This is an article about the project my class is weekly, jointly working on,
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Mesa School students keeping track of sun's position
Photos by Eric Parsons / Star staff Mesa School third-graders Marissa Nunez, foreground left, Kiara Ketchpaw and Nicole Ozawa huddle with other students in a shelter on the school's playground where they have been conducting a science experiment.
STORY TOOLS
More from Education: K-12
Students have been plotting the path of the sun's shadow on a grid painted on the playground.
Students converge on Mesa School's playground every Tuesday morning in Somis, standing near a tetherball court on a giant grid full of red and yellow dots.
One student holds up a round wall clock, and students wait. They throw out a hypothesis or two as seconds tick closer and closer to 10. It has become a weekly ritual at the K-8 school.
For the past 26 weeks, students have measured the same tetherball pole's shadow as the clock strikes 10 a.m., or 11 a.m. during daylight saving time, and have carefully painted their measurements and observations on the blacktop grid.
Rain or shine, they do it "to see what's going to happen next," said second-grader Matthew Weymer, 8. The school plans to track the position of the sun over the course of a year, as well as the daily path of the sun throughout the day.
In the process, students are demystifying complex science and math concepts and figuring out how space and time relate to one another, Superintendent John Puglisi said.
Mesa School launched the hands-on experiment, called Exploring Space and Time, in June, and summer school students' first task was to draw the grid.
Students use the tetherball pole as "a gnomon," marking the length of its shadow every Tuesday at the same time, and every half-hour from 8:30 to 11:30 a.m. monthly. The dots marking their observations connect into arcs on a corner of their playground.
Students also plot the information on a computer, write and draw in journals and use cameras to document their work.
No one lectures or tells them the answers, like why shadows change size. Instead, they work with teachers, administrators and each other, measuring, collecting data and looking for answers themselves.
It's not so much "the things" they learn, but their process of figuring out how it affects them and the world around them, Puglisi said. They learn by observing, playing games to find different coordinates on the grid and by physically performing experiments.
Students want to start comparing their results with other people doing the same thing around the world, and Puglisi is trying to find other schools to join in the hands-on, possibly global lesson.
So far, project participants include a former teacher tracking the same information in Huntsville, Ark., and students at Hathaway School in the Hueneme School District.
Students and Puglisi hope to find more partners, from places like Tunisia and Finland to Thousand Oaks and Fillmore.
The inquiry-based project would give schools an additional tool to teach kids, Puglisi said, while the expanding data will give students more opportunities to learn.
Plus, "it's fun," said Allisa Gonzales, 8. "You can actually see what happens."
For more information about the project, call 485-1411 or visit mesaschool.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=dep_intro&;dept_id=1914.
I am a public school teacher, artist, mother and I write from perspectives as all three to things that seem compelling....with a hope it creates community and cross-communication in a busy world and life. I value human connectivity greatly. See my Mrs. Puglisi's National Standards at: http://sarahpuglisi.blogspot.com/2010/03/mrs-puglisis-100-national-standards.html This blog in no way is affiliated with or reflects ANY school district. Please feel free to comment and say hello.
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