Author: elizabeth1011

6th Grade Trip to the Metropolitan – by Elizabeth

elizabeth1011 6th Grade Writers

On Thursday, May 6th, the whole 6th grade took a trip to the Metropolitan Museum. The Metropolitan is a museum of art in New York City and we were going to look at the Greek and Roman section.  We had to arrive at school at 7:30 and we left at 7:45, and it was a very long drive.

At around 10:00 A.M., we went into the museum and split into two different groups, each with its own tour guide.  The tour guide led us around to lots of different Greek art pieces. A few of the Greek art pieces that we saw included a chariot, a stele or grave marker and a sphinx.  After the tour guide had led us around for a bit and we had talked about the different art pieces, we had a lunch break.  For lunch, we went to Central Park, ate lunch and then had recess.  After lunch, we went back to the museum, split into three groups and did a packet.
The packet that we did had us look around in different sections for art pieces.  We found pieces with patterns, showing daily life and mythical creatures.  We also drew pictures of a couple art pieces that we saw.  On the last few pages of the packet, we had to use a paper to find certain art pieces. The paper was a Percy Jackson guide and included quotes from the book Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief By Rick Riordon. The map of the Metropolitan in the guide helped us a lot and the art pieces were fairly easy to find.
Our group finished pretty quickly and we went to the gift shop to look around for a little bit.  After that, we drove back to school.  I really liked going to the Metropolitan and I think that it’s a great place for a field trip.  It was fun and interesting to look at all the Greek art pieces and one of the favorite things that I saw was a chariot showing Hercules.

Nature’s Classroom by Elizabeth

elizabeth1011 0 - NATURE'S CLASSROOM, 6th Grade Writers

Nature’s Classroom

By Elizabeth

On Wednesday at Nature’s Classroom, all of the PDS Middle School went on a trip to the beach.  We drove in a school bus to get there and once we got there, we walked closer to the water.  A man who worked there told us that there was a seal sunbathing on the sand.  The law stated that we couldn’t go within 80 feet of it, so we couldn’t get close.  The man who alerted us of the seal was a professional and he went closer to check the seal out.  Eventually, we split up into our field groups and our teachers led us to different parts of the beach.

Our field group did a teamwork challenge which we passed, and then we went further along the beach.  There was a line of huge rocks that went out into the water and we walked partway along it.  About halfway down the line, there was a small cave between the boulders.  We all went into it and found that it was partially filled with shells.  We looked around, then went out of it, back into the wind.  Our Field Group leader (Russtache)  pointed out a mussel shell and we proceeded to the part of the beach that is filled with boulders and shells, but no sand.

We were allowed to climb large boulders as long as we keep three points of contact with the boulder at all times.  After climbing along small boulders only about 5 feet tall, we came to a huge boulder.  I don’t know exactly how tall it was, but it was really big.  The rock was smooth and had almost no handholds to climb with.  The boulder was taller on one side and the shorter side was probably between six and seven feet tall.


While everyone was trying to climb up the tall side, I went around to the shorter side.  I stood on a small pile of rocks, put my knee on a tiny ledge and was just able to reach the top.  I pulled myself up onto the boulder and watched everyone else try to climb it.  In the end, a few other people got up.  Then came the problem of trying to get down.  Eventually some people who had decided not to climb held our feet so we wouldn’t fall and we were able to get down.  It was so fun climbing the boulders, I wished we could stay there all day, but we had to move on to other places.


After the boulders, we climbed a short trail out of the beach so that we were next to a parking lot. There we had lunch and our field group leader gave everyone bread, meat, chips etc. to make a sandwich.  Then we ran back to where we had earlier spotted a tire washed up by the tide.  Our field group rolled the tire all the way to a parking lot, where we placed it in another field group leader’s car.  It was funny seeing his reaction to finding a tire in his car, then our field group walked away quickly so he wouldn’t know that it was us.


By then, our time at the beach was almost over, and we walked over to the nature center.  There, there were lots of amphibians and reptiles in tanks that we got to look at.  There was a large snake that I thought was cool, along with a couple stuffed birds on the wall.  Once we were finished looking at the tanks, our group went down to the basemen where there was a touch tank with lobsters and crabs in it.  If we wanted to, we could pick them up carefully by the sides of their shells.  I picked up a crab and placed it back in the water.


After the touch tanks, we all walked back to the school buses and went back to Nature’s Classroom.  I think that the trip to the beach was really fun and I especially liked climbing the boulders.

