Sixth Grade Earth Science - Rock on 6th
grade!!!
Metamorphic,
Igneous and Sedimentary rocks
are fancy names for the rocks that make up our world. All of these
rocks are part of the rock cycle, which explains how they can change
from one form to another. Sixth graders participated in a “hands on”
lab classifying all types of rocks into the three main categories. They
also illustrated some wonderful rock cycles to display in the science
room for Open House, which was a huge success! The whole room was
bubbling with excitement!
Following the unit
on rocks, we looked into the topic of natural resources.
Students learned how to determine which resources are renewable and
which ones are nonrenewable. Did you know that lumber, gasoline and
electricity are all products that come from natural resources? Fresh
water, fish and trees are just a few of the renewable resources
available on Earth. We also studied the three R’s-reuse, recycle and
reduce. Students thought long and hard about how they could be good
citizens of planet Earth and help to preserve our various resources.
As part of our
unit of study, sixth graders were offered the opportunity to participate
in The Green
L.A. contest
run by the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power. This contest
requires interested students to design a poster and write an essay on
the topics of air quality, trees for a Green LA, energy conservation,
recycling, water conservation, or Cool School’s Tree Planting. Mrs.
Chespak and Ms. Thorneycroft will be sending ten of the best entries in
to represent Chaminade’s sixth grade. We wish all contestants the best
of luck.
Seventh Grade Life Science
The seventh
graders have been studying units in Cells, Classification, Bacteria,
Protists, and Fungi. Mrs. Tyson and Mr. Bautista have worked with their
students completing a major unit on Cell Transport, Cell Processes
and Cell Cycle. In the laboratory, the seventh graders have enjoyed
studying osmosis in plant cells by experimenting on passive
transport in apple slices, fermentation by yeast cells through
fermenting orange juice mixture and mitosis in cells by studying
onion cells. The students also made a model of the different stages of
mitosis using strings to show how chromosomes are duplicated and
separated to produce two daughter cells, which are exact copies of the
parent cell.
While studying the
unit on classification, students were asked to classify a variety of
materials, like school supplies, shoes, and even strange creatures! The
Pasta Kingdom lab was a test of how students use their classification
skills to make a dichotomous classification key of different
kinds of pasta. The students had fun making up the scientific name for
each piece of pasta by using two characteristics of the pasta to make a
Latin-sounding scientific name. Students also made some wonderful
classification pyramids to demonstrate their understanding of the
levels of classification. For this project, seventh graders used their
research skills to find information about an organism from different
websites about classification. These classification pyramids can be
found on display in the seventh grade classrooms.
After studying
classification, the seventh graders focused their attention on the study
of the organisms in Kingdom Monera. Students learned the
characteristics of bacteria. In the laboratory, the students studied
how bacteria change our food and how some bacteria can be beneficial or
harmful.
The second quarter
finished with a unit on Kingdom Protista and Kingdom Fungi. Students
created protist keys, small encyclopedias of different plant-like
protists and animal-like protists. The Fungi Feast was a
highlight of the fungi unit. Students created menus that included foods
made from bacteria and fungi, and they brought in these foods to enjoy
their feast!!
Eighth Grade Physical Science
The eighth grade
students, with the teaching of Mr. Bautista and Mr. Saramosing, have
been learning the classification of matter as elements, compounds or
mixtures. They have worked on basic chemistry with the
in-depth study of atoms and their chemical make up. This unit of
work also focused on learning of the parts of a Periodic Table
and its uses. They studied the different physical and chemical
properties of substances to identify whether a substance is an element,
a compound or a mixture.
In the laboratory,
the students combined elements like iron and sulfur to make a mixture
and heated the mixture to form a compound. They tested the substances'
properties before and after heating to show when they made a mixture and
a compound. To further reinforce the concept of making a mixture and
compound, the eighth grade students also made Hokey Pokey, which
is a caramel candy. Mr. Saramosing shared the recipe for "Hokey Pokey,"
which is a popular candy in New Zealand.
Students have
participated in practical lab tests, which encourage them to
demonstrate their knowledge and apply it to the lab. Lab quizzes also
highlight the students understanding of various concepts. Added to
these exciting activities students have completed many hands-on
experiments on chemical reactions, such as the Whoosh bottle, Giant
toothpaste, steel wool fireworks, and fireworks displays.
Next, students
made Dodecahedrons – a scientific but creative eighth grade
project. Each pair of students researched an element. The
information gathered was presented in different creative forms on a
twelve-sided figure called a dodecahedron. Each side was presented in
the form of a story, diary entries, print ads and other creative
representations.
The eighth graders
also visited the California Science Center on December 12. They went to
the different exhibits and interactive attractions and watched the movie
“Volcano” at the IMAX center.
OTHER SCIENCE NEWS
Chaminade
Middle School Young Inventors
Win Top Awards at USC
The
University of Southern California's MESA
(Mathematics, Engineering
and Science Achievement) Program
hosted the Regional
NASA-JPL Wright Glider
Competition on
November 15th at the USC campus. Teams from
Chaminade Middle
School won the first and second place awards and the largest glider
award.
First Place:
Erika Oblea, Jeff
Meyer, Paul Sagoo, Jeff Kane and Nick Dyer
Second Place:
Zachary
Hendrickson, Douglas Chespak, Danny Reeves, and Benedict Garma
Largest Glider
Award:
Julie Ciccarelli
and Shawdi Manouchehr-pour
The top five teams
in this event competed for the National Glider Competition on
December 5th at NASA-JPL in Pasadena. Mr. Christopher
Bautista and Mr. Edwin Saramosing are the team advisors. Mr. Cruz
Torres, our Middle School Physical Plant Supervisor, constructed the
launcher for the gliders.
Further Recognition at the
JPL
Annual Invention Challenge Finals!!
Chaminade Middle
School Blue Eagles team won Third Place
in the JPL Annual Invention Challenge Finals held in the Jet Propulsion
Laboratory in Pasadena last December 5, 2003. The team composed of
Nick Dyer, Jeffrey Kane, Jeffrey Meyer, Paul Sagoo, and Erika Oblea
placed third in the contest with thirty middle and high school teams
participating. The teams from Costa Mesa High School and Frazier Park
High School placed first and second respectively.\
The title for this
year's contest is the Wright Turn Glider Contest. The objective of the
contest is to create a glider that, when propelled from the officially
supplied launcher, flies through the air, makes a right-hand turn, and
lands onto an "X" 12.2 meters [40 feet] away. The winner will be the
contestant whose glider's first-touch is closest to the "X". The glider
of the Chaminade team landed 5 feet away from the "X" mark in the JPL
Invention Challenge Finals, while the winning glider landed 2 feet away
from the target.
There were two
other Chaminade middle school teams in the contest. The glider of the
team of Julie Ciccarelli and Shawdi Manouchehr-pour won the special
award for the Heaviest Glider, while the glider of the team of Zack
Hendrickson, Doug Chespak, Danny Reeves and Ben Garma landed in the top
ten. The three teams from Chaminade Middle School advanced to the final
competition, when they won 1st, 2nd, and 8th
place in the Regional JPL Invention Challenge Elimination held at USC
last November 15th.
An outstanding
performance to the 2003 Chaminade Middle School Young Inventors' Team!
Science Fair Projects
Interested sixth,
seventh, and eighth grade students can create a science project
that may be submitted to this year’s Los Angeles County Science Fair.
Students can work individually or in pairs to complete a project that
pertains to any branch of science. This is an independent study done
outside the classroom. Students meet once every six day cycle to
discuss questions and concerns about their projects with some of the
science teachers. Students who participate and create a project will be
recognized by the school.
