Busy, Busy, Busy....

We've hardly had time to come up for air here in the 5th grade! 

Our fifth grader's paired up with their Kindergarten buddies to write Valentine's Day cards to our veterans. Their collective kindness and thoughtfulness made us all proud. 

Students kicked off their extended President's Day weekend with the annual Valentine's dance, which consisted of plenty of smiling.....dancing...........

and strangely, mummies who seemed to appear out of thin air!

For the record, the last mummy above was voted "Best Mummy," but his identity will remain nameless, so as not to scare the living. Some people without brains do an awful lot of talking...

Earlier this week, our students were lucky enough to watch an example of true selflessness and social awareness when Brendan O'Brien, a member of this year's senior class, took off on his "Raise the Flag Run." Brenden ran for The Travis Manion Foundation, which raises money for veterans and families of veterans. Before he took off on his 15 mile run from our Edison campus to his home in Sayerville, our students were lucky enough to witness this true example of inspiration.

The students continue to work hard on their Capstone research and thesis papers. This process has not only been one of hard work and perseverance, but also one of generosity, as the fifth graders have been given a helping hand by several different groups from the Wardlaw-Hartridge community. 

Below, we see two of our senior buddies come and talk to the students about the Capstone process in general, and offered much advice during the Q and A session. Their pearls of wisdom were a huge help. Thanks guys!

Next, students were lucky enough to watch 8th grade group Capstone research presentations. It allowed them to not only view presentations first hand, but to also watch the 8th graders handle questions from our panel with aplomb, an experience that will no doubt help our 5th graders moving forward as they prepare for their own Capstone presentations!

Lastly, after our 5th graders were able to talk about and study earthquake proof structures built by the Upper School Stem class, (big thanks to Ms. Borzumato!!!), they got right to work on their own designs, which will be put to the test in two ways. 

First, using our earthquake shake table, each structure will have to withstand three different earthquake magnitude simulations. Secondly, they will be put to the test in five pound increments to measure strength. Sadly, we continue to add more and more weight until they reach their limits, at which point they will crumble under the weight of the earth's gravitational pull. Without giving too much away....here is a sneak peak at their designs!

More pictures of their progress is soon to follow, and many of them are already three stories high.

'til next time.....