Grade 8 Science Team Gets APP Published!

The Grade 8 - "Guard UR Heart" Christopher Columbus Awards science team has been working on their app to help teens understand the emotional and psychological consequences of having sex at too young an age.  New brain research from the National Institute for Mental Health has found that the part of the brain responsible for functions, such as, self-control, judgement, emotions, and organization is not fully developed until the mid-twenties.  This has many implications regarding how teens react to the social pressures around them if not guided properly.  The below QR code can be used to upload this app (in addition to some screen shots of the app, which will be updated again soon).  There is also a link to the Guard UR Heart Facebook page.  The data collected by the number of likes and downloads of the app with be part of the submitted project to the Christopher Columbus Awards competition by Feb 3, 2014.

QR Code:

(you can also go to: http://www.appcatch.com/app_guard_ur_heart-524439.html)

Screen Shots:

Facebook Link:

https://www.facebook.com/GrdURHrt

Grade 7 Science Team Teaches Younger Students How to be Humane to Animals

The grade 7 Christopher Columbus Awards competition team is working on a project to educate the youngest students at School 33 how to be kind to animals, especially their pets.  Through research, students learned that inhumane treatment of animals by adults often leads to domestic violence and other anti-social behavior.  This team of 3 seventh grade girls developed lessons to bring to students in first grade to teach them what "is" and "is not" kind behavior to animals.

Patent Inventor visits Grade 6 Science Team

Dr. Rafael Medina, brother of our Principal - Mr. Medina, visited the grade 6 Christopher Columbus Awards competition team.  Dr. Medina is a graduate of MIT and is a mechanical engineer, inventor - who holds patents, and is doctor of ophthalmology.  He visited this grade 6 team to inspire and guide them as they work on developing an invention to help people who have deep pressure sensory issues. This invention is part of their project to help people with autism and will be submitted to the Christopher Columbus Awards competition by Feb. 3rd.

Grade 8 ESL Boxes of Love Project is a Huge Success!

Miss Atten's grade 8 ESL students have worked very hard to use their English writing and speaking skills to help the local refugee community through the Boxes of Love outreach program.  After advertising across the school and school district multiple donations arrived and where then taken by the students to the "Boxes of Love" in the Larkin complex to be wrapped for refugee children for the the holiday season.

Grade 5 - Electric Quiz Boards

Miss Colon's class has been learning about electricity and as a culminating product have made electric quiz boards to demonstrate their understanding of how to design electric circuits.

Photos of students constructing their electric quiz boards:

This student found that she had 2 answers light up for the same question (one one light should light up), so she was explaining how she identified and solved the problem.

Grade 5 Inquiry about Electrical Circuits

Miss Colon's class has been studying electricity.  One of the inquiry learning experiences was for students to compare series and parallel circuits.  In their study of parallel circuits, students inquired how the placing a switch in different parts of the circuit affects how the parallel circuit works.

Below are videos of students who are explaining how these circuits work with different configurations of switches.

Grade 8 - Old West Job Recruitment Videos

Mr. Simpson's Grade 8 Social Studies Class wrote and produced the below Job Recruitment videos as they learned about how the West was built and the struggles people endured and the triumphs made to expand West!

Grade 8 - Guard UR Heart Team to compete in National Christopher Columbus Awards Competition!

The Grade 8 Team of Selena Burgos, Sarah Brown, Joshua Acevedo, and Alfredo Torres are nearing the completion of developing an App for their Christopher Columbus Awards project.  If you have not seen the previous post more information about the National Christopher Columbus Awards competition can be found at http://www.christophercolumbusawards.com/.  These students are addressing the issue of helping teenagers not engage in sexual activity too soon from a less advertised perspective...the Emotional and Psychological consequences, which are just as (sometimes more) devastating as the possible physical consequences.  Using scientific research they are developing an app for both the Apple and Android market places.  In addition, they are linking their app to an organizational Facebook page which also is getting the word out to the public.  You can visit the Facebook page below and "like" their page.  This is part of their data collection to see how many people they can reach with their message.  There are some very cool videos as well.  The App should be completed by the end of next week and will hopefully be up for downloading by the winter break.

Visit their facebook page here:
https://www.facebook.com/GrdURHrt

This is the icon they created for their project:

Middle School ESL Students Campaign for "Boxes of Love"

Ms. Atten's ESL class has been using their English speaking and writing skills to organize a campaign to help the "Boxes of Love" organization.  Boxes of Love works to help new refugees to the Buffalo area with clothing, food, shelter, and other tangible needs they may have.  The ESL students have worked hard to create posters, decorate and deliver boxes around the school, and had a table set up at Open House.  On December 13th students will take all the donations to the Boxes of Love headquarters and assist with the wrapping of gifts.

STUDENT CREATED FLYER

Grade 8 Social Studies - Recruitment Videos for Jobs in the "Old West"

Mr. Simpson's Grade 8 students are learning about the hard work and trials that people experienced while developing the "Old West".  Students have been writing scripts and using information from their classroom learning experience and group research to develop a creative "Recruitment" video for the assigned job (cowboy, railroad worker, homesteader, buffalo hunter).  Below are the posters illustrating each groups learning.  Videos will be posted when completed.

Grade 4 Salt Map Learning Experience

Grade 4 teachers (Coyle, Rosado, and Judson) used the creation of New York State salt maps to teach students about models.  Students color coded their maps to indicate the land forms they have been learning about in science and social studies.  Students will reflect on their final products and report out about how they could improve their work.  Please view the below pictures to see how the project developed.

Groups make the basic salt map model:

 
 
Students Paint the Regional Land Forms (lots of collaborative work):

 
 
 
ALMOST DONE - Labeled with geographic locations and topographic landmarks (Mrs. Coyle and Ms. Rosado's classes wrote theirs in Spanish):