2017-18 classroom projects

Colette Aboudi, Fairview Elementary School

Amount Funded: $800.00

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The $800 will partly fund a camera, and video equipment to make clips of the kids signing the vocabulary, and the sentences they work on so that it is shared with the parents. Our students, especially in the preschool program, are language delayed, this delay is imposed on them because their parents don't sign, and are reluctant to learn. We have offered sign language classes for parents here on sight, but the attendance has been poor 2% of parents attended. We found that the parents enjoy watching their kids on videos, I have been using my phone to send parents pictures, and short clips, but this has been very difficult using limited resources (teacher's pocket book).  The objective is to make videos, and send them to the parents so they can see how the new vocabs are signed, and what their students are capable of accomplishing if their primary language (ASL) is supported.

Amanda Lockwood, Cherryland Elementary School

Amount Funded: $500.00

Hayward Education Association Sue Rosso Award

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For our Cycle of Inquiry work, the first grade team has decided to use visual arts integration to support our social emotional learning activities. We want to create an integrated learning experience for our students that connects, art, SEL, and writing. I need art materials and good first grade social emotional learning books that will get students excited about writing! We've been collaborating on project ideas, such as writing about a painting that responds to Peter Reynold's book "The Dot" and creating self-portraits that respond to Karen Katz's story, "The Colors of Us", which would then provide a writing prompt as well. My Materials list includes several books that I don't have yet in the classroom. The arts materials I will need are watercolors, oil pastels, tissue paper, good construction paper and watercolor paper. Our goal is to bring 75% of our class to grade level on their writing skills. We believe that arts integration and social-emotional learning can help us to do this, because it will improve student engagement and motivation, and help students feel emotionally safe and supported in the classroom. We work with many students who struggle with poverty and trauma, so writing skills are low and students bring many issues to the class every day that affect learning. Arts integration feels good (Our students love to paint and make things) and we want to use that sense of joy to inspire our students to write. It is so important that our students have access to quality art materials so that they can see the value in their work. The stories that I have chosen for my book list are fun, thoughtful and developmentally appropriate.

Rosemarie Dias, East Avenue Elementary School

Amount Funded: $800.00

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Over the last several years, computer programming and robotics has become an essential K-12 curriculum component that fosters 21st century skills such as creativity, communication and collaboration while simultaneously increasing cognitive development in reasoning and mathematical concepts. Lego Mindstorms, a popular robotics kit used in school robotics programs, makes learning simple computer programming and engineering concepts fun, increases engagement among students, while simultaneously providing them with real world relevance. The goal of my project is to introduce and expose 4th to 6th grade students to computer programming and robotics using Lego Mindstorms. Lego Mindstorms is an educational robotic system that provides students with the ability to learn to design, program and control fully-functional robots that carry out life-like automated tasks. As a tool used in the real world, Lego Mindstorms kits teach and reinforce various physical science and technology concepts such as force, motion, measurement, energy, magnetism, and more, that provide fun and engaging hands-on experiences for students. It is the intent of this project to encourage students to think 'out of the box' as well as recognize the impact robotics can make, especially within medicine, space, transportation, safety, agriculture, the environment, and more.

Kendra Capen, Park Elementary School

Amount Funded: $675.00

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Students in my classroom frequently do not have access to books at home, either because they have instability at home, or do not have extra money for books. Additionally, the nearest public library is at least 2 miles away from the school.  This is unfortunate, because reading at home has many benefits for students, including increased exposure to vocabulary, reinforcement of concepts learned in the classroom and valuable family bonding time. This year I have been piloting a book lending program in my classroom in conjunction with my student's homework. Each week, students take home a bag with 6-8 books and return them with their completed homework the following week. The program has received terrific feedback from parents so far. After two months of implementation, all bags have been accounted for. Students are learning responsibility by returning the bags on time, and the consequences of forgetting (students do no receive another bag until they return the first one).  I would like funding to expand this program and make it more sustainable. Currently, books are sent home in foil freezer bags. I would like drawstring cloth backpacks that are more durable and close more securely. I would a few more high quality picture books to include in the sets. Currently the books include 2-3 high quality picture books and 3-4 very old (discarded) guided reading books. Additionally, I would like a few Spanish Language books to support families who are not fluent in English. Finally, I need to make sure the bags are all clearly marked. Iron on printer sheets will ensure that the bags can clearly be identified as belonging to the program. 

