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Students Learn Life Skills Through Monthly Cooking Lessons

by Carol Wenndt

In April, students in my class practiced reading and following directions by making a recipe for frozen bananas. The recipe was called, "Bank on It Bananas". Each student had to follow the seven steps to make this treat. The activity is from Unique Learning Systems, which is a curriculum used in my classroom.

During the lesson, we learned about washing our hands before cooking, starting with a clean work space, and why each item was used. Each student and adult washed their hands and the students all washed the table before starting. They also learned that it is important to help clean up afterwards!

After they were all done eating, each student got to review the recipe. They had to tell: what was in it (bananas, honey, sprinkles), how did it taste (yummy, yucky, or ok), was it easy or hard to make, and was it healthy? The monthly cooking lessons are teaching life skills, as well as introducing new healthy foods to the students. They ALL look forward to our reading lessons when they end with special treats that they make!

First Graders Celebrate Earth Day with the Raccoon River Players

First graders at Altoona Elementary were treated to the "Raccoon River Players," on April 18th, to celebrate Earth Day. Mary Gillaspey, from Metro Waste Authority, and Gail Peckumn, from Des Moines Waterworks, made up a creative team that visited to teach students about Earth-friendly practices. The "Players" acted out and discussed three different skits to help students see the importance of taking care of the environment and what they could do to help keep the Earth clean. The skits centered around: clean water, correct disposal of unwanted chemicals, and different types of litterbugs.

Students were first introduced to a skit called, "A Rainy Day", about how rain carries pollutants into the storm sewer, which takes the water to the river. Kaden Nygen, a first grader, learned how to keep water clean: "When a car leaks oil, clean it right away so it doesn't go in the water." The second skit was titled "It's Your Neighborhood," which was about taking hazardous liquids to the Metro Hazardous Waste Drop-off instead of discarding them in the storm sewer. Dominic Burriola learned, "The storm sewers help us by taking all the water from our streets and sending it to the river."

The last skit was called "Litterbug," and it was about littering at a movie theater, ball park, while traveling, and at a picnic. Cabe Cullinan learned, "You shouldn't litter because it makes the earth dirtier and dirtier." Michael Roach added, "Littering is really bad for animals and humans too."
First grade students were very excited to raise awareness about Earth Day and finished the guest speaker visit by making litter bags to go in their family cars. No more first grade traveling litterbugs! Here's to a clean environment!

Altoona Elementary Students Build and Program Robots

by Carol Hink

The fourth graders of Mrs. Hink's, Mrs. Petersen's, and Mrs. Rabalais's classrooms, at Altoona Elementary School are building and programming robots in their Media classes. Each pair of students is given a kit of lego type pieces and a direction book. The two decide what robot they would like to build, and then follow the step-by-step directions to create that robot.

Once they are finished with the design, they plug in their robot to the computer and program it. The robots can be programmed to move forward, backward, rotate, or move (swing) their arm to complete a task. Students can even race their robots, but this is where the problem solving comes into play. They must determine how many revolutions they need to program their robot to complete and win the race. The competition and excitement build.

The "robot" building experience is an extraordinary teaching tool to turn kids on to problem solve, to work as a team, and to be creative. We were all sorry when the unit came to an end. A big thank you goes to Mrs. Harriet Peterson, our Media Specialist.

Famous Iowan Wax Museum

by 5th Grade Teachers: Mr. Brincks, Ms. Frost, Mr. Rueber

5th Graders at Altoona Elementary recently participated in a Famous Iowan Wax Museum. As a part of their Social Studies unit on Iowa History, the students were required to research someone who contributed greatly to society with Iowa ties. They spent a great amount of time conducting research, writing and practicing their speech, and creating a timeline. The students presented their findings to Altoona Elementary staff, students, and families.

The students did a wonderful job and we are all so very proud of their effort and hard work. A special thank you goes out to Mrs. Peterson, our Media Specialist, who helped make this project a complete success!

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