Student Led Conference By Elizabeth

elizabeth1011 0 - Student Led Conferences, 6th Grade Writers

Last Thursday, the Middle School all had student led conferences.  That means that all the students had thirty minute meetings with their adviser and parents.  During the student led conference, the student talks about how he/she is doing in school, what are his/her strengths, the things that need improvement and two goals that they have for the remaining of the school year. Before the conference, the student fills out an agenda and writes down the things that he/she is going to talk about during the conference.

I started out preparing for the conference by looking over my report and highlighting some things that I wanted to talk about.  Then, I filled out a little grid with questions about how I did on homework, tests, working with classmates and in-class discussions.  After I finished the grid, I filled out my agenda.  There were three items in the agenda, the 1st one was notable achievements, strengths and positive learning experiences.  The second part of the agenda was disappointments and areas for improvement.  The last item was where everyone had to write down two goals and make the 3rd goal at the conference.  My advisory worked on the packet with the agenda and grid at advisory time and it took us about a week to complete.

After we had finished the packet, it soon came time for the actual conference. The whole middle school got last Thursday off from school and we went into our advisory for thirty minutes for the conference.  When I walked into my advisory, I sat at the end of the table and my parents and Joe, my adviser sat on either side of the table. I started out by saying some of my strengths and showing them work that supports the strengths. After that, I told them which areas I needed to improve in and gave them some examples of why I needed to improve in those areas.  After the areas of improvement came the goals. I told them my two goals, but we didn’t really make a 3rd.  I learned during my conference that I make careless mistakes in self-editing in Spanish and math.  I realized that I can stop doing that if I take more time the first time through and look over my work more times. I think that having student led conferences is a great way for students to learn about themselves as a learner.

The Lego Tournament by Elizabeth

elizabeth1011 0 - Choice Topics, 6th Grade Writers

The Lego Tounament

By Elizabeth

On February 12, 2011, I went to a Lego Tournament.  It was hosted at my school and in my team was Claire, John, Raiyaan, Arthur and me.  Every Monday since fall, our team met with our coaches John Houston (Claire’s Dad), Brian and Yuting to work on a research project and a Lego robot that we made.  We wrote programs for the robot to make it accomplish missions and we made a slide show about our project where we each wrote a slide.  We finished up everything so that we would be ready for the tournament.

On Saturday, everyone had to be there by 8:00 AM.  We all got there, set up our pit area, which is where we had a poster about our project and where we put down our robots when we had to go somewhere else.  Our robot was small, had two wheels and two Lego skis. There was also a Lego block in the center which was like the brain of the robot.

In the morning, we had a practice round at the mission table and then the opening ceremony.  All the teams marched around the gym and then we all sang the national anthem.  Our team was team  number 7 and there were 12 teams total, including ours.  In the practice round at the table, we had two and a half minutes to run and complete as many missions as possible.  Our team wasn’t too good at the missions and we only got around 70 points out of 400 at the practice round and our most at the real rounds was 80.  Luckily, that wasn’t the only category to score points in, so even though the top scoring team got 175, we weren’t too far back overall.

After the opening ceremony, we had a bit of free time, we could go get food at the cafeteria, work on the robot or prepare for the judging.  Our team did a mix of all three, we spent a lot of time working with the robot to perfect missions.  There was an extra practice table that no one else was using, so our team was able to use it most of the time.  We spent a little of our time talking to John Houston about what to say to the judges and we had a lunch break after we finished all our turns at the table.

There were a few different things we did at the tournament that were scheduled.  We had turns at the table, which was when we were competing against other teams and the clock to complete missions (like making out robot knock into the right things) and score lots of points.  We also had to talk to judges about our robot design, our research presentation about our project and how we worked as a team.

The best of our judging categories was definitely the research project presentation.  Each year there is a theme and this year the theme was biomedical engineering (for things connected to medical issues).  Each team had to have an idea for an invention that goes along with the theme.  Our idea for the invention was the self cooling cast, a cast that would cool itself so in the summer, it didn’t get all hot and itchy.  We wrote a slide show describing it and made a simple model.  When we presented it to the judges, I think that they really liked it.  Last year our team won the award for best research project and I had hopes that we might win it this year too.