George Kwong, Schafer Park Elementary School

Amount Funded: $533.00

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This project is for students to prepare short videos about issues affecting our school, our environment, and our community. Their recordings using the Canon camera and the accessories such as tripods, microphone extension lines, card reader, etc. will be uploaded onto computer and/or laptops. At this point, they will edit and prepare their videos for broadcasting and sharing with other students and teachers at Schafer Park. Public Service Announcements are an important tool to build and heighten awareness of issues at the school, in our community, and regarding the environment. Before recording, students will have to select an issue to expound upon that is relevant. Students need to prepare storyboards, determine how and what will be recorded, determine the length of the video, have facts and research prepared to support their claim, and practice speaking in front of a camera. It is an engaging opportunity to make language arts, social studies, science, and math connect to the real-world and not just being read and studied from a book.  It meets the standards for persuasive writing as well.

Jaye Clark, Longwood Elementary School

Amount Funded: $800.00

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This project will help me begin to build a balanced literacy guided reading library for my students. I have a wide range of readers in my 2nd grade classroom, reading from Kindergarten level to a 4th grade level. Everyday, I meet with leveled guided reading groups to focus on their specific needs, such as work attack skills or monitoring for comprehension. For these groups it is essential to have books at the students reading level. I would like to purchase leveled books for my guided reading groups. I will receive 120 books! There will 10 titles of level D books, with 6 books for each title. There will be 10 titles of level F books with 6 books for each title. My goal is to have my students improve in their reading, in decoding, fluency, and comprehension. This will be achieved by having my students meet in guided reading groups with me at their reading level. This will also be achieved by having my students read books at their levels during their independent reading time. I will be able to use the books that I purchase for both purposes.

Nicole Heinson, Tyrrell Elementary School

Amount Funded: $75.00

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For the butterfly science habitat, the goal is to literally expose the students to the life cycle of butterflies as well as metamorphosis. The benefit would be the students' understanding of this concept would become real because the life cycle is actually happening right in front of their eyes. The students will document their observations of each stage. Their observation log will serve as an evaluation and can be incorporated into my math and science lessons.

Stephanie Klyce Hindman, Strobridge Elementary School

Amount Funded: $530.00

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Hello, Mystery? Are you ready for fifth grade science because we are ready for you! The Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) are the new science standards that replaced the old ’98 science standards. NGSS was adopted by California in 2013 and reflect the major advances in science in the last two decades. Mystery Science is a new NGSS-aligned curriculum for K-5 elementary teachers that makes it easier than ever to teach hands-on NGSS science. Big problem!!!!! Although the science curriculum is free and access is available, we have no materials. I mean nothing. We have been scraping at the bottom of the bucket, asking begging, and pleading students and parents to bring in materials. This is difficult. What Fifth Grade Strobridge wants: Make Four Science Mystery Kits each for two fifth grade classrooms (Eight Kits). This way we would have the necessary materials to teach the science standards. Our goal is to make hands-on learning experiences available to all of our fifth grade students. We need basic materials to make this dream a reality. Too often teachers do not teach science. We want to change that. Students benefit from hands on learning. For example, if students are studying chemical changes of copper from salt and vinegar to observe a copper oxide reaction, students squeak in glee from shiny pennies. Learning is occurring in a positive climate with visible results. Education becomes alive. Additionally, students will incorporate measuring skills with accuracy, the five step scientific method (question, hypothesize, test hypothesis, analyze/ observe, and conclude). Students will improve writing by including sensorial details, math, and graphing skills.

Mirna Bartl, Ochoa Middle School

Amount Funded: $788.00

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With the NGSS arriving to our school, the science department is preparing to bring new and exciting topics of energy and waves to our 8th grade classrooms. In hopes to be able to provide students with hands on experiences of observing gases and understanding light waves, we would like to purchase power supply for spectrum discharge tubes, and some gas tubes to allow students to observe different lights and colors on the spectrum. We will incorporate engineering in this activity by having our students build simple spectroscopes from the materials we have in our labs. Along with teaching light, we will also be teaching energy transfer and motion. We plan to have students build roller coasters, and we are hoping to be able to show transfer of energy along the roller-coaster track and with using timer sensors, we will be able to measure speed and acceleration of the roller-coaster. This will allow students not only to see motion in action, but also to visualize it, as the data will be directly loaded on computer and presented in a graph format. This specific topic will encompass math and science curriculum, and allow our students to visualize motion, see it on graph and quantify speed by calculating average speed and acceleration from a single activity. After student have experienced observing regular light and gases, they will record the spectrum and compare it to the reference chart. To test students learning, they will indirectly observe sunlight, and they will create solar spectrum and compare it to an actual solar spectrum. Finally, students will be asked to identify the elements found in the sun, based on their experience with observing gases earlier in the lesson.  Students will show their understanding by being able to construct a working roller-coaster and present their speed and acceleration data in a graph format to match their roller-coaster design.

