Category Archives: 5th Grade

5th Grade, Capstone, Social Studies, Technology

Capstone Final Blog

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You’ve heard of solar panel’s. You’ve seen them on a roof while driving somewhere, or maybe there are some installed on the roof of your house. But have you ever wondered how solar energy works and how it helps the planet? The answer was solar energy converts heat into electrical charges and then converts the electrical charges into energy we use everyday. It helps the planet by being a renewable resource and does not pollute the planet.

After I wrote my essay to answer the question, I had to work on my final product, the Wevideo. First I reviewed my research, so I knew all the information I was going to use in the script. My intro was similar to the one I used in the essay. “Have you ever seen solar panels on a nearby house? Maybe there are some on your roof. Solar energy is a renewable resource that helps the planet”. Then I explained how solar energy works with a short explanation, I then went deeper and talked about PV cells and their role in producing solar energy. I then explained why global warming happens and the effects. Since I had a sub questions about the downsides of solar energy, I couldn’t not include it because I had to answer all the sub questions. Then I talked about the pricing, like the average cost of a watt (Which is $3.05) and the cost of an entire system ($17,000 – $21,000). I talked about the incentives, PBIs, Rebates, Tax Credits. And the benefits for businesses. I also talked about degradation and how if effects the production and cost. Then I ended with my conclusion. “In conclusion, solar energy is a great resource which will help us stop global warming as a problem. This isn’t the only solution though, we still need to use other sources of energy. Now that you know all about solar energy, maybe you will consider investing in some panels or alternative energy. For more information visit my blog or scan this QR code”. I then had to add images, and I wanted to an animation format. What I did for the animations was I just made a google drawing and took a screen shot for every frame. If I didn’t make an animation for a part, I just used stock footage. Overall,I enjoyed making this project and I am super proud of what I finished with.

5th Grade, Capstone, Science, Social Studies, Technology

Capstone Blog #2

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For capstone, we were required to interview an expert on our topic. It was a way to get a source of information from a person who knew their facts. We had to come up with questions and a list of materials we would need to use for the interview. I did mine over email, but you could do video calls or voice chat. I needed to figure out who to interview though.

I had a lot of trouble finding someone to interview, because I didn’t know where to start. I searched constantly for specialists at museums and designers. I was having trouble finding their emails. I then asked Ms. Robert for assistance, and she told me to try to find a high school teacher to email. I reached out to an environmental sciences teacher at the high school, Richard Clark.

Conducting the interview wasn’t difficult at all. All I had to do was email my list of questions and await a response. It went as expected, I got all my questions back with answers. I learned a lot of things I wouldn’t normally learn off a website. One fact was that you need rare minerals to create solar panels which is an issue. I also learned more about all of the gases that can affect global warming, so this interview was helpful.

I enjoyed reaching out and I wouldn’t have otherwise I hadn’t been required. I enjoyed this part of Capstone.

5th Grade, Science

Rube Goldberg Blog Post #2

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During the construction of my Rube Goldberg I learned a very important lessons, perseverance. I had a lot of moments where I wanted to give up and quit, where my ideas didn’t work. I persevered and I came up with new ideas, I fixed broken parts. It was difficult, but still I finished it and I am proud. During making my video, I was struggling to think of ideas on how to edit the video. Then when I went to upload the video, It reset, so I had to redo all of the work I had put into it. I was then left with a sense of relief when I finally finished the project.

My Rube Goldberg Video:

5th Grade, Capstone, Science, Social Studies, Technology

Capstone Blog #1

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I chose Space – Stars as my topic. Coming up with a lot of questions was pretty easy because of how often stars are involved in a variety of topics. During my interview I leaned more toward a math related question. It was a more single word answer.

Another one of my questions was on solar energy. I found that that was the better question. The question was: How does solar energy work and in what ways can it help reduce global warming? Finding sub questions was easy as I had two topics to work with. They could either be related to solar energy or global warming. I have not had an interview so I have not confirmed my questions.

5th Grade, Social Studies, Technology

Immigration WeVideo Blog Post

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I felt my WeVideo was short when comparing it to others. I felt mine was good still. I think that my format of, describing the journey then giving the details. I stuttered a lot and I thought there wasn’t a good transition from the audio. I liked my images, as they represented my video well, as I thought. Music was hard because my dad story didn’t have that much of a mood. He wasn’t in any immediate danger.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1FQH7V0N0AkrydlrvgTO-ngxNaSYDc3Ib/view?usp=sharing

5th Grade, Social Studies

Immigrant Interview Blog Post

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The interview was very well. My father gave me information and took it seriously. I got good information that turned out to be very accurate. I even got the exact date he left for America. Overall the interview was fun, and I learned a lot of about my dad. He left for job reasons, and ended up having a trip that brought him to the place he would stay. His story wasn’t dangerous, he just left his home for money. I really enjoyed learning about his childhood. He had a tough time, his life wasn’t easy, but he climbed his way to a peaceful life for himself and his family.

5th Grade, Reading

Argument and Advocacy Debates

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During the research, I was having a bit of a hard time. I did it wrong, and it was disorganized. When we did the digital research I had a lot of information. I had three good reasons. When we were told that we should find extra information, my article was packed with statistics. We had to do our debate organizer over zoom, and I ended having to do some of my parts last minute. When we had the debate though, I was really proud of my reasoning. I felt I had won.

5th Grade, Social Studies

Constitution Blog Post #3

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During the creation of my constitution project, I had a struggle with finding out a theme for the question in it. How did African Americans get the right to vote. I thought that a timeline would best fitting with images and information on the side. I talked about the freedom summer, and the literacy tests, and historical figures. This project was fun to research and make.

5th Grade, Social Studies, Writing

US Constitution Project Blog Post #1

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For our US constitution project I chose the question “How did African Americans get the right to vote because I have an interest in racial justice, and so does everyone in my family. It really makes no sense how we have a bias because of skin color. I also wanted to learn about how hard people work to get what they want in the government. This is a major topic now. With the Black Lives Matter Movement I wanted to learn about how a lot of rights have to be fought for, like voting. There is a problem with racism in our government and I want to learn about past problems to see how they were solved.

5th Grade, Social Studies

The Electoral College

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I believe that the electoral college is a bad system, if most of the people want a candidate, the opposing can still win because he won a big state. This is why many believe there vote doesn’t count. They could fix the electoral college by evening all of the electoral votes. If a candidate wins a state with a low population it can still help. It’s unfair how some states electoral votes are more valuable than others. People want to be able to vote for the president themselves, not let people decide for them.