Amazing Story of Sportsmanship

This is a great story about sportsmanship in competitive swimming.




Here is the full note:

What do you all think about that?

Seven Wonders of the Ancient World

Students are creating a postcard on one of the seven wonders of the ancient world that is due Friday. Here are some websites to help with this assignment:

National Geographic Kids

Mr. Donn (Mr. Donn has many resources for social studies and science)

Kids Gen

Can't wait to see the creativity and interesting information on Friday!

Mesopotamia Bulletin Board

Bulletin board from class focusing on Mesopotamia and the five essential statements / questions.

               Government and Law

                       Geography

Who affects who?

Comparing civilizations and social classes

Writing a Bibliography

Anytime a research paper is written a bibliography or works cited page should be included. This page should be the last page, should be titled either Bibliography or Works Cited and should include all the resources that were used to create the research paper in alphabetical order.

The easiest way to create a bibliography is to follow an example. A quick Google search on creating a bibliography using MLA style will provide many examples of how a bibliography is created. The students also received a packet of information on how to cite sources and how to create a bibliography. A copy of that document can be found here: MLA Document Sources

Another way to complete the bibliography is to find an online bibliography creator. One example is citationmachine.net. Another example is  http://education.bluevalleyk12.org/KidBib/. These websites allow a person to put in the information in blanks and then the website will complete the entry. Please note that these entries will then need to be copied and pasted into a word document once they are created since they only create one at a time.

Here is a copy of the rubric for the research paper that the students received last week Science Fair Research Report Rubric

Mesopotamia

Students have been learning about Mesopotamia for the last week. Here are some interesting websites on Mesopotamia.

Mr. Donn's history page on Mesopotamia  Mr. Donn offers websites on many different civilizations and has a tremendous amount of information on many topics. Some of the links are power points, games, and interesting readings.

National Geographic For Kids - Includes an interesting video on Mesopotamia

Ducksters History of Mesopotamia - A lot of interesting information on different parts of Mesopotamia

Kids Newsroom on Mesopotamia - Shorter entries on different topics of Mesopotamia

Color Lab: Graduated Cylinder Practice

We used the concept of mixing primary colors to practice reading graduated cylinders. Here are some pictures: 

Trying to create the color of Sperry's 

Recreating the rainbow

Science Tools

There are many important tools that scientists use to measure data. This week students have been working with triple beam balances, graduated cylinders, and rulers. Here are some websites to practice reading and using triple beam balances and graduated cylinders.

Triple Beam Balance Website

Graduated Cylinder Practice

Different Types of Measurement Practice

Here are some pictures from our lab we did this week on growing gummy bears and worms. Some of the vocabulary words and concepts we discussed during this lab were:

length
width
height / depth
volume
mass density

Before and After

 Before and After

 

 

Where is the gummy bear? 

 

5 Themes of Geography

The five themes of geography were created to help study the world and its history. The five themes are:

Location
Place
Human Environmental Interaction
Movement
Region

There will be a quiz on Wednesday on the five themes. The students have a study guide to follow and notes in their spiral notebook as well. Here are a few more resources that may help.

5 Themes Rap:



5 Themes Video with Students:

5 Themes Quiz:


Flash Card Help - This link will take you to online flash cards on the five themes of geography.

 

Writing a Hypothesis

In our study on the scientific method, we have been identifying variables and focusing on making every experiment a "fair test" by only changing one variable at a time. Another piece of this puzzle is to figure out how to write a hypothesis.

A hypothesis is an educated guess and can be written several ways. One way is to write "I think" statements and make a prediction of what will happen that can be tested and measured. One example would be, "I think boat design number two will hold the most washers." You can also make this hypothesis stronger by adding a reason. "I think boat design number two will hold the most washers because it has a wide base."

Another way to write a hypothesis that we are learning this year is to write an if / then statement. If (I do this), then (this will happen). This also helps students to identify the variables because the independent variable is the if and the dependent variable is the then. If (independent variable), then (dependent variable). Example with the independent variable in yellow and the dependent variable in green.

"If I design a boat to hold the most amount of washers, then a boat with a wide base will hold more washers than a boat with a narrow base." 

You can also add a reason to this as well.

"If I design a boat to hold the most amount of washers, then a boat with a wide base will hold more washers than a boat with a narrow base because the wider base will distribute the weight evenly throughout the boat."  

Sciencebuddies.org has a helpful description on this topic. Be sure to click on the tabs to look at the explanation and samples.

Scientific Method

Our focus last week and this week, will be on the scientific method. The scientific method may be written or explained many different ways, but we will focus on seven steps.

Problem / Purpose / Question
Research
Hypothesis
Controlled Experiment
Analyze Results
Conclusion
Possible Errors

In order to help us discover the scientific method last week, the students completed a lab on buoyancy. Here is a short video with some of their designs.

*** Important post in the middle of this week. Focus - Variables!

Boat Building Day

Here is a video related to our activity in class. Come to class tomorrow ready to change or modify your design from today. We will see who's design can hold the most washers without tipping or sinking. Remember the scientific method is all about problem solving and critical thinking.

6th Grader Helping His Community

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

6th grader, affected by learning about 9/11 in class, does something good for his community. Had to share. Love his last sentence at the end of the interview.

