RC CORNERS

ARIZONA: Kristen Trejos, AZ Regional Coordinator

This year Valentine’s Day will represent more than a day to celebrate love in the Grand Canyon State. February 14, 2012 marks the 100^th year of statehood for Arizona. It’s a great time to delve into the state’s history, create a timeline of important events, or explore the extreme ecosystems of the landscape. These links have further ideas to celebrate this milestone:

Arizona Memory Project http://azmemory.lib.az.us/cdm4/teacher.php

Arizona Department of Education http://www.ade.az.gov/sa/sdi/AZCentennial/

One of the great pleasures of my position as AZ Regional Coordinator is getting to travel the state of Arizona visiting participating BOEP schools and teachers. From the high country of Flagstaff, to the deserts of the Navajo Nation, I have the best work-related road trips, ever!

In Flagstaff, AZ the Alpine Leadership Academy (ALA), a part of Mount Elden Middle School, is home to the 7^th grade teaching team of Justin Kendhammer, Josh Armstrong, and Megan Walker. The ALA, an expeditionary academy, has offered their students a number of expeditions that any middle school student would be lucky to take part in. One of those on-going expeditions, a partnership with Forest Service, has students collecting and analyzing soil samples and re-planting Ponderosa pine trees in the Schultz burn area of the San Francisco Peaks. Additionally, students are continuing their study of Leave No Trace ethics, creating a field guide, writing letters to local businesses, and studying first aid. The well-rounded curriculum of the ALA focuses on academics and practical life skills that have lent themselves well to the BOEP philosophy. On any given visit I can observe a collaborative project integrating social studies, science, and language arts inspired by a novel like The Transall Saga by Gary Paulsen, enjoy the experimentation of seed dispersal of Colorado Plateau trees in a science class, or watch students learn to use a compass. The process that Justin, Josh, and Megan went through in creating this magnet program will be explained in their presentation at the BOEP Conference this March.

Also in Flagstaff, AZ is Mountain School. Gina Andress, a 1^st grade teacher, has spent her year as a BOEP teacher by creating an entire classroom of observers through experience and vocabulary. She takes her class outdoors, immersing them in their place, and reinforcing the skills of a good scientist: observation, communication, classification, prediction, and inference. I was fortunate enough to observe a collaborative lesson with 1^st and 5^th graders recently in the scientific method. Scientific vocabulary was flying all around the room. In the upcoming months Gina will lead students through Colorado Plateau animal reports that will require research, writing and presentation of information. Susan Spizzirri, the 5^th grade teacher, has students working on a scientific method as learners and mentors with 1^st graders in preparation for the school’s Science Share at the end of February. This event will give students the chance to share their work as well as visit with local scientific professionals who will present mini-lessons to students. As the weather warms the compasses are scheduled to come out and make an appearance on the agenda, as will the reconvening of the Colorado Plateau After School Club. In the meantime you can learn more about this teacher-driven club at the BOEP conference.

In Lukachukai, AZ I am happy to welcome Orlando Lee a middle school social studies teacher at Lukachukai Community School. Mr. Lee completed his training in the late fall and is starting his year off with a historical perspective of the Colorado Plateau. In the classroom next-door Caroline Yazzie, a middle school science teacher, instructs her students in Earth Science with a focus on specific examples from the Colorado Plateau. In a recent visit I observed students performing experiments on the concepts of liquefaction and earthquakes that prompted a discussion of the variety of soils around the Lukachukai area and the effects of erosion on each variety. This experiment is one of many thats done in preparation for the school’s science fair, headed by none other than Mrs. Yazzie. Just down the hall from Mrs. Yazzie is the Special Education specialist Ervin Tom who is collaborating with teachers from the elementary school. In preparation for state AIMS testing, Mr. Tom is doing and planning a number of lessons that reinforce applied math skills. From science experiments, data collection, and presentation, to compass skills that will teach shapes, and perimeter Mr. Tom is up to the challenge. And then, just for fun, a game of Bat and Moth gets the kids outdoors and learning when they least expect it.

COLORADO: Carrie Wheelock, CO Regional Coordinator

Winter in Colorado has been cold and with surprisingly little snow. Still winter moves along at its quiet pace. Chilly geese fly overhead each night enroute from their feeding area to their roosting area. I drive over the Gunnison River to see hundreds of geese weekly and I am reminded of the importance of the rivers of the Colorado Plateau to all life, human and avian, among many more of course.  The mountains are covered in snow and I look out daily to see the peaks gleaming and beautiful.  I wonder how the landscape will change over winter with new paths formed by avalanches and trails formed by rolling icy stones. 

At Ignacio Elementary, Cindy Dale, Health and P.E. teacher for grades K-3, has been doing lessons on animal habitat and adaptation. One lesson that I recently observed was a great one involving her new Southwest Discovery blocks, purchased for her Resource Center. Cindy’s elementary students really enjoyed the blocks, forming a pyramid like structure in the classroom; depicting life and habitat of wildlife and humans on the Colorado Plateau. They also learned more detailed information about the animals specifically in a “who am I” like lesson.  Cindy plans to connect this lesson to “The perfectly adapted winter animal” lesson, where students learn how an animal adapts to snow and other winter features.

