MOST POPULAR VIDEOS

• 3:45 Perseverance in Makerspace

  We've been hitting our stride in Makerspace these past few weeks. Students have been persevering in class regardless of the design challenge coming their way. Design a pencil box? No problem. Present your work to the class? Sure thing! Design a monster by staying under budget with materials used? Piece of cake. It's been amazing to see students' curiosity even when exploring Makerspace stations. Rarely are two projects ever alike. Enjoy!

  Uploaded Nov 17, 2021
• 00:26 Science week of Feb 3-7
  Uploaded Feb 10, 2020 by Ryan Cherry
• 00:20 Talk-A-Mile-A-Minute 6th Grade Team 114

  Check out this video of our amazing 6th graders participating in a fun interactive learning game called "Talk-A-Mile-A-Minute", which reinforces academic vocabulary development in Science class in order to lay a solid foundation for much higher text complexity and scientific writing later in high school and college. It is so much fun to witness the enthusiasm our 6th graders choose to display towards their learning and thank you for checking in with us :)

  Uploaded Mar 07, 2022 by Gerard Kovach
• 3:13 Week 22 of 2022-23|5th - 8th Grade Science

  This week's slideshow highlights: 8th graders continuing to explore molecular structure as part of their "Chemistry of Materials" SEPUP Unit of inquiry; 7th graders practicing the strategy of reciprocal teaching to build anchor knowledge that will be used in subsequent lessons in their "Reproduction" SEPUP inquiry unit; 6th graders investigating the role of convection deep inside the Earth's mantle which led to short skits that they produced and shared with their class as part of their "Geologic Processes" SEPUP inquiry unit; and 5th grade worked in small cooperative groups to read through a skit that included 18th century scientist and statesman Ben Franklin traveling through time to interact with today's climatologists and hydrologists to help explain the role of Earth's warm and cold ocean currents in impacting climates in different regions around the world as part of their "Weather & Climate" SEPUP inquiry unit. Thank you for checking in with us this week:)

  Uploaded Feb 18, 2023 by Gerard Kovach
• 3:22 Week 23 of 2022-23| 5th-8th Grade Science

  This week's slideshow highlights: 8th grade students explored through a lab investigation and computer simulation how atoms and molecules move differently between the states of solid, liquid, and gas depending on thermal energy within a system as part of their "Chemistry of Materials" SEPUP Inquiry unit; 7th grade dug deeper into their "Reproduction" SEPUP unit by investigating how geneticists predict the likely outcomes of alleles of genes passing from parents to offspring through a coin toss model as well as with the use of Punnett squares; 6th grade learned more about the "Rock Cycle" by playing a simulated geology board game where they learned more about the natural causes and effects that drive Earth's rock transformations over time both at the surface and deep below in the mantle between 3 main types--igneous, metamorphic, and sedimentary rocks; and 5th grade became teachers as they worked in cooperative groups to create visual teaching lessons for the rest of the class on a lesson about the causes of climate. They learned from each others' lessons through a gallery walk of each groups' visual lessons. Thank you so much for checking in with us this week:)

  Uploaded Feb 24, 2023 by Gerard Kovach
• 1:42 Week 26: March 14-18, 2022

  This week's slideshow highlights: 6th graders exploring the history of Earth by setting up a human timeline of important geologic events and how they impacted the rise and fall of life on Earth going back to at least 3.5 billion years ago; 6th graders selecting from a drawing new class helper positions as Decatur JHS students like to help out and take more ownership in our Science classroom; 7th graders exploring natural selection and evolution (see video below); and 8th graders began inquiry investigations into "Energy Transformations" by rotating to various hands-on stations to explore how energy and matter interact and transform such as: solar energy to electric and then mechanical; chemical energy to thermal; chemical energy to electrical and then mechanical/kinetic; etc. Thank you for stopping in this week:)

  Uploaded Mar 19, 2022 by Gerard Kovach
• 3:09 Week 9: October 25-29, 2021

  This week's slideshow has pics of: 6th grade class collaboratively exploring global water surface temperature distribution data in order to further their inquiry of weather and climate; 8th grade class setting up an experiment to investigate the role of environmental factors in affecting the traits that will be observed in nicotiana plant offspring as part of their inquiry unit on Reproduction and Genetics; and 7th grade continuing to sharpen their microscopy skills by observing various multicellular organisms' cells up close as part of their inquiry unit, "From Cells to Organisms".

  Uploaded Oct 31, 2021 by Gerard Kovach
• 00:36 WK4 | Social Identity Jigsaw

  8th graders worked in small groups to analyze social identity narratives to reflect on the stories we want to tell about who we are and why identity matters.

  Uploaded Sep 24, 2021 by Marianne Sharping
• 00:26 3rd grade Science Gathering Data- Wolves and Inheriting Traits Featured

  In their unit on Inheritance and traits focused around several wolfpacks, groups reviewed and discussed data from the Wolf Family Data Cards and the informational texts, The Code and The Handbook of Traits and recorded their information on a graphic organizer.

  Uploaded Jan 13, 2023 by Ryan Cherry
• 00:58 5th Grade

  The 5th grade worked on a Formative Assessment Lesson, where they look at a problem, share their individual solutions, and critique the reasoning of each other's work; and then have a chance to improve their original answer to the problem.

  Uploaded Feb 21, 2020 by Andrew Brennan