Vanessa Smith, Bret Harte Middle School

Amount Funded: $578.00

Hayward Rotary Award

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My project is to turn an unlimited number of Bret Harte Students into inquisitive creators using 3D design technology. By giving students access to a 3D printer, turns them into thinkers, designers and builders. These are the kinds of disciplines that form the heart of higher education in the 21st century. Students will take their learned mathematical skills and design, prototype and bring their ideas to life. Students will start with an idea of how to adjust, change or influence the environment of the classroom and/or school. Students will then design, prototype and watch their ideas take shape and come to life. Each design will be displayed around school adapting to whatever environment the students choose to alter. The value of a 3D Printer goes further than most to help students integrate real world applications using STEM skills in every core content area. Students in the content area US History class will be able to integrate their learned math and technology skills to formulate 3D objects (using the printer and filament) and build 3D scenes that make projects more lifelike and visually engaging. Students will not just be presenting a specified topic but actually telling a story using not just a cardboard visual but hand held pieces of history. This is especially important to our ELL and SPED populations who need more real and hands on kinesthetic opportunities to engage in the subject matter and create sustainable learning opportunities. We are only touching the surface in developing the impact of our new course on Computer Science, Coding and Game Design. In this course our students will be able to scan the created 3D objects into their core content games to simulate life-like objects and teach concepts like measuring the area of a cube in a student created video game. The goal of this project is to build and strengthen learning that goes far beyond the classroom and develop college and career skills for future learning. Students will build skills for careers (and jobs) that have not been created yet. The impact of the 3D printer will have a tremendous effect on our classroom and school environment. We are involved in a lot of project-based learning, online collaborations and interactive presentations. The 3D printer allows students to create and project a strong visual image that they can change and or manipulate with their computers.

Adriana Gilmete Taufui, Hayward High School

Amount Funded: $660.00

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Living in an earthquake-prone area, we are susceptible to being in a hazardous situation. As living beings, we need to meet our basic needs, regardless of the conditions. Clean water is a necessity. I would like to provide my students with an engineering challenge to design a working water filtration system that could be used in the case of an emergency or natural disaster.  In this activity, students are challenged to design and build a water filtration device using commonly available materials -- following the same design process used by the engineers and scientists who developed the International Space Station Water Recovery System for NASA. To meet this challenge, students use an iterative process as they build, test and measure the performance of the filtration device, analyze the data collected, and use this information to work toward an improved filtration design.  Although students will work in teams of two to three, they are encouraged to think of their entire class as a single design team working cooperatively and learning from the efforts of all members in order to produce the best water filtration device. The goal of the project is two-fold. First I would like students to think about and use the Engineering Design Process. I would like students consider a real problem facing the world and develop possible solutions. I would like my students to see that simple materials, creative thinking and multiple revisions of a design can yield amazing, useful results.  Second, I would like my students to understand that clean, drinkable water is not a privilege for all. Clean water is often taken for granted. An event as short-lived as an earthquake can have devastating , long-lasting consequences to our water system.  In addition, students will be using the scientific method to hypothesize and predict. Students will also gain lab experience as they determine the purity of the water they have filtered through pH tests and conductivity tests. Students will then gather, interpret and communicate their data as the revise and redesign.

Yvonne White, Hayward High School

Amount Funded: $300.00

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Electricity is an important part of modern life and one cannot think of a world without it. It is used from lighting rooms, working fans, and domestic appliances like electric stoves, air conditioning units, and more. My students are learning about electricity and how it is used as a form of energy to power motors and circuits. We will dissect a small motor to understand its parts and functions. Next, students will examine alternative forms of energy such as solar energy. Finally, students will learn how to solder a solar cell to a motor, then create a solar powered vehicle. Electricity is an important part of modern life and one cannot think of a world without it. It is used from lighting rooms, working fans, and domestic appliances like electric stoves, air conditioning units, and more. My students are learning about electricity and how it is used as a form of energy to power motors and circuits. We will dissect a small motor to understand its parts and functions. Next, students will examine alternative forms of energy such as solar energy. Finally, students will learn how to solder a solar cell to a motor, then create a solar powered vehicle. I have created a series of worksheets and labs that the students will complete. Each activity will expand my students’ knowledge of electricity, circuits, and the various forms energy. For example, we will examine the internal components of a motor, how to measure the voltage produced from a homemade battery using pennies and nickels, and how to read multimeter. Ultimately, the engineering of a solar powered vehicle will be the students final project to demonstrate their knowledge of the subject matter.