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Welcome to the first couple of days of 8th grade science and engineering. The goal of our first two class periods is to create a team and establish our team work norms. Day 1: Paper Towers Students began be creating our classroom good teammate norms. Click the link here to see what they came up with! To test these qualities out, we engaged in our first engineering challenge! Our task was to create a structure capable of holding the most mass off of a table 1 inch using nothing except 3 pieces of printer paper and a "Noffy" length of masking tape. Students were given 20 minutes to build and test their structures and then another 20 minutes to rebuild/redesign to see how much they could grow. The team that achieved the greatest mass held 270 pounds of books. The team that achieved the greatest improvement more than doubled the amount of mass their structure could hold. Here are a few of the teams solving this problem! Day 2: Breakout EDU Teamwork Today we practiced using our norms by participating in our first Breakout EDU game on Teamwork. Breakout EDU is like an escape room--students must solve puzzles and clues to break into a box that has many, many locks in it. Check it out! Today the students had 8 locks to solve in 30 minutes or less. They were unsure of it when they began, but by the end of the day they all wanted to do another one at least once a week. We will be playing Breakout at least once per month for the rest of the school year! Watch the video below to see what they did!
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STEM is everywhere. Whenever I travel somewhere new or visit an attraction, I try to see where I can spy science, technology, engineering, and math. It is amazing what you can find when you are looking. Last week I traveled with my husband, sons, parents, and in-laws to the nations capitol to see the sights. I found some really great examples of STEM in action in a city that is more famous for it's history and culture. ScienceOne example of amazing science that I saw on our trip was the use of Forensics to create lifelike models of George Washington during our visit to Mt. Vernon. Scientists undertook a study from 2003 to 2005 to create scientifically and historically accurate models of what Washington would have looked like throughout his lifetime. The first model represents Washington at age 19 when he was a surveyor working on creating maps of Virginia. The second represents General Washington during the revolution (age 45) when he lead the citizen army to victory against the British. The final model represents the day he became our first president at age 57. Historians at Mt. Vernon thought this project was important because most people had a vision of the president as "old" and "boring rather than as a young, adventurer or a brave leader. Want to learn more? Visit the Mt. Vernon website here. TechnologyTechnology is ever changing and boy does it change quickly. There is no better evidence of this than a day spent at the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum. We spent the day exploring the early origins of flight with the Wright brothers and stood in awe of early pioneers such as Amelia Earhart. Then we learned about the space program and how it progressed from crude capsules like this one from the Mercury program to the amazing new Orion Capsule that will take astronauts to Mars and beyond. Want to learn more? Me too! Just kidding, visit the website here. Next time we visit we will have to go to the larger one outside the city to continue our adventure! EngineeringThe National Mall provided a unique look at engineering in action during our visit. Known as our nations front yard, the mall is used for events year round by a huge number of visitors. While we were there we saw the Smithsonian's Folk Life Festival (Link), Preparations for the Huge 4th of July Festival (Link) and a variety of tourists taking advantage of the grass to play sports, have picnics, or relax in the sun. With all of this use, the grass on the mall takes quite a beating. In order for the park service to preserve the Turf on the National Mall, it has undergone a multiphase renovation to improve it's durability. It uses civil engineering principles to collect water (link) as well as ecosystem engineering in choosing the best grass varieties. They have even hired a Turf manager to ensure the changes are managed (link). MathWashington, D.C. is a beautiful example of math in action. The 100 square mile area for the capital city was surveyed by Andrew Ellicot andBenjamin Banneker who used celestial calculations to lay boundary students. The city was planned by Pierre L'Enfant in 1791 using a grid system built to radiate from the capital and the white house. While we were visiting, we saw the marker about near the Washington Monument. We learned that it was the vertex of the 90 degree angle between the two buildings. Read more here.
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AuthorMrs. Noffsinger is the 8th Grade Science and Engineering educator. Archives
August 2017
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Photos used under Creative Commons from Howdy, I'm H. Michael Karshis, r.nial.bradshaw