SPAGHETTI BUILDINGS AND A WORD FROM THE HISTORIAN

Today we practiced spatial awareness and engineering!!  We're pretty advanced first graders.  We competed in a first grade competition to build a structure out of only 20 spaghetti noodles and scotch tape.  Here's the catch.  The structure had to hold up a marshmallow (the big ones) as high as possible.  The highest marshmallow won.  It was challenging.  The winner came from Miss Jill's class at 21 inches.  We're thinking we should try again now that we have some more ideas.  On a side note...this was an AWESOME team building activity.

First we brainstormed and planned...

Then we built...

---

Kenyan Firm Turns Flip Flops into Art

Yesterday, Micah shared an article that was just perfect for Earth Day.  Apparently, Kenya has a problem with flip flops washing up on the shore.  These flip flops are water pollution in the ocean and then litter on the beach.  The company turns these flip flops into the most amazing pieces of artwork ranging from small key chains to gigantic sculptures.  Turns out Micah was able to order a piece of art work and we are anxiously waiting it's arrival. Thanks Micah!  Today we turned the ideas in his article into a science experiment of our own.  Stay tuned for our look at water pollution.