Sea Eagles Class

STEM

While STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) is a fairly new concept in mainstream education, Montessori has always been about using the hands to learn through building and experimenting then drawing conclusions from the outcomes.  As with Montessori, STEM encourages students to learn to problem-solve through working on ‘real world’ problems.

This term 3C are exploring the transfer of energy through a STEM activity. There was plenty of excited chatter as the Amusement Park Ride challenge was introduced:

Drop Tower Ride

An owner of an amusement park is interested in purchasing a new ride for their park.  The would like a ride in which riders are carried to the top of a 100-foot tower and then dropped to the ground. The ride must have a braking system to stop the passenger car from crashing to the ground. The braking system should also slow down the passenger car as it falls.

 Task: You are to build a model of the ride.  The passenger car will be dropped from the top of the pipe and must slow down before hitting the ground.  Getting to the top of the tower is not part of the task.

Aim: You must design and build a way to slow the passenger care before it hits the ground in order to prevent injury to passengers.  It will still and on the ground or something you build, but it must to do with as little impact as possible.  You have some specific supplies to use for this and a 3-step testing procedure.  You will revise your braking system as needed.

Supply list: 3 paper cups – 2 used for passenger car device, 2 binder clips, 5 paper straws, 2 ping pong balls, game markers for weight in a zip lock bag (snack sized), 2 x A4 card paper, 1 pvc pipe, 90cm of masking tape, 65cm of string.

Note: The supplies that must be used are the pipe as the central tower of the ride and two cups.  One cup has a hole in the bottom and fits over the pole.  The second cup attaches to the first cup, and this is the passenger car.  The two cups together are placed at the top of the pole and then released.

Students were asked to apply for the role they preferred from the following:

• Project Manager – organise the group and keep track of the paperwork
• Engineer – designing and sketching the braking system
• Accountant – keeping track of the limited materials given
• Foreman – constructing the braking system from the plan.

The students were placed in groups of four and the discussions began!

The design process began with discussions in their groups, followed by a diagram with their ideas.  The next phase of the design process is to construct their braking system and then test their ideas. Next, they will discuss the outcome of their tests, then redesign and test as needed.  The final test will be with their egg passenger.  Stay tuned to see who survives the drop!!

Mother’s Day cooking

On Friday we baked some Mother’s Day cookies.  We made some cookies with Nutella and the students gave them to their mothers for Mothers Day.  Thank you to Bella and Ariana for organising and running it all. By E.C. & W.H.

During Term 1, the Sea Eagles students performed The Montessori First Great Story. In fact, they narrated and performed the story twice so that everyone had a chance to attend. This story tells us how the universe was formed and the students included demonstrations using solids, liquids and gasses to show the creation of earth and light. The students learned about the properties of solids, liquids and gasses through their experiments and according to their reviews the best part was when the volcano exploded! They also had a chance to enjoy a couple of unintended bloopers !

In the first few weeks of school, the Sea Eagles class have just been getting back into the groove of doing work instead of just sitting at home and relaxing. Jon has prepared lots of activities for us to complete during to school year.

So far Jon has taught us how to do more versions of the Trinomial Cube

I have learnt how to do the Trinomial Squaring which involves hard math and big equipment. Other students are learning how to use the Stamp Game and how to do division and lots of other math materials.

It has been a very interesting start of the year as I actually saw a snake (luckily it was a tree snake).

It has also been very hot around Caboolture and I hope there isn’t a drought because that wouldn’t be very good for the animals and for humans.

Jon has also shown us how to draw Nebulas and how stars are formed inside of them and their life cycle.

The construction of our new Hard Court is almost complete in fact they are laying down turf as I’m writing this article.

Another thing that has happened is some vandals came into the school and broke a window glass door under the big building. It’s very sad to see our building getting destroyed by teenagers who have nothing better to do.

A new class has also been added to the big building, 3D or The Manta Rays.

Kelly is teaching us research skills during our library lesson on subject chosen by the students. We are learning how to create mind maps and how to develop research questions.

Our class has a family of plants and our Botanist gave them different names like Wendy, Hunter and Spike. It is the role of the Botanist to ensure the plants are watered and are kept in light.

Class has been quite fun with the new juniors added to the group with some students making new friends, including me.

It’s been really dry lately and I’m not too sure why. It’s so dry some of the grass in turning yellow! I hope it starts to rain a lot more because it brings out the worms and it will be good for the birds.

Two middles in the 3C class have been chosen to help with icy poles, which is a great opportunity to help the PNF.

Recently, there have been a lot more wasps in our area like at home there is a big wasp’s nest and at school there are like 8 mud wasp nests in the big building. They are everywhere. Hopefully Ken can come and knock them down so no one gets stung.

Two new math and language groups have been added to the list for our lessons. The two groups are Delta and Pentagon groups.

We are also doing an activity called DANCE FEVER!!!! It’s really fun because we get to dance, it has been hard for many student’s in this heat over the last few weeks. We have new guys  showing it to the cycle three classes and we have been learning hip-hop and a couples’ dance.

