Entrepreneur Fair, Minecraft In The Classroom, and More!
Our Students as Entrepreneurs
Creative young entrepreneurs and generous customers filled our Farrow Gymnasium on Friday afternoon for a bustling student Entrepreneur Fair. The huge response from vendors, in fact, prompted a last-minute venue change from the school entrance to the roomy Farrow Gymnasium.
The Entreprenur Fair’s purpose is three-fold. It is a community activity organized by our student Entrepreneur Club and serves as a math and marketing lesson for K-8 vendors, who learn about managing overhead, pricing, product delivery, and marketplace whims.
It also is an opportunity for community service, with eighth graders and the kindergarten class raising funds for student service projects by participating in the fair. The Entrepreneur Club collects 25% of each vendor's profits in order to donate it to a chosen charity. Previous charities have included Compassion Without Borders and the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. This year's charity is the Make-A-Wish foundation.
Vendors offered many homemade and hand-made items including edible products such as lollipops, butterbeer, sweets, and milkshakes as well as a range of merchandise and services including tote bags, pillowcases, jewelry, manicures, magnets, lotion, candles, and plants, not to mention a human jukebox.
Project-Based Learning with Minecraft
Musical Fun With Science or Scientific Fun with Music? It's a Solid. It's a Liquid. It's Oobleck!
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Creative young entrepreneurs and generous customers filled our Farrow Gymnasium on Friday afternoon for a bustling student Entrepreneur Fair. The huge response from vendors, in fact, prompted a last-minute venue change from the school entrance to the roomy Farrow Gymnasium.
The Entreprenur Fair’s purpose is three-fold. It is a community activity organized by our student Entrepreneur Club and serves as a math and marketing lesson for K-8 vendors, who learn about managing overhead, pricing, product delivery, and marketplace whims.
It also is an opportunity for community service, with eighth graders and the kindergarten class raising funds for student service projects by participating in the fair. The Entrepreneur Club collects 25% of each vendor's profits in order to donate it to a chosen charity. Previous charities have included Compassion Without Borders and the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. This year's charity is the Make-A-Wish foundation.
Vendors offered many homemade and hand-made items including edible products such as lollipops, butterbeer, sweets, and milkshakes as well as a range of merchandise and services including tote bags, pillowcases, jewelry, manicures, magnets, lotion, candles, and plants, not to mention a human jukebox.
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Project-Based Learning with Minecraft
Minecraft, a popular video game played by many SCDS students, also is used for educational purposes. At SCDS students use Minecraft to create cell models and a medieval virtual village and students bring the curriculum to life as they research, design, and construct functional 3D models. During the project-based curriculum, they learn and practice 21st century skills such as perseverance, collaboration, and working through frustration. View teachers Kristen Sorensen and Abby Lake's CAIS presentation to learn more.
CAIS Presentation by SCDS Faculty: Minecraft in the Middle School Classroom
Our Students and Minecraft in Action!
The Atlantic: Teaching in the Age of Minecraft
Our Students and Minecraft in Action!
The Atlantic: Teaching in the Age of Minecraft
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Musical Fun With Science or Scientific Fun with Music?
What might a song have to do with science? A lot…when you’re a sixth grade science learner asking: What can we learn about science and culture through listening to music? Especially if, as their science teacher noted, students are using the the right lens.
Students tackled the query as analytically as possible in study of the songs on the science-themed children’s album, Here Comes Science by the band They Might Be Giants. They analyzed song lyrics, made hypotheses about the meanings backed up with evidence from songs, and recorded observations in journals.
Later, in a reference to the song “Particle Man,” students answered with one-word summaries including: “School” “Science” “Life” “Repetition” “Difference” and “Diverse.”
One question might remain unanswered though: Is it musical fun with science or scientific fun with music?
___________________________________________________________________Students tackled the query as analytically as possible in study of the songs on the science-themed children’s album, Here Comes Science by the band They Might Be Giants. They analyzed song lyrics, made hypotheses about the meanings backed up with evidence from songs, and recorded observations in journals.
While this musical inquiry is distinct from the sixth grade science curriculum, students easily connected song themes to the science topics they also were studying including astronomy and the formation of the solar system, the work of Thomas Edison, the pros and cons of electric cars, the fundamental properties of fire, the dreaming mind, and even synapomorphies shared by all mammals.
To share their learning with our community, students performed two of the songs they had analyzed at Assembly. Students arranged the music to reflect their musical strengths and lyrics included their reflections on connections between the song and what they were learning in science.
For the song “Why Does the Sun Shine,” for example, student included this rap Q & A:
Q: What does this song tell us about scientific discovery?
A: "It tells me theories change all the time."
A: "This song tells us new discoveries can change everything."
A: "It tells us that in science, theories are rarely concrete constantly being updated."
A: "It tells me theories change all the time."
A: "This song tells us new discoveries can change everything."
A: "It tells us that in science, theories are rarely concrete constantly being updated."
Later, in a reference to the song “Particle Man,” students answered with one-word summaries including: “School” “Science” “Life” “Repetition” “Difference” and “Diverse.”
One question might remain unanswered though: Is it musical fun with science or scientific fun with music?
The States of Matter Festival is the cumulative event for kindergarten and first grade science students after a month-long unit about matter and non-matter. The festival, always held outside and on a Friday afternoon, is a messy and exciting event for young students, parents, and eighth graders. We set up eight stations for the eight mixed groups of kindergarten and first graders to rotate though with the help of eighth grade buddies. First, we make oobleck, a solid and a liquid that creates an intriguing substance that can flow like a liquid yet act like a solid when you try to poke it. The tactile exploration of oobleck, with eighth graders asking open-ended questions, sets the stage for the rest of the festival.
After making oobleck, eighth graders read Dr. Seuss's Bartholomew and the Oobleck to their small groups while parent volunteers set up the next four stations for the second half of the festival. Student groups then rotate through stations offering opportunities such as making liquid nitrogen ice cream, creating chemical reactions that can inflate balloons, demonstrating sublimation by using dry ice to make ghost bubbles and fog, making slime, and using sound waves from a speaker to make oobleck dance. Students spend about 10 minutes at each station, which gives all students time to experience pouring, mixing, or handling the materials.
We have refined the festival through the years. For example, eighth graders now practice reading the Dr. Seuss book out loud before the festival with second grade students as their audience. This pre-read helps eighth graders become more comfortable with reading out loud to young students as well as introducing, to second graders, how to give constructive feedback. The festival also is a great introduction for parent volunteers, who handle dry ice, some chemicals, and liquid nitrogen, to learn about the lower school science program.
We have refined the festival through the years. For example, eighth graders now practice reading the Dr. Seuss book out loud before the festival with second grade students as their audience. This pre-read helps eighth graders become more comfortable with reading out loud to young students as well as introducing, to second graders, how to give constructive feedback. The festival also is a great introduction for parent volunteers, who handle dry ice, some chemicals, and liquid nitrogen, to learn about the lower school science program.
Tina Poles, the science teacher who heads this project, is happy to provide a material list, parent handouts about the science behind each station, pre-festival classroom labs, or answer any questions. Please contact her at tina.poles@scds.org. She has also found the Lawrence Hall of Science GEM Matter for Grades 1-3 an invaluable resource.
Sonoma Country Day School
We are…
The premier, fully accredited, independent TK-8 college preparatory school in Sonoma County. Located in northern Santa Rosa and proud home of The Jackson Theater, SCDS offers a challenging academic program rich in fine and performing arts, music, world languages, and social and emotional learning. For more than thirty years SCDS has been the school that brings learning to life.
