It's time once again! We're going to do some research and  post to my blog!

Today's topic: Polymers!

I want you to use the following sites to answer some questions for me:

MSU Chemistry: Polymers

Chemical of the Week

Applications of Polymers

The questions I'd like for you to answer are as follows:

1. What is a polymer?
2. What is a monomer?
3. What are 5 examples of polymers that we would encounter on a daily basis (please include the scientific name of the polymer as well as the common name)?
4. What are 5 examples of polymers that we wouldn't encounter so often as a daily basis (please include the scientific name of the polymer as well as the common name)?
5. What could be an alternate use for 1 of the 5 polymers we don't use very often so that we could increase usage?
6. What are 3 interesting facts you learned while doing this research?

Please comment (with your answers, AND YOUR NAME) below. 

If you have any questions, be sure to let me know!

Seat Belt Laws: Physical Science Assignment

Iowa Seat Belt Laws
Car Seat Information
State Seat Belt Laws
Center for Disease Control and Prevention Seat Belt Info

Choose 3 of the 4 sites in red above,  (or all 4) and read up on seat belt laws. 

1. Open a comment, and this is what you'll need in your comment:
1. 3 interesting facts you found on those three websites. 
2. Are you tall enough/do you weigh enough to not need a booster seat any more?
3. What is your opinion regarding seat belt laws? Should it be a personal choice?
4. Your homework over the weekend will be to read the comments of your classmates and create a new comment responding to theirs (so in the end, you should have 2 comments below!). 

This is what your comment should look like:

1. Interesting Fact #1
2. Interesting Fact #2
3. Interesting Fact #3
4. My opinion on seat belt laws are____________.
5. I, (Ms. H) weigh enough and am tall enough that I do not require a booster seat when I drive/ride in a car. 

New comment: (Insert classmates name here) Your facts were cool! I did not find those on the sites I looked on! I really thought that there was only an age limit on booster seats, not size limits!

***Please respond appropriately, your comments should be reasonable, and at least 2 sentences long. 

Welcome to Redeemer School!

The first days at Redeemer School were days to remember! Being the planners we are, Carrie and I had our lessons planned out, as well as our whole day planned with quick assessments to see what levels students were at, math class, science class, reading, and English. We were thinking that our anxiety was good anxiety, and were just excited to get class started!

Well, being teachers, we also knew that we would need to be flexible, and we found out quickly just how flexible we would have to be! Students came into school early, which was great! It was exciting to see how enthusiastic students were to be starting school and learning new things! Carrie was put in charge of taking names and creating a registration book, here was our first experience with great flexibility! Carrie and I had trouble understanding/deciphering their names, and even had trouble when Sr. Estella told us the names of the children! We quickly put the registration away, to be continued another day and moved on to asking their ages so we could separate out the 60+ students we had for 4 classrooms. 

Based on age, the great majority of students were in kindergarten. Flexibility Part 2! I was quickly pulled down to help with kindergarten, after our morning in grade 2-3 doing our assessments etc (which went rather well by-the-way). In the kindergarten room, things were quickly becoming, well let's just say the other teachers were becoming frazzled! Students were running around, students were crying, students were sleeping (this was partially because we were trying to get them to calm down, so we had them laying their heads on the desks).  Needless to say, we left defeated that day and really had some restructuring to do!

Commence Day 2-3! 
We made our changes, and started over again. Days 2-3 were so much better! We did our assessments again, worked 1-on-1 with a few of the students, and made it through break time, and after break time. We had more adjusting to do, but we were on our way to better days at Redeemer School. 

Normal day in Grade 2: school started at 8:00am, we had religion, reading/writing, maths (yes, they called it maths), science, and when we had our Zambian translator, we also had a class called SDS. After the half of the morning had passed (so at 10am) we had break for a half hour. Students would be able to use the restroom, have their food and drinks sitting out on the steps of the school and have their snack and then go and play for the remainder of the break. 

Redeemer School 

"Little Blue School"

African School Observations

Welcome back!

The first day were were able to observe at schools, we were at Lukamatano School outside of Lusaka, the capital of Zambia. Lukamatano School serves students preschool through grade 9. We left Mt. Zion at 6:00am to try and avoid traffic, but without luck! We did not arrive at school until 9:00am. We were able to observe in a class that was as close to our normal teaching level as possible. I was in a grade 8 science class to begin with. 

Grade 8 science consisted of a human anatomy lesson focusing on the cardiovascular system. I was even allowed to answer a few questions, to which the students all cheered for me! Students in this class were all so eager to answer questions, due in large part to the enthusiasm of the teacher. Watching this teacher with his pupils was refreshing. He had so much energy and made the lesson exciting for everyone involved. 

Carrie and I also had the privilege of teaching a lesson in the English class. They were learning to write business letters and we were asked to teach how we in America write business letters. There were actually quite a few differences. In Zambia, they are told to state their age, gender, and to include where they are from. We informed them that we are not required to include this type of information in our business letters, but we may be asked if we want to volunteer the information later for a survey. 