A few blocks away at Ignacio Junior High, Dr. Mary Lynne Herr, 7^th and 8^th grade Knowledge Bowl and A.C.T prep teacher has been doing some great lessons on pre-Columbian mapping and the Zuni World. Dr. Herr has formerly worked for Zuni Schools and was inspired by the Zuni World exhibit at the Museum of Northern Arizona. As part of her resource order she purchased the museums catalogue describing the exhibit and has been able to teach some of the Native Studies students about recognizing map symbols made by the Zuni in the pre-Columbian world.  The students are also extending this lesson to include symbols in our own world, and meaning we have assigned to them, as well as personal symbols that each student has come to identify with.

In Delta, Colorado at the Delta Seventh Day Adventist School, Martha George, K-8, all subjects teacher has begun her year by teaching her students about crystal formation. To make this place-based Mrs. George has her students researching crystal formation in the area, particularly natural crystal formations in Ouray and Telluride. Mrs. George has also recently done Animal Olympics with her students, and reports that it completely wore them out!

NEW MEXICO: Becky Kerr, NM Regional Coordinator

This winter has been pretty mild in the Four Corners, but Grants, New Mexico has had very cold temperatures.  Today we had snow at my house near Aztec.  The huge snowflakes were mystical.  Weather on the Plateau is amazing, snowing one minute and sunny the next. 

The teachers at Heights Middle School have been enjoying the weather, and also their technology.  Every student has a laptop, which makes the internet accessible to all.  The teachers use blogs to give the assignments, and have the student’s research topics, which they present to the other students in the class.  Ervin Trujillo’s math students are using trees to investigate the concepts of number boxes, mean, median, mode, range, maximum and minimum.  It was great fun seeing the “aha” looks on their faces as the concept was realized using the data they had collected from the trees around the school.  Sherry Aruchuleta is having a great time with her students, using references to the Colorado Plateau with her language arts students.  They journal, go outside for inspiration, use pictures as prompts, and write poetry and stories about the people and places on the Plateau.

At Hermosa Middle School, Don Martinez is working on his Professional Development Dossier (PDD) using the BOEP program as the mentoring and professional development portions.  His students look forward to going outside, looking for tracks in the snow and observing the plant they chose early in the year.

Ruth Bond Elementary teacher Christie Brown is working with special needs students.  Using the puppets she purchased for her Resource Center helps engage the students in the stories she reads.  They stories come alive and it is great to see the students crawling around pretending to be bears.  She incorporates their entire body into each activity, which reinforces learning.  Sandy Emery is helping her students learn about the Colorado Plateau, especially water.  They have a much better understanding why they should not waste water, and how to conserve it.

Tse Bit Ai Middle School’s Nancy Kastning does a great job with place-based education.  Every concept is explained with a personal story or example that students relate to.  The students had a great time learning why Canadian Geese and Crains fly in a “V” formation.  The students flapped their “wings” to feel the wind resistance.  I wish I had had a video camera for that!  Luz Sumingwa is having her students experience their environment while learning biology.  The school yard is a perfect place to explore their senses.  She is also conscientious about incorporating language arts into her science classroom, having the students write complete sentences about their experiences. 

CISD District Science Coach, Amy John, is using her knowledge of place-based, hands-on, outdoor lessons to recommend lessons for all the teachers in her district.  It is fantastic to have the district curriculum reflect the BOEP philosophy.  A training she conducted was to help teachers understand a scientific method, and use science fair projects to meet the NM core standards.

UTAH: Carrie Wheelock, UT Regional Coordinator

One of the amazing things about Utah is the variety of climates I see in the winter. In Monticello for example, there is plenty of snow and wind. But an hour away in Bluff, I can go for a snow-free hike and enjoy what I would normally consider spring weather.  Now we are really settling in to deep winter weather, so we will see what is to come.

In Monticello High School Jamie Carling, 7^th and 8 grade science and nature club teacher, has been running some great lessons with her after school nature club, including a snowshoe trip to learn about winter tracking and winter animal adaptations, and a field trip to the Anasazi Heritage Center to learn about native plants, animals, and cultural history.  Jamie’s nature club lessons are unique and wonderful field trip lessons, and I am excited at how much interest there has been for her club!

In Bluff Elementary there has been a lot going on with the three BOEP teachers.  Amanda Bouchard, Kindergarten teacher, and Tanya Nees, 2^nd and 3^rd grade teacher, have been working together in lessons where they team up kindergarteners with older students as “Science Buddies”. This has been successful and we will see more from them at the conference. Also Tanya has been doing some great lessons with her 2^nd and 3^rd graders including an environmental writing project about an environmental issue in the community and some local bird lessons about the Turkey Vulture and Pinon Jay with their Science Buddies. Amanda, in addition to her work with the Science Buddies lessons has been doing some great lessons on mapping Bluff, gardens through the seasons (using the Bluff school garden), and Hey Little Ant with an intro to local insects.  Shawnmarie Powell, Social Studies teacher, has been working hard on getting ready to teach her Utah Studies in a place-based way, in addition to assisting other teachers with implementing their own place-based lessons.  Shawnmarie has also been inventorying place-based materials at the school and coming up with a way to make them easily accessible to all teachers.