Mr. B’s Blogspot

On Nov. 14, National History Day teacher, Mrs. Larsen, took seven of her students to Arizona State University to do research on the university’s library system. This year’s NHD topic is “The Individual in History: Actions and Legacies.” Students must create an original research project based on this broad theme. There are various categories students may choose from to create their project: documentary, exhibit, paper, performance, or web site.

This year’s students are researching historic individuals ranging from Napoleon Bonaparte to Jackie Robinson.

The Arizona State Competition will be held at FHMS on April 4. For more information about NHD, contact Adrienne Larsen, alarsen@fhusd.org. 

FHMS was proud to host an Internet safety forum presented by Arizona State Attorney General, Terry Goddard today. Mr. Goddard makes this presentation to Arizona schools “about once a week.” Mr. Brennan contacted the AG’s office after receiving a copy of an Internet safety manual for parents and teens back in September. 

Mr. Goddard gave some powerful examples of what can happen when kids become careless on Internet forums such as MySpace. An AG staffer brought the point home by showing the FHMS students how he created a phoney MySpace page and identified himself as a student moving to Fountain Hills. Fifty-two Fountain Hills youth invited 14-year-old “Troy” to be a MySpace “friend,” not realizing the page actually belong to an adult with the AG’s office. To make the point even more startling, one FH child identified another FH child by first and last name, thus creating a gateway for “Troy” to locate the second child’s home. The demonstration showed FHMS eighth graders how easy it is for a predator to work thorugh MySpace to find unsuspecting students.

Additional copies of the Internet Safety Guide for Parents are available in the FHMS lobby. Mr. Brennan, Ms. Dudziak, or Mrs. Gomez are able to speak to any parents about Internet safety. For more information on Internet safety, click on the link below to the Arizona Attorney General’s office.

www.azag.gov

Ms. Sarah Butchin’s Language Arts class did a unit on the novel How to Eat Fried Worms by Thomas Rockwell. The students enjoyed the stomach turning story! After each group of chapters, the class created flow chart graphic organizers to assist in sequencing the pertinent events. After completing the book the students created colorful time lines, wrote a book report and cooked a worm-tastic meal.

 To read a book report about the novel, click on this link:

andrew-worms-report

Mrs. Nichols and Mrs. Perry collaborated to create an assignment that linked descriptive language and writing with visual art.

Mrs. Nichols’ assigned students to write a detailed description of a character called “Glue Boy”. Glue Boy was wanted for causing damage in a variety of areas and the students used words to create the image of what he looked like.  This project was the culmination of a unit using descriptive language to create a word picture, thereby enhancing creative writing.

Mrs. Perry’s Art class first learned the importance of Forensic Art and how sketch artists create images of a person from a description. They then became Sketch Artists by using the Glue Boy written descriptions, or created new ones, to create a realistic portrait. Students used correct proportion in relating parts and sizes when placing those unique features on Glue Boy’s face. Students also applied value through shading to create a more realistic image. The final touch turning the drawings into a poster by adding the words “Wanted” and a reward so the FHMS students can help find this much talked about boy!

To view a complete slide show of all posters, click on the link below.

wanted-poster-slide-show

Seventh grade science teacher, Ms. Wright, helped her students discover how air bags work. Students learned a variety of facts about air bags, and then conducted an experiment to test their home-made air bags. The crash test dummy for this experiment was a raw egg.

Here are some of the learning objectives for the unit:

1. Acetic acid reacts with sodium bicarbonate to produce a gas. 
2. Acetic acid and sodium bicarbonate are the chemical names for vinegar and baking soda, respectively.
3. The two main purposes of an air bag are to slow a person’s forward movement into the steering wheel (or dashboard) and to provide a cushion between the person and the steering wheel (or dashboard). 
4. The three parts of an air bag are the bag itself, the sensors, and the inflation system (or gas generator). 
5. The main chemical responsible for the inflation of an air bag is sodium azide, which rapidly decomposes into nitrogen gas and sodium metal when it is ignited.
6. Other reactions occurring within an air bag ensure that highly reactive, dangerous byproducts are changed into stable and safe compounds.
7. The inflation of an air bag and the other chemical reactions occur in a very short amount of time (1/25^th of a second).
8. The reaction between acetic acid and sodium bicarbonate is similar to the decomposition of sodium azide because both reactions produce a gas.
9.