Constitution Day 2013

Constitution Day is Tuesday, September 17th and is celebrated in many of our schools across the nation. On Tuesday, we will learn why the Constitution is the supreme, "law of the land," all  the freedoms it provides for us that many people in other countries do not have, and we will work on mini-posters related to the Constitution. Watch this short video about the National Constitution Day poster contest. Start thinking about ideas that you think would be good to draw on a piece of paper that represent the Constitution, our government, and our freedoms. The Constitution Poster Design Contest website also contains many previous winners' designs to help you with ideas. Come to class with some great ideas about our great Constitution that has shaped our great nation!

Week in Review: Misconceptions, Scientific Law, and Scientific Theory

Science has started in our class and many of the students are excited. Our first unit in science is titled, "Scientific Knowledge and the Scientific Method." In this unit, students will explore some key concepts related to the basics of science, the scientific method and the science fair.

Students will also start tackling some misconceptions. According to one online dictionary a misconception is: a view or opinion that is incorrect because it is based on faulty thinking or understanding. Students and adults generate misconceptions as we learn about new concepts. In 6th grade we will begin to try and change these incorrect views into correct ones. The students wrote this (or something similar) in their science notebooks on Thursday on how to attack misconceptions: What did I know when I came to class, what did I learn today, how does that change what I know. A great question parents can ask their children that is more specific then "How was your day?" is, "What did you learn today that changed what you know?"

One example of this is on scientific law and theory. Many of us might agree with this picture:

 

 

The chart shows that a hypothesis turns into a theory which then turns into a law. When looking at the definitions of these terms, however, a misconception begins to show.

 

A scientific law is a description of a repeated behavior or action in nature. Laws are discovered in nature.

 

A  scientific theory is a well tested explanation of how or why something works, it may even attempt to explain why or how a law works. Theories are tested over and over again.

 

 

In looking at these definitions we can see that theories do not lead to laws and in fact these are two completely different concepts.

 



Additions to the Blog

The Homework / Quiz page has been updated to include important events that are coming in the future. The page has been updated for this coming week from September 16th - 20th.

A "Follow by Email" link has been added to the blog. By adding your email, you will be notified when there is a new post or updates. This will make it easier to know when to check the blog for information.

In Remembrance of 9/11

I imagine many posts today mention or are dedicated to this day in our history. A day when we can reflect on some of our true heroes, our military, our fire fighters, our police, our first responders, and countless citizens who looked out for each other.

This 9/11 interactive timeline is a memorial of 9/11 that includes videos, pictures, and audio recordings. I shared it briefly in class today.

This week I encourage you to thank someone in service for our city, state, or country. You may do this with a simple thank you or even write a letter.

Thank you to all who serve.

More Than Just a Blog . . .

Quick blog on a feature I have added to the blog. I have added a new page. A page is basically a website page that provides information. The page that I have added is "Upcoming Homework/Tests". This page will hopefully contain upcoming test and homework information. I hope to keep it current throughout the year, but the student's agenda still should remain as the best place to find upcoming tests and homework. This does not replace students writing in their agendas on a daily basis and bringing those agendas home.

The page links are near the top of the blog. I plan on adding more pages as different needs come up, including pages with the class syllabus, common study skills, and possibly a science fair page. When checking the blog, a quick check of the pages will help everyone keep current with where our class is headed.

Week in Review 9/3/13 - 9/6/13

Week in Review - What we learned in class this week (hopefully)! Although it was a short week, we were able to cover almost our whole unit on different types of maps and how they are used. Here is our week in review:

Tuesday, September 3rd - Lesson on how to use the scale on a map to find the distance between two different places.

Wednesday, September 4th - Lesson on climate zones and latitude lines and also time zones. The students took a "walk" through each climate zone and learned that the main factor that determines a location's climate is its latitude. There are many other factors that affect climate, but a location's latitude is what we called the "X" factor or main factor. A picture is included of the different climate zones. We also discussed time zones. If students have relatives in different time zones,  discussing the difference in time would be a great way to review this concept.

Climate Zones: Blue - Arctic / Polar Zone, Green - Temperate Zone, Orange - Tropical Zone

Thursday, September 5th - Lesson on population density. I really enjoyed watching this activity on population density as some students were able to spread out in the "rural" areas while other students had to stand on chairs and fit together in a tight space in "urban" areas.

Friday, September 6th - Last review of four types of maps definitions. Students had to write the definitions and check their notes to see how well they did. Students worked on their "One Last Vacation" project and unit vocabulary.

Students, enjoyed the week and I am looking forward to seeing you step it up on your test on Tuesday. Can't wait to see the growth from your pretest.

Post a comment on something you learned last week or a favorite activity. Post by Monday, the 9th.

Practice Quiz, pick the right map for the right purpose

Definition practice, example of one piece of the end of unit test

Welcome to Our Blog

Welcome students and parents to our first blog of the year and to be honest my first teacher blog. The main goals of this blog will be to distribute information to students and parents, to bring class content and curriculum to your students in a different and more media friendly way, and to provide an opportunity for the students to enhance their learning through different types of media. This might include watching a video on the blog, exploring different links or even posting comments and possibly blogging themselves in the future. I would like to stress that this is a work in process, that simplicity will be stressed in the beginning, that mistakes may happen, but with the understanding that great accomplishments come from humble beginnings.

Another purpose of the blog is to have fun and learn a lot about the world and each other. So the last part of this post will be dedicated to some interesting summer vacation photos either from this year or years past. Here are a few of mine. Feel free to vote for your favorite. Post a comment by putting the number of your favorite picture with your first name and last initial. Looking forward to a great year!



1. Careful



2. Perfect summer time activity!



3. Family!



4. Sliding through Golden Gate Bridge Park this summer.