Hold It!

Fifth grade students from the Tye DI Dragon Destination Imagination team were surprised how much weight their first tower held. Now it's time for them to make improvements. Anyone have any barbell weights?

Feliz Navidad

Meet Me at the Movies

The 7th and 8th grade students rolled out the red carpet for their trivia night participants on Friday, December 2nd.  We raised $1,500 for our Chicago trip!

Dorthy and Jolee

Princess Katie and Princess Leia

What a Crowd!

Allana and Cassie serve food!

Chris entertained us with his electric guitar!

Shayla entertained us with her guitar too!

Movie Stars on the Red Carpet

Elf Yourself!

I love this site! It is really easy to use, and the videos are hilarious to watch. Merry Christmas!

Muvizu Animation

I'm very excited to begin using Muvizu for animation.  The sixth grade challenge students are going to start creating their Hoodwinked (flipped fairy tales) with Muvizu.  The following tutorials can be used to help guide you in your animation endeavor. Visit Muvizu to download the free program or watch more tutorials.

Muvizu in a Nutshell

Building Sets

Creating Characters

Directing--Basic Dialogue

Future City Mentor

The 7th grade classes are making great progress preparing for the Future City Competition.  Both teams have virtual cities with populations over 100,000!

They met with their engineering mentor for the first time last week.  Mr. Ramos taught students about various scales using model airplanes and blueprints from the Spirit of St. Louis Airport.  He also gave students suggestion on how they could make improvements to their virtual cities.  We are very excited to continue working with our new mentor.  Thank you Mr. Ramos!

Hickory Dickory Dog

I'm very excited to announce that my first and second grade students have completed their poetry book! We've been writing couplets, limericks, and ruptured rhymes. Each student chose two poems to have published in a hardback book. Here is a sneak peek! 

Stepping Up

The Instant Challenge this week is called Stepping Up. Students are given FOUR minutes to create a presentation through the eyes of an old pair of shoes. Their performance must include a funny character and a song. I think this one has quite a catchy tune. Enjoy!

Stepping Up Instant Challenge from Jennifer Hawkins on Vimeo.

Waste Warriors

      Have you ever wondered how much trash is created in our school lunchroom?  The fifth grade Challenge students have been pondering this question.  They have concerns about the amount of trash that is discarded in their school lunch room.  Because of this, they've decided to to take on the challenge to reduce the lunchroom waste.  They have entered the Siemens We Can Change the World Challenge.   They are calling themselves the Waste Warriors, and they have created a proposal to help reduce lunchroom waste.  Their first task has been collecting data.  In the pictures below, they are weighing the trash from the lunchroom.  I'm so excited to see them motivated to help their school!

SCSI

What do fake blood, fake vomit, and fingerprints have in common?  They are all Labs in the sixth grade SCSI unit.  Students have been conducting experiments to solve crime simulations.

Blood Typing Lab

Fake Blood

Each student used FACES software to create a police sketch of  a classmate.

Vomit Lab

Vomit Lab

They were tempted to eat the vomit, but you can't taste your lab experiments!

Meramec Caverns Field Trip

The eighth grade Challenge students are creating a documentary about Meramec Caverns.  We toured the caverns to gather our initial research.  They will be conducting interviews with Meramec Caverns employees, and they will be filming more footage on site.  Mikaela was the photographer on the first trip, and she did a fabulous job!

7th and 8th Grade Challenge Students

Singing Horses

If you are down in the dumps, listen to these singing horses!  This is really cute, but you will only be able to take a few minutes of it.

What is the Meaning of Life?

Participate in the 2012 Kids Philosophy Slam!

The Topic for 2012

What is the Meaning of Life?

Postmark Deadline for Entries: February 3, 2012.

Synergy Comic Book Challenge

Some of the Challenge students are creating comics for the Synergy Comic Book Challenge.  The goal of the challenge is to create a comic book character that promotes the good of our community or society.  Students assign a super power to a protagonist and tell a story about how their character improves the world.

Solar Sampson by challengedog4 | Make your own at www.toondoo.com

recycling jack by challengedog2 | Make your own at www.toondoo.com

Demeter's POwers by challengedog1 | Make your own at www.toondoo.com

Fred the food giver revised by challengedog7 | Make your own at www.toondoo.com

Don't Litter in the force of nature!!!!! by challengedog2 | Make your own at www.toondoo.com

Sky Lab

We had a great time creating our personal constellations.  Challenge students created their very own constellations wrote legends to tell how their constellations ended up in the sky.  The best part was poking holes in the Sky Lab, then viewing them together as we shared our stories.