The normal school day at Lukamatano School runs from 8:00am to 12:00pm with a break around 10:00am and lunch after the last class. The reason they only go until 12:00pm is for students who have a great distance to walk to school. Some pupils walk over 4 miles one way just to get to school. 

Following the observation at school, we were able to tour the clinic which was simple, but also fairly modern. They had a maternity wing, an x-ray room, a pharmacy, and a nursery. The clinic has a group of people who volunteer their time to make rounds to over 200 patients who are homebound because of HIV/AIDS. The volunteers take medicine around which is free (because of a government program I believe is what the director of the program told us) and they also make sure the patients are eating as it is crucial when taking the HIV/AIDS medicine. 

On Tuesday, we traveled again into Lusaka, this time to Our Lady School. This school was considered a private school, and had students preschool through grade 12. On this day, we were able to observe in classes specific to our teaching level, so I was able to observe in grades 10-12. 

Grade 12 was a chemistry lab, and there was 8 students in this lab. The instructor stood at the front of the class, completing the lab, students involvement was limited to observations made on the test tubes the instructor passed around after he explained and then completed the experiment. This specific lab was one we did in biology at Dakota Valley where students ran different tests on unknown substances to determine if they were fats, carbohydrates, or proteins. At Our Lady School, the pupils were expected to know the test for each substance and explain it to the instructor before he completed the test, and then they passed around the test tube to record their observations of the test. 

Grade 11 was a math class where students were working on ratios. There were four examples on the board that they were required to work on solving themselves and then they could volunteer to complete the example of their choice on the board. 

Grade 10 was a geography class in which we learned about the International Date Line and time zones. I was able to talk a little bit about America and how it is split into 4 different time zones and how where I live was 7 hours behind Zambian time (when it was 12pm in Zambia, it was 5am at my home). Before we were able to discuss this, students took notes from the board that the teacher wrote straight from the book. 

This school started at 8:00am and concluded at 1:00pm. They also had a break, where most every student had a snack or purchased a snack at the school store. 

It was interesting to compare the two schools and get an idea about just how different and similar African education is from American education. We also had a base to build from for our instruction at Redeemer School. Little did we know that we would need to use so much of it!

Next posting will be about our first 3 days at Redeemer School. 

Thanks for reading!

Zambia, Africa Experience: Redeemer School

This past June, I was blessed to be asked to join a group of sisters and lay people and travel to Zambia, Africa to aid the Daughters of the Redeemer open up a school. The group/ project is The Franciscan Common Venture, or we were referred to as the Common Venture Team. We met in January to go over specifics and obtain more information on the culture of Zambia, what types of foods to avoid, and much more.

We went into the experience thinking that we would be helping out in the classroom, giving aid to the teachers who were hired to fulfill the education of the children. That happened...But not until they hired the teachers a week before we left to come back home!

We were greeted upon arrival by Sr. Matilda, Sr. Emelda, Sr. Margie, and Sr. Connie. We collected our luggage, and luckily Sr. Rosie was the only one of the 7 of us not to receive her luggage (never fear, it was located and picked up the following day!) We then traveled by vans to Mt. Zion which would be home for our stay in Zambia. The road was quite interesting to say the least! Dirt road with many dips, holes, and large rocks jutting from the ground! Susie, who is a novitiate at Mt. Zion with the Daughters of the Redeemer, had a light supper prepared for us, then we were able to shower and go to sleep. They advised us to sleep right away when we got there and sleep until we woke up and that would help our bodies to adjust to the time changes. I think I slept from 4:30pm to 11am the next morning!

We were able to check out what we called "The Little Blue School" AKA: Redeemer School, and talk with Sr. Emelda and Sr. Brenda who would be the principal of the school. Construction started on the school in February, and was ready to open (for the most part!) on the first Wednesday we were there.

I'll close this post for now and pick up again later with more details about our school observation experiences and more on Redeemer School experiences!

Thank you for reading!

Next Chapter: Teaching Begins

Today is the official day! I signed my contract over 3 months ago, but today is the day that it all starts! I am officially a physical science and chemistry teacher at Saint Edmond High School in Fort Dodge, Iowa. I will also be the JV volleyball coach (Go Gaels!) and assistant girls varsity track coach.

I was able to get into my room a few weeks ago, and I love it! There is so much space, and the students will have flat desks to work on, and we may also be able to use the tops of them for sidewalk chalk drawings for labs/demonstrations!

I hope to keep this blog updated as the year progresses, I am looking forward to diving into physical science and chemistry and of course volleyball!

Thanks for reading!

Costa Rica!!

Day two in Costa Rica and it has been awesome so far! We came from San Jose to Tortuguero where along the way we were able to see 3 types of monkeys, howler monkey, spider monkey, and the white faced capuchin. We also saw a cayman which is in the same family as alligators. We have seen two toucans, a type of grasshopper (that was huge!) and a cool red-eyed leaf frog! Definitely very cool stuff!