 |
|
|
|
Photograph by George Sakkestad
Fourth-graders Rachael Viale, Sean Huntly and Trevor Unger of Louise Van Meter Elementary use materials from science kits to study frogs. The Los Gatos Elementary Educational Foundation funds the kits, which will be on display this weekend at the foundation's first-ever science festival. The foundation will also host the festival to kick off the beginning of its endowment fund.
|
Schools experiment with science festival
And local foundation is hoping for a successful conclusion
By Rebecca Ray
When Sandi Yellenberg looked through a microscope lens at four baby crayfish swimming in a clear container of water, the third-graders in Patricia Jackson's classroom could watch, too, as the image was projected onto an overhead television screen.
"Ooh, they're so small," the students from Daves Avenue School observed, as they watched all of the 9-millimeter-long crayfish kick their eight legs, feel the others with their antennae and snap their 1-millimeter-long pincers. "They're so cute."
Yellenberg, the science resource teacher for the Los Gatos Union School District, paused the screen so the children could count the legs--although it was difficult, since the crayfish moved so much that their legs looked like blurs. Yet the children still saw how the babies had the same number of legs as their mother, Spitfire, who lives in a bigger tank at the back of the room.
When Yellenberg announced she would use a more powerful lens to get an even closer look at the crayfish, the children became even more excited.
"Ooh, the 200 lens," one boy exclaimed to another. "Remember what we saw with it last time?"
Through the lens, the children saw the orange spots on the babies' white shells. They also saw the babies' compound eyes, which were blue and appeared to have pupils. Surprisingly, the eyes looked more like human eyes than one might think.
Then the children asked questions. How long were the baby crayfish? How long did it take them to grow? How many times did they shed their shells? How could a person tell boy and girl crayfish apart?
With the microscope that plugged into a TV, the children could watch the crayfish at the same time and watch them for a longer period of time, instead of having to line up just to get a peek. As they watched the crayfish and talked about what they saw, they thought of more questions they wanted to ask about the crayfish and engaged in scientific thinking.
The microscope is one of two that the district is borrowing this year from School Technology Resources, a Los Gatos-based company. The other microscope plugs into a computer, which allows the children to view specimens onscreen. The district would like to purchase microscopes like these--two microscopes for Fisher Middle School and one for each of the four elementary schools--next year.
In order to afford the microscopes--as well as other desired objects to enhance instruction in science, arts and technology in the district--the Los Gatos Elementary Educational Foundation is starting an endowment fund, which will collect interest like a savings account.
To kick off the endowment fund, the foundation will hold its first-ever science festival.
As the name implies, the event will be about more than the endowment fund. Not surprisingly, it will highlight the district's science program so that people can see how the foundation has spent its money in recent years.
Since the nonprofit foundation formed in 1982, it has funded educational programs in the district that don't receive state or federal funds. The programs include science, literacy, counseling, tutoring and art.
The foundation pays for half of Yellenberg's salary, while a $290-per-parcel tax, which residents originally passed in 1990 and renewed on April 9, funds the other half. Yellenberg helps teachers plan and teach science units.
At the festival, people will watch a marble roller coaster, donated by the Tech Museum of Innovation, launch water balloons with a giant catapult, and they can walk through a model of a cell. Students will perform dissections and demonstrate their science projects.
People will also see--and experience--the physical science kits.
Classes have used the kits since the 1999-2000 school year, when the district began its first year of a five-year plan to increase the number of its science experiments. The kits, which the foundation paid for, contain materials for experiments. The lessons are designed to be hands-on and help students experience science concepts, rather than just read about them. The materials are also designed to teach children how to ask and answer questions and to enhance their thinking and reasoning skills, Yellenberg said.
There are physical, life and earth science kits for each grade level.
At the festival, participants will be able to conduct experiments containing elements from physical science kits that students used this year. Each experiment will be similar to one that students in a certain grade did this year so that students can take pride in showing their parents how an experiment works, Yellenberg said.
Experiments will range from weaving and unweaving different pieces of fabric and examining their properties--such as whether they absorb or repel water--to trying to use batteries and wires to illuminate light bulbs. Participants will be able to pour cornmeal and beans onto screens to determine which screens can filter which objects, as well as watch what happens when they mix calcium carbonate or citric acid with water.
Besides the microscopes that hook up to TVs and computers, science teachers at Fisher have mentioned wanting to spend the endowment money on new equipment such as burners and scales. However, district and school employees haven't determined what they will spend endowment money on, since they don't know how much money they'll raise.
Those who donate money to the endowment fund will have their names engraved on walls, stations and/or equipment inside the new science building at Fisher, or on a brick in the front walkway to the building.
Participants will be able to view plans for the new science wing at the festival.
After construction workers demolish the current science wing on the first day of summer vacation, they will replace it with a two-story building that has science classrooms on the top floor and administrative offices on the bottom floor. The entrance to the building will serve as a new entrance to the school.
Measure B, a $91 million general obligation bond that district voters passed in June 2001, will fund construction of the new building, as well as several others at the five school sites.
Although one goal of the festival is to heighten awareness of the district's monetary need, Yellenberg refers to the event as a "friendraiser" rather than a fundraiser, since attendance is free.
In addition to being able to participate in a raffle with prizes, those who attend the festival will see the foundation reveal its new logo. The foundation will also announce how it is dropping the word "elementary" from its name, because it sees the name as too much of a mouthful.
The festival will take place at Fisher on April 28, 2-5 p.m.
|
|
|
|
Los Gatos, California Since 1881
