Category Archives: Academics

4th graders started the quarter by traveling the Oregon Trail through Nebraska. We started at the Little Blue River where we ate Skeeter cakes (cornmeal pancakes with mosquitos in them, really it was flax seed). Next we traveled to Ft. Kearney where we accidentally pulled water hemlock (poison) and ate it killing 3 wagon members. Windlass Hill and Ash Hallow were very beautiful and had refreshing water but some of our wagons got stumped (rolled down the hill and crashed). One family even had a new baby here, which they named Ash. At Jailhouse and Courthouse Rock we saw rattlesnakes and tried hardtack. Our next stop was Chimney Rock were we learned to make a toy named a “humdinger”. Our last stop is Scott’s Bluff. Hopefully, we can finish through Nebraska without digging any more graves!

Fourth graders attended the Bird Conservancy of the Rockies presentation on bird banding. While we were there we saw the nets the birds fly into, banding of the birds, weighing of the birds, and we got to hold a felt bird that was a model of a real bird. Students also got to use binoculars and bird books to identify birds and play a bird survival game. We found out that only around 30% of birds that migrate make it to their destination.

Fifth graders participated in an egg drop challenge to help them learn about the practices of science and how to think like a scientist. After asking questions, they had 30 minutes to design and build a model with the available materials that would protect an egg in a drop. We tested the models and, afterwards, analyzed the data to think about how they would revise their initial models to make them better.

Today the first grade class released 18 butterflies. The class has watched their butterflies metamorphosize from caterpillars. Mrs. Marie Nelson and Mrs. Melissa Mracek from our county extension office have visited with us over the past few weeks. They taught us many things about the life cycle of the butterfly and the parts of a butterfly. If you see any painted lady butterflies flying around town, they might be ours!

Fifth graders traveled to Chadron State Park for their Trout in the Classroom field trip. We started off the cool, wet day with some fishing in the pond. We got our hands dirty baiting our hooks and caught several bluegill and a couple smallmouth bass. We even had one student catch his very first fish ever! Next we released our trout. We received these trout eggs in January from Nebraska Game and Parks, and raised them in our classroom fish tank. Students were a little sad to say goodbye. Finally we went on the hunt for aquatic macroinvertebrates aka water bugs. Macroinvertebrates are helpful in determining water quality. The damselfly nymphs and dragonfly nymphs are indicators of potentially good water quality.

Second grade had “Camp Learn A Lot” this week. We brought in tents, sleeping bags, flashlights and a campfire! We read so many camping books under the “stars”, learned and wrote about how to eat a worm, wrote and shared spooky campfire stories, read maps and made maps, constellations, bees and how they make honey, and we had a couple special readers come to camp! Turns out, learning can be fun!