Etch 'n Sketch Reflections

That's been me for most of the last few days of winter break. It's just really hard to wake up on any given morning of break and know what day it is! So, yeah, maybe I kind of forgot that today was Thursday and that I needed to work on my blog (although once I did realize it, I seriously thought about not doing it). Nevertheless, I figured I would at least do a short post. I can't really say I have a lot to report on since last week, as this has been some much-needed rest and relaxation time during the holidays. I've had some nice time with family and friends so far, as well as some additional get-togethers scheduled in the coming days. Winter break has also been a good opportunity to take care of some "to-do" items around the house. And, of course, there is grading and planning to do. Those projects that my classes wrapped up prior to leaving for the break are waiting to be graded, so I am carving out some time to solely focus on them. So, seeing as how I...

It's been a whirlwind of a week leading up to Winter Break, but the students have been kept pretty busy this week to keep their minds occupied and not distracted by the coming vacation. Both the 7th and 8th-grade classes have been wrapping up some projects. Of course, there were still occurrences that drew their attention away from their work, but I have to say how proud of them I am that they were able to hold things together and be productive. The 7th graders have been working on group projects related to natural hazards, in which they got to select a weather-related natural hazard to learn more about and then create a presentation. The students needed to research what causes the hazards, where the hazards are typically located, the frequency and strength of the hazards, the effects of the hazards, and what technologies have been developed to mitigate the effects. The students were given a few ideas for how they would like to give their presentations, and most of them chose to m...

That how these last few weeks have been! It's crazy to think that next Thursday I'll be posting this blog with just one day left before Christmas break...but time flies! Speaking of flying, we had some fun with flight this week! The 8th grade science students had a design challenge this week to use some engineering skills on a piece of phone book paper to create something called a tumblewing. We were learning about the crosscutting concept of systems and looking into how the different parts of the tumblewing system need to work together to allow the system to operate correctly. To complete the lab, the students needed to first collect some control data by trying to "fly" a regular piece of phone book paper by propelling it with a piece of cardboard, which would create an updraft, and timing how long it took. But, predictably, it pretty much just flopped to the ground. Then they needed to engineer the tumblewings by making folds in the wing that would catch the updraft...

Already? Would you believe me if I told you that today was the 65th day of school? I happen to know because we put the days in our science journal daily entries. And knowing what point we are at in the school year makes me feel pretty good when I think about my pace in my units. We are one-third of the way through the school year, and in both my 7th and 8th grade classes we have completed two of our 6 units (for those of you who are a little rusty with your calculations, that is also one-third :-) Not too shabby, if I say so myself! (Knock on wood) It's been another pretty good week (and it didn't feel as long as last week). The 7th grade students have been hard at work applying some of their math skills in the science classroom by graphing and analyzing average and interpreting temperature data for the last 116 years in order to make a claim about global temperature patterns. Additionally, the students continued to work on climate change projects that they started at the end ...