Sunday, October 30, 2016

Provocation: Build Part of the Shore

Using fabric, twigs, and blocks... that is just what these Kindergarteners did.  




Rolling in the wavy ocean.



Building a coral reef.

Part of the reef.

And a passenger ship...



Saturday, October 29, 2016

First Grade Farmers: Community Supported Agriculture


Thanks to parent volunteer, Amy John, the Angel Farm CSA, is back at 610 Henry Street.  For about $200, a family can get 8 weeks of fresh produce.  BNS first graders purchased their own share. And each week they worked to help display and sort the produce. 



Angel Family Farm Facebook Page







That's Amy John with kids.








Then students had a chance to prepare a snack using the CSA and BNS produce.









And thanks to La Rubia, (Blondie), Speckles, and Red...hard boiled eggs were part of the snack



Speckles:  One of the founders of the feast

Monday, October 24, 2016

One Day in the Life of the Hudson 2016

Joining thousands of students all along the Hudson River, BNS fourth grade ecologists studied the quality of this mighty river.  Nearly 110 students visited Valentino Pier with the help of parent chaperones, a hardworking team of student teachers, and of course, BNS teachers.     Special thanks goes to Christine O'Neill who traveled hours to get to Brooklyn.  And to our DITL runner, Sarah Mount of NYSDEC.

There were four stations:  Station One run by Eva  and Kiana had students testing the chemistry of the water: temperature, Dissolved Oxygen, and pH as well as its turbidity, and salinity.  pH was a neutral 7 and the DO was in a healthy range of 5 ppm to 8 ppm. Salinity averaged a brackish 27 ppt.  Turbidity:  40 JTUs.






The second station:  measuring the biodiversity of the river. Christine O'Neill, Student Conservation Member who is in the Hudson Valley Corps.


These green crabs were found at the bottom of a bucket camouflaged and waiting for us!  There is no scientific proof, but Science Lesson Magic strikes again.

Christine O'Neill helps students  ID crabs and the silverside fish caught in our seining nets.





Sarah Mount, of NYSDEC, was on hand to help students as well.

  The third station involved determining the current direction using light green flowers as well as the wind current and direction using the Beaufort Scale.  Robert Pincus, chaperone and climate scientist, tied streamers to poles to help us see the variation in winds between the poles.








This station was run by student teachers Rachel and Molly.  Northwest current and wind.  Wind speed varied from a gentle to moderate breeze.

An amazing cloud ID'ed by Robert as an Asperitas Cloud--uncommon and not well understood!

The last station had students "take a snaphot" of the river using pencil and paper.




















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