What do you know about plastic straws?  They're fun to drink out of for about ten seconds, but after that where do they go?  Turns out they're kind of a nightmare.  Plastic straws are too small for recycling machines and end up in landfills for hundreds of years before biodegrading or cause big problems for land and marine wildlife.  Miss Amy's 2nd grade class wants to do something about this!  Will you join us? 

Check it out: Bans on Plastic Straws in Restaurants Expand to more Cities.  Will Aspen be next?

Our scientist of the week, Mr. Andrew, showed us that not only humans can dance, but raisins too! Turns out if you mix water, baking soda, and vinegar a chemical reaction occurs that creates carbon dioxide.  If you put some raisins into the mixture they are dense and sink. But the gas created starts to form bubbles around the fruits wrinkly skin and brings it floating back to the top.  Then the bubbles pop when they hit the air and the fruit sinks again. This happens over and over making the raisins look like they're dancing.  You can try this at home with baking soda and vinegar or soda water.  Check out the video on the left for directions.  So cool!

Our reporter of the week, Miss Baylie, shared a fascinating article about a 1,320 pound hippo on the loose in swampy southern Mexico.  Here's the weird thing, hippos are not native to Mexico and no one knows where it came from.  Hippos are one of the most dangerous animals on the planet as they tend to be aggressive and are massive.  Environmental agencies are working to capture the hippo safely and relocate it, but have not had much luck yet.  Locals beware!  Will we ever see a loose hippo roaming the playground at AES?

Our secret reader, Mr. Seth, read us a Dr. Seuss book we'd never heard before--I Wish I Had Duck Feet.  It was a hilarious book with a wonderful message.  After dreaming about many different useful adaptations (like duck feet or deer horns or a very long tail) this little boy realizes that the most useful (and practical) thing to be is himself!  We talk about that all the time in first grade.  Even if someone is a better reader or dancer than you, everyone has such unique qualities to share.  Sometimes we have to practice gratitude for just being ourselves.  Thanks Seth and Silas!

The Wild Robot has a sequel.  And we're SO excited.  We've missed our robot friend Roz and we can't wait to see if she makes it back to the island to be with her adopted son Brightbill.  Right now she's working on a farm leading a double life.  When her owners are looking she's a good farmer.  But, when they're not around she can be found chatting with the cows and playing in the fields.  Will she be able to plot her escape?  How will she find her way back?  Peter Brown has done it again and we just can't get enough.

Today we started opinion writing.  We began with a great book, I Wanna Iguana.  This book is written in letter form between a boy, Alex, and his mother.  By the end Alex has given so many convincing reasons that his mother agrees to a pet Iguana.  Pretty awesome!  Today we took some time to convince Miss Kylie of some things we are passionate about.

Today we finished up Charlotte's Web and we gave it an average score of 8/10.  The general consensus was that it was a fabulous book, but nothing compares to The Wild Robot this year.  This book taught us all about the value of friendship..  Nothing beats a good friend who can see our best qualities and forgive our imperfections.  Charlotte saw that Wilbur was terrific, radiant, and humble.  If you had to describe yourself in three adjectives, what would they be?  How would you describe a friend?  We're on the hunt for a new book starting next week.  Let us know if you have any really good suggestions.

Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite:
​TESS

Our reporter of the week, Ms. Jadyn, shared some fascinating information about the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite.  NASA has created a satellite scheduled to launch June 2018 that is going to spend two years searching around 500,000 stars hoping to find some orbiting planets.  An exoplanet is a planet located outside of our solar system.  Scientists are curious if there are other life forms or habitable planets outside of our little bubble circling one of the many other heat sources out there in the universe.  Maybe one of us will go to space one day and check it out!  Thanks Jadyn.