Walters' 8th Grade Blog

Every important thing I did in 8th grade, you'll find right here!

Current Event

Two children killed in Minnesota field trip landslide

On Wednesday, May 22, 2013, Authorities recovered the body of a Minnesota child who was missing after a gravel landslide on a field-trip. Fourth graders from St. Louis Park Elementary School went hiking in Lilydale Regional Park on Wednesday, when the ground gave way. With all the rain Minnesota has gotten, the ground was soft and wet, which made it easy for it to give way. Students were hiking along a steep slope, hunting for fossils, when the ground gave-way and they fell into what became a ‘pit’. Gravel came on top of them and two students were trapped. Soon, they were both dug out by firefighters who clawed away the gravel with their hands and shovels. “Crews finally recovered the missing body on Thursday (May 23), after bad weather let up.” St. Paul Assistant Fire Chief, Jim Smith said. One of the children who was pulled from the slide, later died, but has not yet been identified by authorities. “One child injured in the slide has been released from the hospital and another remains in serious condition.” Officials say. One child was only partially buried, but another was completely buried. The search for the missing student was suspended overnight, but thankfully has now been found. Before the students were uncovered, St. Paul Fire Marshal Steve Zaccard said, “Water is flowing right into the hole, making it extremely dangerous for rescuers to work anymore.” “Thoughts and prayers go out to the families of the children and to our first responders who continue to deal with the situation as it develops,” said St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman. “Classes went on at Peter Hobart Elementary, where the students were from, on Thursday.” district officials said. “This is an incredibly sad time for our schools and our entire school community. Our hearts go out to the families, friends, and everyone touched by today’s accident,” St. Louis Park Public Schools Superintendent Debra Bowers said in a statement. “We, like everyone else, want to understand how this tragedy occurred, but today we ask for your continued thoughts and prayers for everyone involved.”

I think this is very tragic makes me worried about those going on field trips when wet outside. I think people need to be more careful when walking on wet, soft ground; although you never can predict when the ground may give-way. We need to continue to pray for those in Minnesota, who may have lost a son or daughter in this tragic incident.

Link: http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/05/23/18441754-two-children-killed-in-minnesota-field-trip-landslide?lite

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LA+ Book Reflection (The Pearl by John Steinback)

1. What stands out to you from the book or one of our conversations? What impacted you the most?

I’d say when we had our discussions, it helped me understand the book more. I liked how the Discussion Directors talked about what they said in their groups, because it gave our class more in-depth discussion about what happened. I would say I was impacted the most by  how much Kino changed from the beginning to the end of the book. In one of our discussions we talked about how much he changed. Like how, in the beginning, Kino wanted to sell the pearl so that he could be rich and do many things for his family. But by the end of the book,  Kino had given up many of his possessions which led to killing his own son- whom he was going to send to school after he got money from the pearl. Coyotito’s death made Kino realize how foolish he was about keeping the pearl. I’m glad that in the then Juana and Kino finally gave up and threw it into the sea.

2. What do you learn from this book or one of our conversations? Why does it matter?

I learned that you need to put others before yourself, even if it means loosing someone in your family.

3. How does what you learned cause you to live, think or approach the people around you differently?

Thank God for everything you have. Don’t be greedy, but be thankful. You never know when something may happen, which could make you tempted and you may loose something/someone close to you.

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Language Arts: 8th Grade Shadow Day Reflection

I shadowed my aunt who works at Art Reality, downtown Zeeland. A realtor is a person who sells houses. My aunt is the secretary at Art Reality (My Aunt and Uncle’s business.) It was really fun. I learned whats all involved with the real-estate world. I could totally see myself working their, even though it’s kind of a low pay. I don’t think I would like being the secretary, like my aunt, because all you do it paperwork, bills and paychecks. I think I could do something more like my Uncle, who is one of the agents there- one of the people who actually sells houses to people and talks to people.

Overall, I really enjoyed shadow day, and I would like to see the 8th graders do it next year too. 

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‘The Pearl’ Intro- Creative Writing

If I could have anything in the world, I would want a horse. I would like a black horse that has a  white snip on it’s nose. I would also like to have a saddle and all the other stuff you need when you own a horse (I would need: barn, hay, pasture, feed and feeding box, reigns, blankets, combing brushes, ropes to hook it to things so it doesn’t run away, and a house by woods so that I can ride the horse in trails behind my house.). I’ve always loved horses. Last summer, I went to Cran-Hill Ranch and I took a horse camp for a week. I loved it and I basically fell in love with horses. I’ve always wanted one of my own, but taking that horse training camp made me want one even more.

If I got a horse, I would train that horse and spend all my hours with it. I would want to participate in races and try to become the best horse racer who ever lived. – Now, I know that sounds like a little bit of a fairy tale, but I do really want a horse. Maybe I wouldn’t become a professional racer/horse-ridder, but I would sure want to try.

Having a horse would make me more motivated to finish my homework and other tasks I have to do. Having a horse of my own would make me more motivated, because I would want to spend lots of time with it, but as my dad says, “work before play”, I would have to finish my homework and math before I could go hang-out with my horse.