Before Dance Fever we have art rotations and we do all of the arts (well not all of them…) including Art, Drama, Media and Music. I myself am doing Media with Siarra is 3A and we are learning Claymation which looks and is very fun.

We now have homework to do including Mental Math’s and revisions of spelling.

Everyone in the classroom have different jobs that reflect to real life jobs like Fire warden, cook, politician, zoologist and lots more. They all have a special purpose in the class to help make the room more balanced.

This article was written by Hudson and photos by Elysia.  I hope you enjoyed it.

The Sea Eagles have studied drama this term and have learnt about using space.  So far, they have learnt about starting position, rest, still, fall and jump.

Following on from our biome study last term, we have looked at the adaptations that animals have made to survive in their particular habitat.  We have enjoyed spending time at the billabong where we observed and classified biotic and abiotic features.  A highlight was watching a Kingfisher diving for food and spotting a large black fish with a red fin among the lily pads.  We are all excited to be going to Australia Zoo this week to observe some animals in their habitats and learn about their adaptations.

The class has also learnt how to use the peg board to find factors of numbers, and worked in small groups to find the factors of each number up to 60.

We had some fun on Melbourne Cup Day by making our own craft-horses who we placed on a small track with the numbers 1 to 6.  We then rolled the dice and moved the corresponding numbered horse until one reached the finish line.  There was discussion about what the students thought should happen and then about what actually happened.

We have enjoyed the last three weeks of transition.  It will be fun to have a new group of students join us next year although we found the room was a lot more crowded and noisier than we are used to.

The end of year assessment has been completed and we are looking forward to starting some Christmas crafts and cooking.

Sadly, we farewell Arryo, Celeste and Mia and we wish them well in their new environments. Thanks for being a wonderful part of our class.

This term the Sea Eagles have been learning about biomes.  Students visited our billabong to see what a messo ecosystem looks like and how biotic and abiotic organisms interact with each other.  They took their sketch books to record their findings. Don’t forget to click on the photos below to get a really good look at our beautiful billabong.

We managed to do that all while keeping on top of our spelling, grammar, word studies, sentence analysis, focused writing, handwriting, math operations, mental math, measurement, memorization of number facts, practical life work, reading and making and maintaining friendships.

Well we are halfway through our first year as Sea Eagles and what a busy semester it has been!  We started with The First Great Story which led to our work on the Periodic Table, volcanoes and the movement of air.  This work included some science experiments which were great fun!  We made a volcano erupt and we stopped the flow of water through a funnel using clay,

We explored all things French for Multicultural Day which was one of our most favourite days.  During our research on France we discovered Georges Braque, an early 1900’s pioneer of Cubism and his art work intrigued us.  We produced our own Cubism works of art that were displayed on the day.  We also completed research projects on various aspects of French Culture.  The most popular part of our French exploration was the macaroons!

We continued to explore our artistic sides with the study of colour: primary and secondary, wash, tone and tint.  We produced colour wheels and a monochromatic painting to show our learning.  We finished the study by designing and painting our own designs onto a small square of canvas.

We managed to do that all while keeping on top of our spelling, grammar, word studies, sentence analysis, focused writing, handwriting, math operations, mental math, measurement, memorization of number facts, practical life work, reading and making and maintaining friendships.

Welcome to the new Sea Eagles class web page and the first news that we are sharing about our class.  We hope you enjoy it.

Sea Eagles practice Random Acts of Kindness

We have been practicing random acts of kindness as February 17th was Random Acts of Kindness Day.  Our students enjoyed doing kind and lovely things for people.  They students also learned that Random Acts of Kindness day was started by Will Glennon in Denver in 1995, and then spread to New Zealand in 2004.  Suggested ways to demonstrate acts of kindness are:

• Give a big hug
• Write a letter to someone
• Make a meal for someone
• Visit your grandparents
• Say something nice to someone.

The Sea Eagles wrote letters to our classmates as an example of a random act of kindness.

by Liam Cappizzi and Aryo Mirzaei

Sea Eagles do Research

For Multicultural Day, the Sea Eagles also did some research on St. Patrick, and this was what they found:

Once every year at the 17^th of March in the Republic of Ireland they celebrate St Patrick’s Day. On St Patrick’s Day everyone gets to go to a parade

Everybody also wear green (national colors of Ireland). The first St Patrick’s day was in 1979 in Dublin. We have St Patrick’s Day because the day commemorates Saint Patrick and the arrival of Christianity in Ireland. St Patrick’s Day often starts with a march and somebody saying la fheille pardaig sona duit which means happy Saint Patrick’s Day in Irish. On St Patrick’s Day they eat corned beef, cabbage and Irish pie.

Fun facts

Saint Patrick was born in England.

The Irish Were Once Scorned in America.

Corned beef was an American invention.

St Patrick arrived to Ireland as a slave.

St Patrick’s Day was not celebrated in 1941.

St Patrick travelled around Europe.

St Patrick died at the age of 120.

By Arryo Mirzaei