SAGE Update 1/27/12

5th Grade

This week, the 5th graders conducted the first phase of their wet strength testing of paper towels.  This phase has students working in pairs to devise fair and accurate experiments that test the strength of each towel using 1 sq. in. ceramic tiles as the unit of measure.

At this point of our experimenting, students have created and conducted enough experiments that their work is producing quite reliable results - so much so, that even as teams create a variety of experiments to test the wet strength, their rankings of paper towels is pleasingly consistent from team to team.

Our next steps will be for each team to do a "dry run-through of their experiment for the class, and we'll take be best ideas and create one experiment for the entire class to conduct in order to determine the wet strength rankings for the towels.




ABOVE AND TO THE RIGHT:  Students at Creekside and Grand Ridge conduct their initial experiments to test the wet strength of the 4 different paper towel brands.

4th Grade

One of the considerations students need to keep in mind as they continue to develop Polyhedraville is the organization of our city. In actuality, cities usually have planners to oversee the development of their city.  To get a more developed understanding of what this entails, we spent this week learning about what city planners do, and beginning to become familiar with the City of Sammamish's Comprehensive Plan. 

Next week, we are fortunate to have Emily Arteche', a Senior Planner for the City of Sammamish, visiting our two classes to tell us about her responsibilities as a city planner, and to give us some specific examples of how the city's Comprehensive Plan influences the growth and development of the city.  The informatioin is not only quite intresting, it is ultimately pretty useful when we move into the overall design of our community.

Students study and discuss Sammamish's Comprehensive Plan vision statement as their initial investigation of the document that serves to direct the city's development.

Senior City Planner for the City of Sammamish, Emily Arteche', will be in class next week to discuss her job and to help students understand how the city's comprehensive plan serves to direct and define its development. (She's pictured here sharing with the 2010-11 Polyhedraville team at Grand Ridge.

3rd Grade
Our wonderful third graders are finalizing their Mr. Bear Memos in order to present them to their classmates next week.  We will be scoring each other using a Rubric that fits the different aspects we've been talking about all along through the entire investigation and write-up process.  It is always fun to listen to each other's write-ups, and then to hear the account of what actually happened to Mr. Bear.  Stay tuned!