Thank you, Carole Nelms!

IMG_2555IMG_2553The 5th grade G/T class was treated to a special presentation last week. Mrs. Carole Nelms came to speak to the class about her experience working at Johnson Space Center in Houston during several Apollo missions. She was in Mission Control when Apollo 13 landed, and shared with the students how it felt to hold her breath, praying that the astronauts would survive the return to Earth! She had a photo of herself sitting in Mission Control, and showed the scene in Ron Howard’s film, “Apollo 13” in which an actress is staged to look like her! She said that Ron Howard was very careful to be as accurate as possible in the creation of the film, and she felt it was very close to what happened.

The students had read about, and were familiar with the Apollo 13 Mission. A lesson in 10 Things All Future Mathematicians and Scientists Should Know (But Are Rarely Taught) details the three major mistakes that led to the oxygen tank explosion which endangered the lives of astronauts Jim Lovell, Jack Swigert and Fred Haise. The students had also viewed scenes from the movie depicting one example after another of creative problem solving, such as when a team of experts build a carbon-dioxide filter out of duct tape and miscellaneous materials available to them.

Screen Shot 2016-04-10 at 2.51.47 PMWe loved hearing Mrs. Nelms share her “inside knowledge” and the students also benefited from her wise advice to never limit themselves and value working collaboratively with others, no matter how small a part you may play on a team. We also had a good time discussing how technology has changed our lives and what the future may hold.

You can click here to see some of the thank-you notes written to Mrs. Nelms by the students. Thank you, again, Carole Nelms! We loved having you!

THANK YOU! – from Mrs. Lasher

flowersI was overwhelmed by the lovely flowers, goodies, gifts, and sweet notes from students during Teacher Appreciation Week! You are too kind, too generous, and I thank you! I am still working on individual thank-you’s!

The year has flown by, and my mind is already spinning with things I’d like to do next year! I hope you all have a wonderful and safe summer! I will be sending an email to parents with a link to some summer ideas. Because I am a fan of WONDEROPOLIS, I will mention their “Camp Wonderopolis,” which is an online summer camp you might like to check out. Click here to learn more about it.

Brainy Guest Speakers – by 3rd grade class

Guest Speaker 3Last month, our 3rd grade class had two special visitors: Dr. Lisa Drozdick and Dr. Stuart Red. Mrs. Lasher invited them to speak with the class about their work with the brain because we had been learning and researching about the amazing system inside our craniums!

Both guest speakers work at Pearson (click here to learn more about this company). Dr. Drozdick is a psychologist whose work includes developing tests that help people who may have a brain injury. She designs the tests to show which parts of the brain may not be working as well as they should be. Dr. Red is a neuroscientist and he studies all about the brain. He’s worked a lot with people who’ve had concussions.

We got to try out some of the tests that targeted certain parts of the brain. For example, one test had different colored circles and we had to touch them according to the directions. In one part, we had to touch every color she said except “black.” If she said “black,” we were not supposed to touch anything. This may have been checking our temporal lobe (which helps with memory) and how the hemispheres of the brain work together.

We really enjoyed our guest speakers and learned a lot! We appreciated their time with us! Thank you, Dr. Drozdick and Dr. Red!

P.S.- We found a cool video with optical illusions and an article about what makes your brain wake up. Click here to see it on Wonderopolis!

Guest Speaker 1Guest Speaker 2

A Plethora of Puzzles! – by Mrs. Lasher

Logic CenterLogic on SmartboardWe love our logic puzzles! The LOGIC CENTER in our classroom houses dozens of puzzles in sheet protectors. They are stored in cubbies according to level of difficulty. Students solve them using dry erase markers, and keep track of the puzzles they’ve correctly solved by coloring in on a progress chart. The room is never as quiet as when we are working on these perplexors, courtesy of MindWare. We also love using the Smart board to solve them together.

It is one thing to solve a puzzle, and another thing to create one! The fourth and fifth graders have become amazing puzzle creators! Recently, we shared some with our friends, the Reach Rocketeers, and they are planning on giving us feedback in a future Skype session.

Please visit these pages of our blog to see original logic problems created by kids!

Sports Logic- by Kendra

Four Travelers – by Josh and Jake

Zoo Animals – by Garrett

Recess – by Lauren

Four Friends – by Claire