3A's Got a "100 AR Pointer!"

Congratulations goes to Allison Noggle for earning 100 AR points! Great job, Alli! I'm super proud of you!:)

Officially Starting the Tower Garden! :)

A couple of weeks ago, we officially started our Tower Garden by placing the Rockwool blocks, which contain the seedlings, into the pods of the Tower Garden.  Now, our plants will be getting circulated water from inside the middle cylinder--it's kind of like a water fountain inside.  The water gets circulated by a pump for fifteen minutes, and then it's off for forty-five minutes.  Before we placed our plants in the pods, we used a dry erase marker and wrote what kind of plant it is below the pod.

Before we put them in the Tower Garden itself, we had to allow them to germinate and grow roots first.  Tyson's plant (rainbow chard) was BY FAR the clear winner of the "Longest Root" contest.  :)

Noah's plant came in second which was surprising because his seedling wasn't as big as the rainbow chard at all.

Mr. Jon Fazzaro and Mr. Matt Noggle Brings Coding to the 3rd Graders!

On March 16, Mr. Jon Fazzaro and Mr. Matt Noggle came to our school to talk to us about and show us how to code on a computer.  Both gentlemen work at Aptera which is a business that creates apps and software.  They told us that in order to create software, you need to know how to code first. Their goal was to encourage kids to learn how to code and to start at an early age.

After a couple of quick introductory videos about coding (which can be found at code.org), we were on our way to coding-- Star Wars style!  :)  We did "pair coding" in which one person was the driver and one was the navigator.  Then we would switch.

We even got Mr. Arnold in on the action.  Who ever said that you can't teach an old dog new tricks? ;)

Mrs. Noggle and 3A's Tower Garden :)

In March, Mrs. Erica Noggle came in to teach us how to get our seeds ready for planting in our Tower Garden (which is in the background).  She helped us plant just a few seeds in each Rockwool block.  Then we added some little pellets which act like the soil.  Next, she told us to sprinkle a little water on top of each of the Rockwool blocks.

Then, we have to put the container (with the lid open) on top of the Tower Garden so that the light could start the germination process.  Next, we waited to see how they would grow...

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Just three weeks later, when we saw roots growing, we were able to plant the Rockwool blocks in the actual Tower Garden.  

More pictures coming soon!  :)