Many of you know that the ducks on our retention pond were hatched in the science lab last May. Zip and Percy are both male ducks and Uno, the white pekin, is a female. Well, it is spring and Zip and Percy were no longer being friendly. We decided to move Zip to Mrs. Gammage’s pond with her ducks. Everyone is happy now! This is Zip with his new friends.

I try to make every corner in my room alive with science.

Every four years an extra day is added to the calendar, making
the length of the year 366 days, instead of the normal 365.

Why on earth does that need to happen?

From Kids Know It Network- The calendar is supposed to match the solar year, in other words, the length of time it takes for Earth to orbit the Sun once. But things aren’t quite that simple. It actually takes Earth 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes and 46 seconds to complete its orbit (about 365 1/4 days). Those extra hours gradually add up so that after four years the calendar is out of step by about one day. Adding a day every four years allows the calendar to match up to the solar year again.

In honor of Abraham Lincoln’s birthday, kindergarten scientists learned about the history of the penny and how coins are minted. Click here to watch a video. Then we used hand lenses to observe the pictures, words, and dates on our pennies.

Oxidation causes pennies to tarnish. Oxidation also occurs when metals rust and apples turn brown. We tried cleaning pennies with soap and water with no success. Then we mixed vinegar (a weak acid) and salt together. Our pennies were bright again. Click here to learn more about this investigation.

I rinsed off the salt and vinegar solution from some of our pennies, but I left it on others. What do you observe? Why are the pennies green? The Statue of Liberty is green for the same reason- oxidation and acid rain. Click here to learn more about the Statue of Liberty.

Before our next investigation, we practiced using a pipette. It works like an eye dropper.

I explained that water molecules like to cling to each other and introduced the concepts of surface tension and cohesion. I asked my scientists to hypothesize how many drops of water they thought could fit on the surface of a penny. Most thought the number would be between two and ten. They were amazed when they were able to fit between 20 and 40 drops on their pennies. It didn’t take long for one of my scientists to notice that a water bubble (or dome) formed on top his penny.

Watching flurries fall from my window all day.  It was fun to see the students outside during our “snowstorm”. Several classes tried to catch snowflakes on black paper.

Click here to watch the ducks in the snow.

Dr. Rosener and her nurse Maggie, from Loving Hands Animal Clinic, visited my third grade biologists. They brought along some animal friends too!

After reviewing the characteristics of fish, third grade biologists learned about the cichlids that live in the hallway aquarium. Cichlids are freshwater fish from Lake Malawi in Africa. The fish like to hide in crevices and caves in their rocky habitat. African cichlids are known for their beautiful patterns and array of colors that are not typical to most freshwater fish. Males are territorial and the largest, most colorful males are the dominant fish in the tank. The females are mouth brooders. They incubate their eggs in their mouths for three weeks. They are easy to breed and we often have young fish in this tank.