This week was our annual Halloween celebration! All the homerooms planned and set up lots of fun activities for the afternoon celebration, which included: a costume contest; werewolf games (on body outlines!); a dance party; a Mario-themed room with Wii games and snacks; a cake walk; face painting; and a costumed basketball contest. Thanks to Jennifer Shelton’s sister, Heather Kelso, we also had a balloon animal artist! There were so many creative costumes, delicious snacks, and fun games.
This week, Charlie’s shop students started to work on expanding parking spots across from the entrance of the school to help with drop off/pick up. They cut and removed the telephone poles, cleared the brush, and leveled the ground to allow for short-term pull-in parking. They are currently brainstorming how to make parking lines to show where cars can go. Hopefully this helps with parking lot congestion during drop off and pick up!
This week, three homerooms went on field trips to farms! On Tuesday, Neha and Cezanne took Neha’s homeroom to Tucson Village Farm. While there, they picked eggplants, planted broccoli, and made their own pizza from scratch. Students who came back were excited to purchase some of the crops they picked at the farmer’s market they have every Tuesday from 4:00-6:00pm.
The next day, Jennifer K. and Tony took their homerooms to Shamrock Farms. Students learned all about cows! They got to see the cows, learn how the farm cares for them, milk a simulated cow, and try ice cream made from the cows they raise.
This week, Charlie and Dawn took a group of students on a two night camping trip to Lake Patagonia. Here are some pictures of them at the lake and campsite. They are having a great time fishing, kayaking, playing in the sand, and being in nature!
The U.S. History students started the semester with a unit on indigenous cultures in America. They decided to focus on tribes in the southwest, specifically the Apaches. They’ve been doing several projects in class to better understand how they lived in the desert, including practicing throwing an at-latl.
To make a tipi, they found saguaro ribs for the frame, and dug them into the ground. They used tarps to make the coverings instead of animal hides.
They also have been making their own adobe bricks to build a fire pit at the Animal Center. They’ve been experimenting with mixing dirt they harvest from the desert with different materials, such as sand, concrete, and hay, to strengthen the bricks.
