Springing into STEAM
Late Winter Edition
Hillside's STEAM Fair - Monday, May 13th
Our Annual STEAM Fair is set for Monday, May 13th at 6 p.m. For more information, please click here:
Inspiration from Let's Play! by Herve Tullet
After learning about the properties of magnets, our third graders published original, interactive magnetic books based on Herve Tullet's Let's Play! Third graders then had the opportunity to read their stories aloud to our kindergarten students while our kindergarteners used "magic wands" to move the characters in their books.
Vine Lopping with the Hastings Vine Squad
Fourth grade students had the exceptional opportunity to learn from Hastings' own Vine Squad as they freed trees around our school from invasive vines. After learning about invasive species and the ways in which they can overgrow native plants, our fourth-grade volunteers were able to go out to free our trees!
Kindergarten
Our touchstone word this time of year is habitat. Kindergarten scientists are discovering different habitats around our world, and they are sorting plants and animals into their correct homes. Through poetry and movement, we learned that even an old log can be a wonderful home for many animals!
First Grade
How are animals similar to and different from their parents? What can we learn from our families as they help us grow, learn, and stay safe? Our first grade scientists are observing a variety of animals in different habitats in order to explore how young animals are able to learn from other, older animals. We took on the role of penguins caring for our eggs in an icy, cold Antarctic environment, we made pompom creatures and predicted the types of pompom babies they might create, and we used our voices to communicate like different animals so our parents could find us using only their sense of hearing.
Second Grade
As we progress from melted crayons to melting snow, our second grade scientists are thinking about where we can find water on our planet. Students have learned about the water cycle by making clouds and making models. They have done their own version of an "Escape Room" by solving clues about landforms and bodies of water. We are creating our own rivers that start in mountains and flow down to the ocean, and we are then noticing the power of moving water in creating canyons.
Third Grade
How are plants, animals, and environments of the past similar or different from current plants, animals, and environments? What happens to organisms when their environment changes? These are some of the questions our third graders have been exploring this winter. We have seen how people can select traits they would like to see in future generations of animals in order to meet their wants as well as needs, and we have seen how this type of selection happens in nature all on its own. Recently we observed social behavior by animals that live in groups, and we then tried to work in our own groups to solve different challenges.
Fourth Grade
Weathering, erosion, and deposition were the focus of our explorations during the early part of our winter learning. Students made their own topographic maps, created their own canyons and even ran relay races to help them understand the ways in which our land has changed over time. Currently we are working through a variety of engineering challenges to help us learn about six types of simple machines: inclined plane, lever, screw, pulley, wedge, and wheel and axle.