Grade 1 Category
Spring SAVY 2019, Day 3 – Forensic Science (1st/2nd)
Feb. 11, 2019—Parents, We had another fabulous day together exploring more about the field of forensic science. Today our focus shifted from acids and bases to DNA. We learned that while DNA is often categorized in the scientific field of genetics, we would be focusing on the chemistry of DNA. We watched videos (shared below), explored with...
Spring SAVY 2019, Day 2 – Witty Wordplay (1st/2nd)
Feb. 4, 2019—What is a system? What are the components of a system? How can a system be identified? To determine and understand these questions, we evaluated a place we are all familiar with, a school cafeteria. Working with parts of a system, we brainstormed elements of a cafeteria first, where students came up with food, tables, chairs, plates,...
Spring SAVY 2019, Day 2 – Wind and Wings: Beginner Biophysics (1st/2nd)
Feb. 4, 2019—It was another great class on Saturday! I can see the students developing relationships with their peers as our course progresses. It was especially noticeable this week as students worked together and helped each other out with some research on birds. One of the great things about a SAVY class is that students have the...
Spring SAVY 2019, Day 2 – Forensic Science (1st/2nd)
Feb. 4, 2019—What another fantastic week! Students were thrilled to continue solving our mystery! Our focus this week was on testing for acids and bases in aqueous solutions. We extended our basic understanding of chemistry and how analyzing patterns at a molecular level can reveal patterns and relationships that are crucial for solving crimes. We used the...
Spring SAVY 2019, Day 1 – Witty Wordplay (1st/2nd)
Jan. 28, 2019—Dear Parents: Saturday, week 1, was a fabulous day for our wordsmiths! I was happy to welcome back friends whom I have previously taught in either SAVY courses or enrichment, and I was thrilled to make friends with students who are new to SAVY. After a few icebreakers, everyone felt at home. I wanted to...
Spring SAVY 2019, Day 1 – Wind and Wings: Beginner Biophysics (1st/2nd)
Jan. 28, 2019—We had a great first week of class! It was great to meet all the students and watch them interact. One of my hopes is that the students enjoy and learn from each other in our class. At the start of class, we talked about what scientists did to be successful, and the students came...
Spring SAVY 2019, Day 1 – Forensic Science (1st/2nd)
Jan. 28, 2019—What a great first day! We took some time to get to know each other, examine our crime scene, review case files, and read through our suspect profiles. Students learned that while in the office last week my laptop went missing! They were so excited to examine the crime scene and form some initial hypotheses. ...
Fall SAVY 2018, Day 2 – Hydrology 101 (1st/2nd)
Oct. 8, 2018—Streams, aquifers, and glaciers, oh my! How does water move? We all know it flows, but did you know that water meanders, conveys, and infiltrates?! On Saturday, the students built models to replicate real-life processes. First, we built (and labeled) a meandering stream to observe erosion and deposition. We created flubber glaciers and tested different...
Fall SAVY 2018, Day 2 – Games Galore! (1st/2nd)
Oct. 8, 2018—Today was another fantastic day in Games Galore! We are showing leaps of growth in our knowledge of how to evaluate the fairness of a game, and today, we added another layer of game-playing awareness with depth of understanding of theoretical probability and experimental outcomes! We reminded ourselves of the last activity we did at...
Fall SAVY 2018, Day 1 – Hydrology 101 (1st/2nd)
Oct. 1, 2018—How much water is there? On Earth, there are more than 326 million trillion gallons of water, which covers 71% of the globe. That may sound like a lot of water, but less than 3% of all this water is freshwater. And of all the freshwater, more than two-thirds is locked up in ice caps...