Our first silk moth chews its way out

Spinning silk from coccoons

Step 1: Freeze the cocoons

Step 2: Heat the cocoons, don't let them boil

Step 3: Use either your fingers or the toothbrush to find the "true end" of the thread

Step 4: Gather a number of thread ends from different cocoons, twist them together 

 

R. Buckminister Fuller, Passengers on Spaceship Earth

Grades: Middle School and High School

Objective: To explore Buckminister Fuller's idea of "Spaceship Earth" as it pertains to the first images of Earth from space and the 1960s and 70s American environmental movement

Painting with Lisa

More classroom pictures, plants, and learning displays

Silkworm Update: Ants, Cocoons

This morning when we walked into our classroom we found carnage.  Ants had come into our classroom and decimated an entire box of silkworms.

Luckily, we've been isolating the strongest and the weakest silkworms, separating them into populations we intend to breed and populations we don't want to procreate.  The box the ants attacked was the box of the weakest and most sickly silkworms--none of which had begun to spin cocoons.  

We took measures to prevent another ant attack.  We sprayed the area where the ants had been entering with our classroom with white vinegar, put lids on some of our silkworm boxes, and placed the boxes without lids in trays of water.

Ants killed dozens of silkworms in this box this morning

 

Art with Lisa

Grades: Elementary and Middle School

Objectives: To experiment with different drawing, gridding, and watercolor techniques

Hiking to Hart Lake

Making an Abacus

Grade: 6

Objective: To enhance our studies of both mathematics and Ancient China through designing and constructing our own abacus

Today, K. and A. made their own abacus using found materials.

They....

1: Drilled 10 holes in a cardboard box

2-Cut a strip of cardboard to put through the middle, then drilled 10 holes through it as well

3-Strung 5 beads below the cardboard and 2 above, knotting the ends to hold it in place

5-Continued stringing and knotting until each of the ten holes had a strand of seven beads running through it

6-Bordered the edges with orange card-stock

Ancient Chinese (inspired) block printings

Grade: 6

Objective: To connect with our studies of Ancient Chinese art and writing through a block-print making project

Cocoons!

Silkworm posters

 

Our silk worms GROW and begin to cocoon!

Field Trip "Moments"

Grade: 6

Objective: To focus on "telling our stories" using details

Moments by: A.

Converse: I waited as the escalator took me into Nordstrom Rack and listened as my mom told me not to get my hopes up.

The Zoo: I walked into “The Rainforest” and immediately started to sweat. Boy was this room humid.

Seattle: I start to feel sick as I breathe in exhaust and cigarette smoke. Why does the city always have to smell like this?

The Café: We rushed out of the parking garage and tried to memorize where we had parked. Then we ran down the street and into my aunt’s favorite coffee shop.

Aquarium: The otter swam around his enclosure on his hairy brown back and clutched a big red dog toy.

Burlap: The 46 year old orangutan sat with his face against the glass while he huddled under a burlap sack.

Woolly Mammoth?: I looked over the fence and was surprised to see how hairy the elephant was. He almost looked like a wooly mammoth.

Space Needle: I peeked over the edge of The Space Needle and argued with my brother about with building was our hotel.

Food Court: Looking around the food court I tried to choose a booth to eat at. I finally chose Pie and ordered a chicken pot pie and a lemon San Pellegrino.  Mmm, good.

Granite: We waited for everyone to come to our 12:00pm meeting place at the Pacific Science Center, and rolled around the 4,000 pound granite ball.

My Favorite Moments on our Seattle Field Trip by K

Jimi’s guitar techniques:

1.       When I turned to see the last existing piece of Jimi Hendrix’s guitar that he lit on fire and smashed. It was the lower right side of the guitar with a place where you could plug in the cord to the amp.

Wahoooo!

2.      The moment I jumped from the stairs of the EMP to land on the concrete ground of the parking lot sidewalk.

This is luxury

3.      When I popped the bottle cap off of my Mexican coke in the comfort of my hotel room.

We’ve arrived!

4.     Lifting my head up from my exhausted posture to realize that we had arrived in Seattle and the sudden exhilaration running up my back.

Giant bamboo

5.      My arm brushing against a giant metal bamboo sculpture while looking down on me is the great space needle.

Wouldn’t it be fun to go base jumping!?

6.       Standing atop the space needle and peer down upon down town Seattle with many thoughts flying through my head.

Our second hotel room

7.      Twisting the door handle to our comfy hotel room at our second hotel the Maxwell.

As I yaaaaawn

8.      Opening my eyes from a short sleep after staying up until 12:00 watching Gladiator on TV.     

Field Trip (Written Reflection)

Grade: 6

Objective: To record our field trip experiences using sensory details and strong verbs

Field Trip to Seattle By K and A.

As we rode up the Space Needle, we watched the world beneath us become smaller and smaller as the Seattle skyline came into view.  We felt our ears pop as we peered through the elevator’s windows.  To get to Seattle, we had to take a forty-five minute bus ride from Holden Village to Lucerne, then ferry for an hour to Field’s Point, where we got in cars and drove for almost four hours before Seattle’s skyscrapers engulfed us in a forest of glass, concrete, and steel.  We stayed in a city less than a week, but during that time, we had many great adventures: from watching sea jellies at the Seattle Aquarium to strumming giant guitars at the Pacific Science Center.  We explored the world’s fastest transport plane at the Museum of Flight, sweated at the Seattle Zoo, and witnessed the carnage of Shakespeare’s King Lear.  We listened to the Seattle Symphony and applauded at John Lill’s piano concert.  We learned and listened and saw, but some of our favorite moments were moments like the one on the Space Needle: moments where we got to witness the city’s skyline, add to the Post Alley “gum wall”, crack open fresh sea food at the Crab Pot, walk along the Puget Sound, and peer out at Mount Rainier and Mount Baker.

Our hands: A group poem by Holden elementary and middle school students

Grade Level: Elementary and Middle School

Objective: To begin thinking about detail, analogy, and metaphor through looking at and writing about our hands. (Inspired by:  Finding Your Sense of Place Through Observation, Art, Journaling and Poetry

Today we:
-Looked at our hands using a microscope
-Listed things our hands reminded us of
-Compared lists
-Collaborated to write a group poem

Our hands remind us of... by Holden Elementary and Middle School students

Rivers flowing in, out, around
polluted waters underground

We think of our hands and the grooves in our skin
 remembering clear waters we were baptized in

our hands make us think of the land
of canyons and valleys and dry desert sands

our hands are road maps, spiders, bamboo

when we look at them close, our hands are made new.