In Project Discovery, first graders are exploring various habitats and we are currently assessing our outdoor surroundings to decide whether or not Barrett is a good place for animals to call home! We are building our knowledge for an upcoming design challenge--creating a habitat for our model Blue Crabs, using some of the evidence from our findings outside!
This week the students from the classes of Mrs. Bruce, Mrs. Gomez, and Mrs. Owsley participated in sea turtle activities in the Discovery Lab. For half the time students used the laptop computers (most of which were purchased with our NASA and Toyota grants) to play an online sea turtle migration game and to view videos on the National Geographic Kids website. For the other half of the time students made foldable flipbooks that will be used on their next visit to the Discovery Lab. You may be interested in reading an article on the CHANGING environment and endangered sea turtles that was published in the New York Times this week. We will discuss this article during our next lesson in the Discovery Lab.
Mr. Bryer shared his career with all three fourth grade classes during presentations on Thursday and Friday. Mr. Bryer's presentation connected nicely to the 4th graders' study of the Chesapeake Bay watershed and the plant and animal life in the bay. Mr. Bryer talked about his work to restore the oyster populations. Click here to see photos related to an oyster restoration project. Thanks Mr. Bryer for an informative presentation!
In conjunction with Barrett's annual Career Week, Project Discovery has hosted several career week speakers over the last two weeks.
Third graders heard Mr. Rick Nagle (Mrs. Nagle's husband) speak of his career as a navy officer and his work with aquatic life. Also, we had Mr. Carey Johnston speak to Ms. Toussant's class about his job as an environmental engineer and his work with water quality control.
Fifth graders spoke with Mr. Bruce Moravchik, NOAA Specialist, about his career with NOAA and the kinds of skills needed to pursue a career in ocean exploration.
Career speakers in December include:
Dr. Emilia Costin, a toxicologist, will share her career with 4th graders.
Dr. Susan Garfinkel, a molecular biologist, has created a visually stunning, animated PowerPoint presentation to share with 5th graders.
Mr. Ken Lavish will share his work with the endangered whooping cranes with our Kindergarten students.
Later in the year, we will host more career speakers, which will tie into current topics discussed in the Discovery lab and classrooms. Most importantly, we hope that our speakers provide inspiration to our students to work hard and to dream BIG!!!!
Here are a few pictures! Enjoy!
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Posted by Allyson Greene at 1:00 PM
11/10/2009
4th Graders...Design Challenge: A Watershed Model
Ms. Royston's class did an outstanding job designing a model of a watershed. They worked together in small teams and used their engineering minds to construct an accurate model as all of the 'pollution' washed away into the large body of water when Hurricane Royston hit! Nice work, Ms. Royston's class!
Posted by Allyson Greene at 12:00 PM
11/4/2009
Design Challenge: A Watershed Model
Ms. Royston's 4th graders were challenged to design a model of a watershed in today's Discovery Lab lesson. Students had to plan their designs and be sure that they would clearly how a watershed moves water over a piece of land. Students also had to create a key to represent their chosen pollutants.
As you can see from the video, this class really got into the challenge and met our expectations in an outstanding manner! Way to go, Ms. Royston's class!
This Wednesday through Friday the Kindergarten students started learning about whooping cranes. We will be studying whooping cranes and following the current migration from now through December.
This online video from National Geographic gives an excellent overview of the endanangered whooping cranes
This week all 4th grade students participated in watershed demonstrations facilitated by Ms. Hodges from Arlingtonians for a Clean Environment. The students learned about point and nonpoint pollution as they "made a mess" of the watershed model. Coming up in the Discovery Lab the students will make their own watershed models. Also, Mr. Bryer will talk about his work with the Nature Conservancy related to the Chesapeake Bay Watershed and the Oyster Restoration project.
