During the expo, students watched as parents and teachers competed in a friendly game of basketball. Students also had the opportunity to put their skills to the test and burn calories as they took to the court for exercise during halftime. Jaquavious Jackson, a fourth grader at Cascade Elementary, was very enthusiastic about exercising and learning how to stay fit.
Courtney Spraggins, a Kindergarten teacher at Cascade, said she thinks the basketball game is a great way for parents and teachers to show that exercise can be fun and model how to stay fit. Keisha Spells, the PTA president at Cascade Elementary, felt that it was important to host a wellness expo at the school to help provide students and parents with information about maintaining healthy lifestyles, while facilitating parental engagement. Fourth grader Chlya Figueroa says she learned that your health is important because it can have a direct correlation with how you function at school and your academic performance in the classroom.
The 4 th grade challenge students at Morningside Elementary were proud to present their own inventions to a panel of judges in an annual event called Thomas Edison Day. For the past 10 weeks, the students have been preparing for this event by learning about simple machines, Rube Goldberg, and even worked together to create inventions that solves problems for fairytale characters.
Their next assignment was to create their own invention and an ad campaign. After submitting their ideas to their teachers, they underwent a patenting process, which included writing a paragraph and drawing diagrams of their invention. Once it was patented, they designed an ad campaign and presented their inventions to the class and received feedback from their classmates. On Thomas Edison Day, the auditorium was filled with excitement and lines of tables with creative inventions.
The judges walked around the tables as the students showcased their inventions and explained how it works.
