Earthquake Week Day 2

Good evening!

The students continue to be engaged and excited by our Earthquake Week activities. Here is the recap of today's events:

Social Studies:  

​

Today in Social Studies, we discussed and researched key geographical features that are found in regions that experience earthquakes. In addition, we covered plate tectonics and the movement of the continents, from Pangea to present day. Students read informational text to learn both about global geographical features as well as the history of some of Earth’s largest recorded earthquakes.

Literacy: Today we dug deeper into  the theme of interdependence.  We read aloud Dear Children of the Earth, A Letter from Home, by Schim Schimmel.  On their Chromebooks, students made webs using Google Draw, to identify interdependent relationships in the book.  Students were creative in the different ways they connected  the ideas and relationships.  Ask your child to show you his or her web in their Google Drive! Once we develop a stronger understanding of interdependence, we will connect this theme to everything the students have been learning about earthquakes.  

Science/STEM: Things started SHAKING UP today in STEM sessions. Students watched video of real earthquake (EQ) engineers testing models.  Next, students helped test 1 story and 4 story models of buildings with NO EQ technology/structural supports using our very own EQ simulation shake table.  Movement was recorded using grid paper, and documented via photos/video.  In groups, students used our interactive web page to chart movement shifts on their own grid paper and answer questions about the process and reasoning behind results found. To communicate their findings, groups used the iPad app, Educreations, to record screencasts (images, live annotations, & voice) explaining the movement, observations, and explanations behind our 1 story and 4 story CONTROL GROUP tests today.  We loved “BREAKING GROUND” with our first experiments!

See daily photos/videos posted at: http://goo.gl/Z3aYF3

Math:  Today in math class we began analyzing graphs of real earthquake data. We learned about the importance of the graph title, the categories on the x-axis, and the increments along the y-axis. All three of these pieces of information help us to correctly interpret the data. We also began the 100 coin flip challenge to test the concept of probability.