MOSS Day 2

Hello Families!

Wow what a day!  We woke up to a beautiful blanket of snow at MOSS.  Today we focused on adaptations.  We spent the morning conducting a series of activities ranging from bird beak adaptations to plant defenses.  Our work with bird adaptations focused primarily on the feeding mechanisms of humming birds, finches, and woodpeckers.  Following this we hiked up to the sagebrush meadow and analyzed the various adaptations sage has developed to cope with such dry climates.  After the sagebrush we moved into a gorgeous aspen grove, and followed that with a session in a meadow that is starting to shift into a forest community (or at least will in the next couple hundred years).  After a very cold lunch, we spent the afternoon learning about using insect biodiversity as a water quality indicator and discussing ecosystem services.  Everyone is in high spirits and having a fantastic time!

From left to right, Kaylee, Sara, Jeremiah, Anna, Jordyn, Taylor, and Lauren giving the weather report to the entire MOSS student body.

Sophia, Tobias, and Lena brainstorming different bird beak adaptations

Culminating bird beak adaptation activity

hiking up to the sagebrush

the local fauna doesn't seem too scared of 6th graders

hiking into the aspen grove (this shot really captures the dominant weather pattern today... sooooo cold!)

Noah and Cathan working on their meadow adaptations creature (we created creatures that were adapted to these meadows, but were also entirely fictional).

Liam crossing the meadow

a nice winter shot of Payette Lake

CREW building activity to lead a blindfolded partner to a tree, let them feel, smell, taste (well maybe not taste) the tree, lead them away, and see if they could find the exact tree with the blindfold off.

MOSS Day 1

Hello Families,

Well I am sitting here in very close quarters with very rowdy boys!  Today has been quite a successful first day.  We arrived at MOSS with plenty of time to spare, had a nice lunch, and started with our orientation at 1:00.   We had a wonderful, but cold, first few hours.  We started off with some nice team building activities, had a great game of capture-the-flag, and had a fun inquiry on wind energy.  Tomorrow, we will be heading up into the state park and focusing on animal adaptations.

-Mr. Pierce

opening circle

formation of field groups

opening of wind energy inquiry

Moscow Mountain

Hello Families!

As I'm sure you all know, Moscow Mountain was a huge success (with the exception of some rather irritated bees).  We started off at the 4 corners lot, and hit the trail just west of that location.  The trail we took is one of my all time favorites on Moscow Mountain.  I typically ride my mountain bike on this trail, but it works just as good on foot!  The trail weaves through a beautiful grand fir/cedar forest, makes its way up through an old clear-cut site (now well into initial succession), passes through a nice rock outcrop with a spectacular view, and dips back down into the forest.  In addition to enjoying a wonderful hike in the woods we played all sorts of outdoor games.  Among the most popular was the game 'camouflage.'  Camouflage is a hide and seek type game, that is scientifically impossible not to enjoy (don't quote me on that)!  We also sang some songs, had a good ol' fashion scream (when was the last time you got to yell at the top of your lungs?), and had some CREW building initiatives.  When we returned to school we had a very interesting conversation about the relationship between the two EL Design Principles 'The Primacy of Self Discovery' and 'The Natural World.'  Most students faced some form of adversity throughout the hike, whether that was in the form of just being in the woods, getting stung by a bee(s), or being hot and tired at the end of the day.  The wonderful part about the adversity our CREW faced, was that every single CREW member that faced a challenge over came it.  One last thing, I would like to thank Tadd and Wendy Wheeler, Kevin Kinzer, and Stacy Miller for driving and helping with the hike!

On the trail!

Kaylee, Sara, and Jeremiah bolting into the woods during the camouflage count-down.

Taylor making a valiant effort to be the first to tag Rhett.

Go Team Miller!

I told the crew not to make silly faces... based on this evidence I'd say they are really starting to understand my sarcasm!

Back on the trail.

Liam the Conqueror!

This was a great place to stop for lunch... until the bees found us.

A great end to a great day!

1st Week of School!

Hello Families!
We had a great first week, filled with adventure, CREW work, and fun!  The first week is such a wonderful and exciting time for CREWs to come back together and rediscover the wonderful benefits of collaboration.  Thus far in the year we have already had some fantastic moments.  Yesterday for example, the CREW worked through what is known as a 'rich task' in math.  The idea of the rich task is that it requires deep mathematical thought, and has an array of possible outcomes.  The focus is less on the 'answer' and more on the process and explanation of thought.  During closing circle yesterday most of the CREW shared that the best part of the day was the rich task in math.  With that said, today was also a great day!  PPSEL had its first community circle of the year, and it was a huge success.  There was singing, music, skits, birthdays, spotlights, and a 7/8 CREW presentation on student expectations at Palouse Prairie.  Our trip to the Arboretum focused on trust, collaboration, and supporting one another in a positive and effective way.  After lunch, we worked on collaborative paintings.  Each CREW member created a painting that was then build upon by each of the other CREW members.  The symbolism here is of course that we create higher quality work when we collaborate with each other.  

Sarah and Noah collaborating prior to a presentation.

Kaylee working to put the finishing touches on a presentation poster.

CREW discovery at the Arboretum.

Ask your child about 'Duckie Wuckie!'

The 'innie/ outie' circle interview allows CREW members to share their thoughts in a safe and open way.

 An important component to the Arboretum work is to provide CREW members with time and space for quiet alone time.  This is to be mindful of our EL Design Principle 'Solitude and Reflection.'

CREW art.

MOSS Day 4

Hello Families!  I am completely exhausted, so I am going to be brief.  :)

Today the crew had a session with a park ranger discussing local ecology.  Following this we sampled the plots we established the other day.  After our sampling was finished, we had a class clean up around MOSS.  This was a nice friendly competition to see which person or group could collect the most trash from the forest or sagebrush.  According to our scale we removed abou 200 pounds of trash from the surrounding area (not bad for 45 minutes).  After dinner we all jumped in the freezing cold lake, built a fire, had an absolutely fantastic spotlight session, and played a really fun game of 'fugitive.'  I have more pictures to share (I'll display them at gallery night).

MOSS Day 3

Hello Families,

We had such an awesome day!  I don't have time to explain the specifics of each photo (and some of them aren't in order), so I will just give a brief summary of the day.  We started the day by experimenting with fire boards (these are boards that we load up with matches to create scale experiments of actual wildland fires).  After finishing, I tallied it up and we burned 1,500 matches during these experiments!  One aspect of this that was really interesting was that these scale experiments did a great job of demonstrating some principles of fire behavior we analyzed in class.  After this we hiked up to the marsh.  One interesting part of this marsh is that it is in the process of succession.  About 1,000 years ago it was a lake, and over the years it gradually fills in with sediment.  In the future, this marsh will turn into a meadow, and eventually a forest.  Our main purpose in this ecosystem was to discover insect diversity and look at turbidity.  Following the aquatic sciences we split into two groups and the students chose which group to join.  One group went on a discovery hike with me to the northern tip of the peninsula (which turned out to be a 5 mile scamper around the edge of the lake, followed by bushwhacking to find the trail), and the other group chose to do nature art.  After both groups returned to MOSS we had a wonderful time down at the beach.  Several of our CREW jumped in the lake (I should tell you there was still snow on the beach and the lake just thawed last week).  We were whooping and yelling and had such a fun time!  After the beach we had a really fun campfire, roasted some marshmallows, and played board games in a yert!  Today was definitely the best day yet!