Field Trip!

All year I had been saving our science unit on oceans to do at the end of the school year, once the snow  and ice had melted.  Guess I'm still an Oklahoma boy at heart--there's still snow, and the bay is still solid.

In fairness, it has warmed up slowly this spring, but measuring salinity, tides, water pollution--not really all that likely in western Alaska in May.

Even so, we took a field trip to the beach yesterday.  We were planning to collect and measure rocks, clean up pollution on the beach, and then just enjoy ourselves.  The last two got done, an as the song says, two out of three ain't bad.

I'll let the pictures (and captions) tell the story:

On our way to the beach--a hike of 1/2 mile or so

I was with the last group to arrive--Elias, our janitor, led the first group.  Joshua (foreground) wanted me to retake the picture so it looked like he was holding the class, but I was eager to get the whole group together.  The kids are standing on the beach, but the (solid) bay is the expanse of white beyond them.

Students journaling about animals and other things they had seen.  Some of the journals "mistakenly" got thrown into the campfire and had to be redone at school.

Elias (center) had the fire burning by the time I got there (no more than 10 min after him).  The kids enjoyed using their graded homework as kindling, though you can see that some of it tried to blow away.  If Elias hadn't been there, we would have (1) had a cold lunch and (2) had to go back much earlier.

One of the local dogs, Chica, chose to come along with us.  She got at least two hot dogs for lunch; the kids wanted to feed her more since she has puppies to nurse.

A short-lived kickball game

On the hunt for pollution

Bernelle had the find of the trip--the skull (and backbone) of a small fox.  She and all the boys found it fascinating; most of the girls found it gross.

Another view of the skull.  Mr. Main found the skull fascinating, too!  The jaw was intact and operable, and there was a "beard" of fur left on the chin.

The results of one group's pollution hunt.  Many of the small pieces are "sea glass," from a ship that sank (?) in the 1800s.  Lots of glass still washes ashore, with the edges conveniently rounded, so it makes a nice collectable.

The pollution hunters that belong to the collection above: Jaylyn, Frank, and Cory

Pollution collection #2

Pollution hunters, group 2: Cheray, Autumn, Ryleigh, and Bernelle (and Chica again)

Last pollution collection.  Notice the black sand on all of our beaches due to its volcanic origin

Last group of pollution hunters: Eric, Silas, and Joshua.  Eric was also one of the 9 (all cousins) who made their First Communion two weeks ago.  I didn't get pictures of that, but I'll try to find some from one of the other teachers and post them.

Lunch around the campfire: hot dogs and s'mores

One more pic of lunch (and the photographer's finger) brings the photojournal to an end.

We left at 10:00 or so, but even leaving late, we were cold by 1:30, so we hiked back to school, watched science videos, and had a paper-airplane-flying competition.  Overall, a success: no injuries (we have our guardian angels to thank for that), no major discipline problems, and a mostly enjoyable experience.  Not so enjoyable for the kids was having to stay after school today when they didn't get their work done on time.  Lots of complaints!  Still, only two more days of school.  After that, I'll be packing up and leaving, to be back in Anchorage around the 25th.  I'll try to post at least once more from SMK before I leave.

Some will be interested to know that one of the students missed the field trip to go goose-hunting with his father, and another missed school today to hunt.  Like in earlier days in the Lower 48, hunting (always to eat) takes precedence over school.

AMDG

Tim