After all the judging, came the closing ceremony.  We all sat down in the gym and watched all the junior Lego teams get their medals.  The junior teams weren’t competing against each other, so none of them won.  Then came us, the senior teams that were competing against each other. First, we all got medals and then came the trophies.  The categories for trophies were team spirit, team spirit, robot design, research project and the overall score .  Other teams got the team spirit, teamwork and robot design.  Our team was called up and got a trophy for the best research project. We were all very excited, but we thought that was all. Then something even more exciting happened.

A man explained that the top four overall scores would be moving on to the championship.  The championship would consist of the four best teams from three different tournaments.  The 1st, 2nd and 3rd places were other teams that had won trophies for other categories, but I couldn’t believe who got 4th place, US!  We’re going on to the championship!!!  The championship will be at the Duchess Community college in two weeks!  I can’t wait!

In the Footsteps of Marco Polo by Elizabeth

elizabeth1011 0 - In The Footsteps of Marco Polo, 6th Grade Writers


I went to Vassar College with the rest of the middle school and people from another school.  We had come to Vassar college because we had just watched In the Footsteps of Marco Polo, a movie about two people, Denis and Francis, who traveled along Marco Polo’s footsteps.

We started out by watching a few scenes from the movie and then Denis explained about his trip. He and his friend, Francis had spent one month in each place where Marco Polo had spent a year.  That way, they only spent two years traveling, when Marco had spent 24 years. They went to places like Turkey, China and Iran. The most interesting part of their trip was that they traveled at least some of the way like Marco Polo did, traveling only over land or sea.

After Denis talked about his trip, he answered lots of questions from everyone.  Some of the questions were… what his favorite part of the trip, did he bring anything back culturally or socially and didhe remembered any of the languages?  He said that he couldn’t decide what part of the trip was his favorite, that he learned to be more welcoming to strangers and that he had forgotten most of the languages that he learned.  I found listening to him talk about his trip very interesting, but I wish that we did something a little more interactive than just sit and listen.  Overall, I think that it was an interesting experience.

Online Learning Experience by Elizabeth

elizabeth1011 6th Grade Writers

Online Learning Experience

I found using Edmoto to be (somewhat) efficient and relaxing.  Being able to chat was nice, also being able to just  sit on my bed, rest and follow the chat.  I found it a bit hard to follow the conversation because everyone was saying random things, which made it harder to do the tasks.  I think that it was a fun way to do the tasks, but I think that it would have been easier to have been e-mailed the questions.  Then we could just reply with the answers.  If we used e-mail, we could answer the questions at any time, and it would be more organized.  I think that Edmodo was fun, but the more efficient way to answer the specific task assigned, would be to use e-mail.  However, if we needed to have a conversation about something, and it was a snow day, Edmoto would be the perfect choice.

What Makes A Great Student? By Elizabeth

elizabeth1011 6th Grade Writers

What makes a Great Student?

A great student is someone who works very hard.  The student needs to try their best at what ever they’re doing. A great student would pay attention to the teacher and the lesson so that he/she can learn a lot.  He or she would get their homework. done as much as possible.  A great student would schedule their time so that they never have too much homework on every given day.  Also, I think that he/she should be well rounded and do different things. A great student would help other students when they need it and never make fun of another classmate or brag. Also, I think that a great student should have a sense of humor and not be serious all the time.  However, the student should be focused in class.  Those are the things that I think make a great student.

What Makes A Great Teacher? By Elizabeth

elizabeth1011 6th Grade Writers

A Great Teacher

By Elizabeth

I think for someone to be a great teacher, that person has to teach in many different ways.  That way, everyone can learn, even if their styles of learning are different.  The teacher should have different kinds of end of the section projects, like making things, writing reports, tests, drawings etc.  Since everyone’s way of learning is different, if they did different projects, everyone would learn more.  I think that the teacher should have a sense of humor, so it’s possible be comfortable around him/her. I have been in classes where the teacher is too laid back and everything is crazy and no one focuses. Although, at the same time, the teacher must keep people mostly focused on the current project, so that the work gets done. I think that the teacher should be somewhat laid back, but not let things get out of hand. I think that the teacher should plan interesting lessons so that people pay attention, for example watching a movie.  I also think that once in a while, the teacher should plan a really fun lesson, that wouldn’t teach much, but keep everyone interested in the subject.  Overall, I think that a great teacher should be nice and funny, but keep everyone focused. A great teacher should teach lessons in different ways so that everyone learns, and finally, I think that a great teacher should plan interesting lessons. Those are the things that I think make a great teacher.

