Get ready to slide into science! Our junior engineers are taking on the Great Sled Challenge, where they’ll design and build custom ramps to see whose sled can travel the farthest across the finish line. By experimenting with different materials and slopes, students will explore the basics of physics—specifically how the height of their ramp changes the distance their sled travels. We’ll be grabbing our rulers to measure every record-breaking jump, turning our classroom into a winter laboratory of gravity, friction, and high-speed fun!
STEM Concepts We're Exploring
Gravity: Learning what pulls the sled down the hill.
Slope: Seeing if a steeper ramp makes a faster ride.
Measurement: Using tools to track height (inches/cm) and distance (feet/meters).
There’s a special kind of magic in a first-grade classroom when we get to use the Chromebooks for the first time. This week, our budding tech experts officially launched their digital learning journey!
Introducing Chromebooks to six-year-olds can feel like a tall task, but our first graders handled it like absolute pros. Here’s a look at how we got started and the skills we’re already mastering.
🐝 Safety First: The 4 Bees
Before we even opened the lids, we talked about how to treat our new tools with "tender loving care." We are applying our school’s 4 Bees to the digital world to make sure everyone stays successful:
Be Kind: We use our words to build others up when working online.
Be Responsible: We carry our Chromebooks with two hands (the "hug" hold) and make sure they are plugged in to charge.
Be Respectful: We listen for the "Screens Down" signal and treat the hardware gently.
Be Safe: We only visit the apps and sites our teachers approve.
🚀 Logging In? It’s a Snap!
Forget the days of students struggling to remember complex strings of numbers and symbols. We used Clever Badges to sign in. Each student has a unique QR code on a card; they simply hold it up to the Chromebook camera, hear a "beep," and they are in!
The look of pure joy when the screen magically unlocks is definitely the highlight of the week.
🎨 Learning the Ropes with Seesaw
Once we were logged in, we headed straight to Seesaw, our digital portfolio app. Our first mission was a "Chromebook Scavenger Hunt" activity designed to build muscle memory.
Here is what we practiced:
Mastering the Trackpad: Using "point and click" to move items around the screen.
The Power of the Keyboard: We practiced finding letters to type our names as well as capitalizing our name.
Digital Artistry: Students used the drawing tool to create self-portraits.
Shape Shifting: This was the fan-favorite! We learned how to insert shapes, change their colors, and grab the corners to resize them from tiny dots to giant circles.
💡 Why This Matters
While it looks like play, these activities are foundational. Learning how to navigate a trackpad and manipulate digital objects builds the fine motor skills and digital literacy our students will use for the rest of their lives. Plus, seeing their work instantly uploaded to their digital portfolio gives them a huge sense of pride.
2nd Grade
Our 2nd graders got to put their math skills to the test. They participated in the ultimate IXL Spark Studio Jeopardy challenge! Students tackled the "Zero Heroes" category, where they practiced the super-cool trick of triple-digit subtraction across zeros. It might seem tricky when you see a number like 500, but they knew just what to do to turn those zeros into powerful tens and nines. Students worked in pairs with their whiteboards, remained focused, and solved big-number puzzles.
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