a fruit loop for Mars and it was 1 cheerio [30,000,000.] Then a fruit loop for Earth and it was 1 cheerio [30,000,000.] Then a fruit loop for Venus and it was 1 cheerio [30,000,000.] Then a fruit loop for Mercury and it was 1 cheerio [30,000,000.] The last thing we did was a honeycomb for the sun.  

By: Cameron and Caroline 

We also measured out the solar system to scale with toilet paper!

Finally, we made a model of the sun, moon, and Earth out of Playdough!!