My favorite Web 2.0 Tool by Elizabeth

elizabeth1011 6th Grade Writers

My favorite web 2.0 tool is Google Docs. I like it because it lets us write things online, and we can choose who can see it. Also, because we can share our writing online, we don’t have to print, which saves a lot of paper. We can let whoever we share the document with edit our writing. Also, at home, I can do my homework and turn it in without having to take it to class. A classmate can look at my work without me having to e-mail it or print it out. Google Docs. isn’t flashy or colorful, but I think that it really helps get work done quickly and efficiently.

Edgar Allan Poe Essay By Elizabeth

elizabeth1011 6th Grade Writers

Edgar Allan Poe is a very well known writer today. He was born in 1809, on January 19 in Boston Massachusetts.  His parent’s names were Elizabeth and David Poe. He also had a brother and sister. When Edgar was six, he went to England to go to a school which he finished when he was eleven. Early in his life, Edgar Allan Poe was orphaned when his dad abandoned his family and  his mother died.  Later, he joined the army, but to do so, he had to lie about his age. When Mr. Poe was 26, he married one of his cousins who was 13 years old.  His wife was named Virginia Clemm, to allow  Edgar to marry her, they had to say that she was 21 years old.  Edgar Allan Poe wrote many stories and poems, but the thing he was mostly known for in his lifetime was being a critic for writing.  At age forty, right before his death, someone found him outside, delirious and was taken to the doctor.  Edgar later died on October 7Th, 1849, of a cause that is still unknown today.  some of Edgar Allan Poe’s work are the Raven and the Tell Tale Heart.

Edgar Allan Poe is known as the father of horror stories.One horror story that he wrote is called the Tell Tale Heart. It is about a servant who kills his master and then keeps thinking that he was hearing his master’s heart beating when it was really his own.There are several things that make it a horror story, and which also makes Edgar Allan Poe the father of horror stories.  First, he used a lot of description, especially in the eleventh paragraph, even though there’s lots of it in the other paragraphs too.  The description makes the story more scary and it helps people picture the scary parts better.  Also he often repeats words which emphasises them and increases the scariness.  For example, this is the first half of the eleventh paragraph:
“But even yet I refrained and kept still. I scarcely breathed. I held the lantern motionless. I tried how steadily I could maintain the ray upon the eye. Meantime the hellish tattoo of the heart increased. It grew quicker and quicker, and louder and louder every instant. The old man’s terror must have been extreme! It grew louder, I say, louder every moment! –do you mark me well? I have told you that I am nervous: so I am. And now at the dead hour of the night, amid the dreadful silence of that old house, so strange a noise as this excited me to uncontrollable terror. Yet, for some minutes longer I refrained and stood still. But the beating grew louder, louder! I thought the heart must burst. And now a new anxiety seized me –the sound would be heard by a neighbor! The old man’s hour had come! With a loud yell, I threw open the lantern and leaped into the room.”
The last thing I would like you to know about Edgar Allan Poe as a horror writer, is that he used very good vocabulary.  For example, when he said that the strange noise was very scary, he used the words: “uncontrollable terror”. Those are the reasons why Edgar Allan Poe was the father of horror stories, which made him a very successful writer.

Edgar Allan Poe was a very successful writer for a number of reasons.  One reason that I think that he was a successful writer is that his stories were unique at that time, so everyone wanted to read them.  Also, he wrote lots of different pieces, so some of them ended up getting published.  I think that he chose very good titles for his stories and poems.  One of his stories that he had a particularly well chosen title is The Tell Tale Heart. I think that the title is a good one because it is very mysterious and unique.  It is mysterious because it makes you start wondering what the heart has to do with anything.  I am not sure what gave him the idea for the plot in the story, but I have some guesses.  One guess is that he once heard his own heart beating loudly and thought it was someone else’s.  My other guess is that someone once told him a story where a servant murdered his master.  Even though that I usually don’t read horror stories, because the plot is well chosen and the title good, I would like to read more of his writing pieces.  I think that the one comment that I would like to make about Edgar Allan Poe’s stories is that they all have the same theme -horror stories.  I just wish that he had written other kinds of stories too.  Also, I think that it is interesting that the story of his death isn’t average.  For one thing, no one knows why he died.  Also after he died, he was placed at first under a grave with no markings, but later it was given a headstone.

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By chriswatkins