SAVY Category
SAVY 2019: Session 4, Day 1 – Unpacking the Magic of Harry Potter (Holland W.) (Rising 5th/6th)
Jul. 8, 2019—Good afternoon SAVY parents! What a wonderful first day in the Harry Potter-verse! It was wonderful to meet our young witches and wizards after much anticipation. We are looking forward to a great week. After introductions and housekeeping, we were able to dive into the concept of the influence of Harry Potter in the world...
SAVY 2019: Session 4, Day 1 – Unpacking the Magic of Harry Potter (Sarah B.) (Rising 5th/6th)
Jul. 8, 2019—Hello, SAVY parents! It was so wonderful to meet all of our young witches and wizards today! We had a wonderful first day getting to know each other and our subject matter for the week—the expansive world of Harry Potter. Today, we explored the ways that Harry Potter can be considered a cultural phenomenon, and...
SAVY 2019: Session 4, Day 1 – Puzzles and Problem Solving (Rising 5th/6th)
Jul. 8, 2019—The Puzzles and Problem Solving class first investigated the Ultimatum Game (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultimatum_game) and the Prisoner’s Dilemma (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prisoner’s_dilemma). After this introduction to game theory, the students then played a 2-player card game, attempting to determine the winning strategy. The problem goes like this: “Given a deck of 21 cards, players alternate turns by taking one, two,...
SAVY 2019: Session 4, Day 1 – Journey Through Time: An Investigation of Colonial America (Rising 3rd/4th)
Jul. 8, 2019—We had a great first day in Journey through Time! We started class talking about what a historian does and what, in turn, a history class should be. The students were presented with the challenging proposition that, while factual and carefully researched, historical studies are still interpretative and inherently subjective. Students then, if they are...
SAVY 2019: Session 4, Day 1 – Fractions at Work (Rising 3rd/4th)
Jul. 8, 2019—Day 1 What a great first day! Your students were ready and eager to learn today in our SAVY Fractions at Work class. We started the day by creating a model for equivalent fractions using strips of paper. Students made strips representing whole, halves, fourths, eighths, sixteenths, thirds, fifths, and more! We talked about different...
SAVY 2019: Session 4, Day 1 – Circuitry, Systems, and Design (Rising 3rd/4th)
Jul. 8, 2019—Dear SAVY Parents, Thank you so much for making this opportunity available for your child! The level of engagement and enthusiasm was ELECTRIC! I truly look forward to all that we can learn and accomplish this week. What is a system? In observing many systems (refrigeration systems, educational systems, transportation systems, political/governmental systems), etc.) we...
SAVY 2019: Session 4, Day 1 – Intro to Coding and Robotics (Rising 1st/2nd)
Jul. 8, 2019—These programmers had a great first day conceptualizing the world of robotics! We started by reading the first page of Peter Brown’s best seller, The Wild Robot Escapes. This allowed us to discuss how robots know what tasks to perform. Then we learned about perseverance and frustration through evaluating clips and images. We focused on...
SAVY 2019: Session 4, Day 1 – Creative Contraptions (The Wesby’s) (Rising 1st/2nd)
Jul. 8, 2019—The Rising 1st and 2nd-grade SAVY Scholars had a fantastic day of learning! We kicked the morning off with Creative Exploration with Legos, then we played the game, Find Someone Who. The students learned a lot about their fellow SAVY peers and connected with new friends. We later hit the ground running and started discussing...
SAVY 2019: Session 4, Day 1 – Creative Contraptions (Ms. Tyson) (Rising 1st/2nd)
Jul. 8, 2019—Can we build a machine that can move an item from one end of the table to another? That was our first challenge to start the day! The constraints were that we could only use the following materials: pencils, toilet paper rolls, paper strips, straws, tape, and imagination through problem solving. The answer is that,...
Summer SAVY 2019: Session 3, Day 5 – Powerful Programming (Rising 5th/6th)
Jun. 28, 2019—Our last day was bittersweet. We’ve had a great week and we can’t believe how quickly it passed. We offered feedback to our peers during a gallery walk of all of the models we’ve created and used it to make even more improvements to our own projects. While some students continued to edit their models...