Beach Clean up SUCCESS!

Hi All!

Twenty four students and three adults descended upon Cove Island Park from 10 am to 12 pm on Saturday and did a wonderful job improving the beach ecosystem by removing many pounds of dangerous debris and recording it for the International Beach clean-up effort. We were the largest group present at the event. Our group represented an large increase over last year and impressed our Sound Waters host. Here is a picture of our group! Great job!!


Thank you to Mr. Fallon (and his son) and Ms. Sileo and the following students:

8th graders: Anna D., Janet C., Francine B., Nicole C., Daniela R., Stephanie P., Sydney P., Jennifer Y., Gabor K., Nikita J., Harsha B. Deepali P., Alden P. , Erin M.

7th graders: Jineida H, Frank G., Brian D., Jack H., Sirish B., Enesa P., Michael I., Matthew I., Skyler I.

Week of 9/15

Hi All,

It was an eventful week at Scofield! On Monday we finished cleaning up our notebooks. On Tuesday and Wednesday we conducted out our population study (see last posting.) On Wednesday and Thursday we started learning more about food chains and webs and we discussed why we are solar powered. Did you know that we are all really solar powered?

Here are two images from our attempt to make an actual food web using yarn and playing the roles of producers and different level consumers.





On friday our first teams tried their hands at creating their own balanced ecosystems. They carefull measured and then included abiotic factors, producers and consumers. These are sealed up to make them air tight. Let's see how long they will survive! Hopefully they will do well! Here are some pictures from their efforts.








I created a mini-ecosystem of my own. It is a minnow, a water plant, some gravel and a snail. I sealed them up and will observe how long they will work as an ecosystem. What do you think will happen? Why do you feel that way? Respond to these question for extra-credit! :-)

Population study

Hi All,

I thought I would show some images from our mini-population study that we did overt he last few days. Student teams were given samples from plants on a section of our property and the they were challenged to do a population census or count. This reinforced the definitions of the words organism, population, community and ecosystem.

The students did a great job! Here are a few of the images of them at work.

Week of 9/8

It was another fun filled week in science class!

The students started off the week by preparing for our first lab report of the year (Due Monday 9/15) and by planning their own research by developing and investigable question about mealworms. They then spent the entire next class actually conducting their research! The diversity of projects was amazing. Teams were testing the response of mealworms to different tastes, sounds, lighting and temperature conditions and textures. Some even developed mazes to use with their worms! What an interesting set of inquiries!!

See the short slide show to see some of the teams in action.



Next we turned out attention to the nature of life? We pondered the question, "What does it mean to be alive?" We brainstormed what living things have on common. The students then met my "sewer lice" and "glue monsters". These demos were designed to show how something can appear alive even when it is not. I hope they weren't too creepy for some students! (ask your child about them) We then examined soil samples for signs of living (BIOTIC), non-living (ABIOTIC) and once living components.

Here are two pictures from that activity.







We ended the week by cleaning up our binders a bit and reviewing the "martian and the car" HW sheet and doing our last ALIVE activity where the students separated items into categories of "living", "not living", "once living: and "not sure". In some cases it wasn't s easy as it sounds. For example, a chair is non-living unless it is made of wood that was once living. :-)

It continues to be a blast working with the new 7th graders.

All the best. Mr F :-)

Week of 9/2

HI All,

The first week of science went very well. I learned more about my students and we started using our science process skills to get started in class.

On Tuesday we did the "Are you squeamish?" and "Are you a scientist?" inventories. We then analyzed the data as a group. This helped me learn more about the students better and produced some great questios about the upcoming school year in science class.

On Wednesday we looked at images and tried to describe them in great detail. This was a way of working on our observation and description skills. After mixing them up we then tried to match the team descriptions to the images.



On Thursday we worked with mealworms and observed them and created a notice/wonder t-charts. This allowed us to generate questions that could be reviewed to determine whether they were researchable or investigable. We discussed this at the end of class.

The following slide show shows the kids at work.




On Friday the students conducted a teacher designed investigation to determine if mealworms would be attracted to vinegar, sugar or salt solutions. It involved careful observation and data collection. We will discuss the results on Monday. I hope to have student generated investigations next week along with coverage the topics of "What s life?" and "Abiotic/Biotic factors".

I hope you enjoyed this week! It was a nice start.

Mr. Forde

Black Team 08-09

HI All!

It was a pleasure meeting you all today! If you're reading this then you made it to my BLOG!!

Congratulations and drop me a comment!

See you Tuesday!

Mr. Forde :-)

NEW ADVISORY FOCUS!

This year in Mr. Forde's Advisory we will be focusing on helping our local environment by providing assistance to the SoundWaters organization.

You may them as the group with the great 3-masted schooner and the cool house you can visit at Cove Island Park.


There are so many ways to help. What do you think would be a good way to assist Soundwaters?

Thanks in advance for your ideas!

Mr. F :-)

ps- The Food Bank of Lower Fairfield County was an awesome advisory topic last year but anohter advisor will take over that topic! We can still help them also! :-)

My Yearbook photos...

Which of these looks should i sport this school year? Hee Hee. Mr. F :-)

Beaker Sings Yellow by Coldplay

Beaker is my favorite muppet. There, I said it!

Back to School Meter :-)

Countdown Clocks at WishAFriend.com