Thursday January 8 2015

Thursday January 8 2015

Ms. Jaskolka apologizes for the late post. She has been resting because she has been sick.

Tremendous Thursday!

We began the day learning from a real scientist about structures!! We began by discussing various structures and if there were human or natural made. Some examples were: a water slide, a bird’s nest, and a bridge. We were then broken off into different groups and we took turns at the various stations to learn more about structures. We conducted a bridge experiment where we came to the conclusion that a corrugated beam is able to hold the most amount of weight; we used pennies to conduct this experience. We also built two different structures out of straws and connecters. We made one long and short structure and a structure that was thin and tall. Then we preformed a wind test to see which structure would fall down. We quickly found out that the tall and thin structure was not stable enough to withstand the wind test. This experiment showed us how important it is to have a strong foundation, especially when a structure is tall. We learned more about stability using our bodies. We stood in different positions to see when we are most stable. We figured out that we are the most stable when we are lying down. We discussed what we know about habitats and then learned how they are effected by hydro dams, a man made structure. We came to the conclusion that hydro dams can have serious effects on all wildlife and therefore we should try figure out various ways that we can use electricity less. Some student suggestions were: playing outside instead of watching television, turning off the lights when we are not using them.  We also inquired into compression and tension.

Here we are having fun learning about science!!! 

Afterwards, we worked in groups to make bridges using only tape and newspaper. We were told that our bridges needed to hold three textbooks!! This was a challenge but by this point we have become experienced engineers and when scientist Angela tested each of our bridges, they all held up the textbooks!!

After first lunch we had French.

When students returned we wrote our homework in our agendas.

At the end of the day we had Math. We reviewed adding by 10’s. For example: 80+8. We discussed what would stay the same (the number in the ten’s column) and what would change (the number in the one’s column). We then moved on to adding two-digit numbers by two digit numbers. For example 60+11: with this question, the number in the one’s column stays the same because we are adding a number with 0. All we need to so is add the numbers in the tens column to get the sum.

Here is another example and strategy:

30+15

We know 30 can be broken up into 3 groups of 10 (10+10+10)

We can then add this to 15 (15+10+10+10)