The Windy Ridge Silver Hawks were recognized with the prestigious Spirit Award at the 2010 National Science Olympiad Tournament May 23rd at the University of Illinois. Thirteen Windy Ridge Middle School students, their coaches and families traveled to the Urbana-Champaign campus of the University of Illinois to compete in 23 events against the best teams from across the country. “We were shocked and a bit humbled when we heard our team being called on stage to accept this award, there are so many amazing teams at these competitions” said Roger Grant, team coach. What makes this award special is that it is the only one voted on by tournament judges, volunteers and fellow competitors who select the team that most exemplifies the true spirit of the competition. The award comes with a trophy and a $2,000 check from Lockheed Martin.

“We couldn’t be more proud of our students” said Jay Carcara, assistant principal. “In just 3 years of competing, they have accomplished so much: 3 times Central Florida Champions, twice number 2 in the state and twice selected to compete at the National Tournament. This award shows they also have ”the right stuff,” the character traits that will help them be successful in life.”

http://mysciencespace.com/documents/Study%20Guide%202.pdf

• Regular classes focus on:
  • Rock Cycle 
  • Energy Resources
  • Weather
  • Climate
  • Rivers/streams
• Regular classes will not be tested on:
  • Water Cycle
  • Plate Tectonics
  • Minerals
  • Astronomy

Practice Tests:

Honors Minerals

Rivers (Regular and Honors)

Don’t tell students to put away their electronics, tell them to get them out!

Our experiment in classroom technology continues. Discuss what works and what doesn’t, make recommendations for apps and how to prevent abuse (you know that stuff teachers get upset about). How about applications beyond note taking?

Chapter 17  You should have read and noted this chapter by now so you are responsible for the content. We also created our layers of the atmosphere illustration by graphing the temperature at different altitudes. Additional resources are on the study page.

Chapter 19  You have been working on this content using different websites listed on the study resource page and using the notes outline I provided. Reading through this chapter will provide you with a better undertanding.

Chapter 20 Reading through this chapter will provide you with th basics of how we can predict the weather. You’ll learn about air masses and fronts. Then look at severe weather like Florida’s thunderstorms and hurricanes.

Chapter 18 To understand weather we need to understand the process of moisture cycling in our atmosphere. Some of this will be a review from the beginning of the year when we did the water cycle but there is some new information also. 

Windy Ridge takes 2nd place in Florida and gets an invitation to Nationals

Having proved their metal in competition, Windy Ridge’s Science Olympiad Team now faces the daunting task of raising $15,000 needed to compete in the National Tournament at the University of Illinois.

Since we can’t use our projector I decided to put the powerpoint presentation on the web.

By 7:30 am we are registering Windy Ridge’s 2 teams along with coaches from 50 some other teams, the best from all across the state of Florida. Outside our team and supporting parents are gathering to set up camp for a long day of competition. One more time our students compete in 23 events. Attach your wrist band, complete your event card and you are off to the first events at 9am. And so it goes through out the day: disease detectives, road scholar, fossils, experimental design, anatomy, battery buggy and more, until at 3:00 pm events done we gather again at “camp”. Now the wait for judges to complete their tallies.

Fast forward 3 hours and the award ceremony begins. Our students wait to hear their team called as the judges award individual medals for each event. It has been a tough day of competition and you can see the anticipation and anxiety on the faces of our students; will their hard work be enough? And then it happens Windy Ridge Gold, and again, and again with some bronze and slivers too. In total we take medals in 9 events! Now the individual awards are done and it’s time to announce the top 3 teams overall, of which the top 2 teams will go on to compete at the national meet in May. A quick look at the medal count shows a very close race between Archimedean Conservatory, Orlando Science Middle School and Windy Ridge but overall scores count each student’s place not just the top 3. There is no way to know.

The overall awards begin, we huddle together and listen, “in third place …… Orlando Science Middle School”. We cheer and some venture a tentative smile. I caution them we don’t know yet, not until we hear the words. Another huddle, then we hear “in second place ……. Windy Ridge!” The crowd goes wild well at least it seemed that way to us. We race to the podium pick up our trophy and pose for pictures. I think I spotted a few students signing autographs from adoring fans but I’m not sure. We wait one more time and “in first place Archimedean Conservatory.” We cheer again and congratulate our worthy opponents. It’s been a long, exciting and rewarding day. Now on to the National Competition at the University of Illinois on May 20-22.

Thanks again to all our amazing students, wonderful parents, volunteers and 9th grade assistants.

Here’s our individual medal winners:

Gold Medals:

Ecology: Kristen Williams and Tyler Powers
Experimental Design: Tyler Powers, Jeni Norwalk, and Trisha Sing
Trajectory: Steven Gilmour and Charlotte Labinski
Elevated Bridge: Steven Gilmour and Charlotte Labinski

Silver Medals:

Road Scholar: Jenaan Maali and Trisha Sing
Science Crime Busters: Maren Tomcsak and Jen Gluck

Bronze Medals:

Fossils: Kristen Williams and Maren Tomcsak
Solar System: Heather Gluck and Jenaan Maali
Wright Stuff: Steven Gilmour and Charlotte Labinski

Your Coaches,

Roger Grant and Carrieann Schneider

Naples Florida second grade teacher Rachel Miller hits FCAT booklets with a hammer during an FCAT pep rally.

You’re about to take your FCATs; what do you think of them? What do they mean to you, your school, your teachers, your future?  Are they important?  Should we be doing them? Do they measure what you know? Are you prepared?

Practice good argumentation in your response. Be thoughtful and defend your position with sound logic and evidence. Voice your opinion.

By-the-way are you wondering how you did on the sample questions? Grades are in Progress Book, but here is how we did as a whole.

This is just a small sample test so I don’t know how well it will predict your actual FCAT score. If you want a better idea take the 2007 test mentioned in the post below.

Try this — 2007 Science FCAT. This is the actual test from 2007. While this year’s test will not include extended response questions, the content should quite similar.

Now check your answers against these – 2007 Science FCAT Answers.

Let me know how you did.

More FCAT study resourecs can be found on the study resources page.