Erosion, take two

Hello,

We had some nice erosion experiment proposals which led to some interesting set ups this afternoon. One tray had clay obstacles and random coins placed in the dirt. A big mountain of dirt had a narrow canyon go through it with a quarter jammed in the canyon to dam up the flow of water. The sides of the canyon didn't last long and the quarter went down fast.

The other tray had a giant mound with its sides shaved down, Lego walls and some random Lego men, along with a unique hole in a cup way of dispensing the water onto the tray. While most students predicted the Lego guys to go down, they actually got their legs stuck in more dirt as the river passed. It was like standing on the shore of a sandy beach as waves bring sand in and the water loosens sand beneath your feet causing you to sink deeper in.  Very cool and quite interesting. Thank you to our experiment proposal writers. I was also happy with the class participation. Every new prediction gave us something more to look for and/or think about.

We started estimating addition problems in math.  For example 483 + 1234 is about 500 + 1200, so about 1700. We talked about knowing when our estimate may be high or low. A majority of the class did these exercises with me, while students still working to grasp the rounding concept worked with Ms. Hill on those skills. Our fire alarm/bus evac drill, (They get on the buses and get instructions, but don't actually go anywhere,) cut into our math time significantly. I was disappointed that our class didn't go out our proper exit. Since this is our third drill of the year, I had a talk with them about "just following" and speaking up when you know the people in front of you are going the wrong way. I'm all about speaking up.

Our silent reading time was fantastic today. At one point, I caught the eye of Ms. Hill, our student teacher, and gave her a very satisfying "take a look at this" wave of my arms. Good stuff.

We had a long union meeting tonight. I joined the union last spring. This was my second meeting ever. It was nice to meet with so many colleagues.

Have a great night.

Mr. Shea