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Recap the Senate Session/Our Jobs (History Class)

I also liked how lots of things were conflicts, during our senate session. Conflict made our discussions interesting. This leads to what frustrated me. Since there was a lot of conflict, lots of bills didn’t pass. After a while, that got really annoying because nothing would pass. Either we would vote it down, or we would pass it, but then the President would veto it. This really frustrated me.

I learned that I like to talk in front of people. I would’t do it for a living, but I don’t mind doing in in History Class. I liked being in charge, when I was the Secretary of the Senate. I like writing on the board too, so that was really fun. I also learned that certain people in our class sometimes would vote on things just because they like/dis-like the person who’s presenting. Or they would vote things down, just to make our discussion interesting. Yes, most of the class would vote on things by if they actually liked it or not, but I did notice others who would vote things up/down just because they didn’t care or didn’t like the person who was presenting.

In the future, I would like to become a teacher because I like writing on the board, being in charge, and talking in front of small groups of people. I am not really involved in the government, but I do like knowing whats going on/what are the big issues.

* I’d say my favorite part of the entire Senate Session, would be that I got to vote on everything. I liked to be into/engaged into what people were talking about during our discussion.

* One thing I would change, would be that there could only be a certain amount of Amendments on a bill. When people kept amending things, it got super annoying because I would have to write them on the board, for one, but also because it made our procedure/voting process go longer. I started to get sick of doing the senate session towards the end.

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Science Erosion Project

In Science class, we were assigned a type of erosion. We had to work with out table partner to create some unique to show the process of our erosion. My table partner, Dainen and I, were assigned wind erosion, so we created two 3D projects; one of before the erosion, and one of after the erosion. Every group also had to come up with at least 7 vocabulary words and show them in their project. We labled our vocab words by using popsicle sticks. Before the erosion, the land was flat with rough rocks. After the erosion, the land had hills with smooth rocks.

Before and After the Erosion 3D Models

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Current Event

Scientists say Canada’s glaciers are headed for unstoppable thaw

Last Thursday, Scientists said that Canada’s glaciers were going to suddenly met, which would raise the sea levels greatly. They predict that 20% of the glaciers could melt by the end of the 21st century. This big melt-down could add 1.4 inches to the sea level. The U.N. Panel of Climate Scientists say that the world sea level could raise 7-23 inches this century, if ice in Antarctica or Greenland continues to melt rapidly. Scientists are coming up with a way to tell the citizens who will be effected by the melt-down. They need to come up with a plan, so that the people living there will still survive after this big melt-down. The scientists have claimed the mass that the glaciers will lose will be irreversible and foreseeable. (This cannot be stopped, and it can’t be undone.) They think it will melt at the end of the 21st century, but they are not for-sure when it will melt exactly. The lead author, Jan Lenaerts from the University of Utrecht, said this seemed unstoppable because “the thaw of white glaciers would expose dark-colored tundra that would soak up more of the sun’s heat and further accelerate the melt.” Scientists stated that if the glaciers continue to melt, it could be several centuries before they are completely melted. Michiel Van Den Broeke, a co-author of the study at Utrecht University, said, “Most attention goes out to Greenland and Antarctica, which is understandable because they are the two largest ice bodies in the world.We want to show that the Canadian ice caps should be included in the calculations.” Scientists have used satellite data of past Canadian glaciers, to make a model to ‘map-out’ their decline. If the glaciers loose 20% volume, the world temperatures would rise by 5.4 degrees Fahrenheit in this century.

I think this is very interesting. It makes me think of how God is all powerful, and that he can make a whole glacier melt over-time. I also think that Scientists are doing a great job of trying to make the citizens aware of this incident. I’m glad they can be prepared for this melt-down.

Link: http://science.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/03/07/17226869-scientists-say-canadas-glaciers-are-headed-for-unstoppable-thaw?lite

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Comparing Governments

What did you learn that surprised you?

It was interesting to learn that every country has some type of  different government than the US. I didn’t know there were so many countries with lots of Political parties. I knew the US had four, but I didn’t realize that other countries like Poland, have 8 or more.

How do you think about yourself or your world differently, because of what you learned?

I see the world as a more structured place. I never knew there were so many people that over-see their country. Every country has a organized government- which I never knew.

How were your countries’ government similar to the US?

       – In structure? Poland and the Philippines have a Republic type government, just like the US.  All 3 of the countries I researched, have the 3 branches of government.

       – In how they dealt with issues?  In the Philippines, there was a shooting on Friday, which made the President call members of a clan occupying a Malaysian village, to surrender to avoid bloodshed. I didn’t really understand this issue/current event, but I do know that the US would not have handled it like this.

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Volcano Project

In Science Class, when learning about volcanoes, we created our own actual volcano. First we chose a volcano and created a poster about it. Then, we created a real life ‘exhibit’ of it. Today in Class we watched them explode. Before we did though, we were told to take a picture of our volcano. This was my groups’ project. (Credit to Maggie and Andrea)   Here is a video of our eruption: Click Here

Our volcano is a Composite volcano. Composite volcanoes have AA type lava, and usually have explosive eruptions. In Our volcano, we used many things to represent different parts. (Example: cotton balls for the could of gasses, and chocolate chips and glitter for the rocks/bombas that come out in the eruption.)

 

 

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Volcanes Interesantes

Mi Projecto de Volcanes:

Espanol Volcanes Projecto

Por: Sarah Walters y Maegan Sneller

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