Extra Credit

At first glance, I would say the pumpkin represents Halloween, but after looking at the design carved into the pumpkin, I would say it represents radiation...

Journal #6 Response to Reaching for the Stars Article

I think that a lot of people may change the lives of other people without even knowing it, whether it be a teacher teaching students, making a friends with someone, or helping someone with a simple task.  I am part of the Unified Sports program at Greenwich High School.  Unified sports gives students at Greenwich High with special needs the ability to learn to play a sport and stay active.  We encourage them.  We are there to make friends with the students, play with them, and instruct them on how to play the game.  With this program I have been able to connect and interact with many of these students.  I love cheering them on and seeing a huge smile on their faces after they have scored a goal (right now we are playing soccer).

The article talked about a decrease in the amount of doctoral and graduate students interested in the field of science and or technology.  "We want these intelligent, dedicated people to live in our cities, to make their discoveries at our universities and to raise their families- the next generation of bright minds."  (paragraph 7).  The reason for this decrease is the fact that no one is guaranteed success because they went to college.  Also, the scientific field is not a very high paying field. Jobs are not abundant either. (One of the reasons for Occupy Wall street). "There is a sense of fear among our leaders that we can't afford to invest in our future, just the kind of fear that endangers thoughtful debate about big-picture priorities." (paragraph 3)

The United States was the scientific leader of the world.  It still is.  If the decrease of graduate and doctoral students will cause the United States to lose its status as the scientific leader.  The amount and rate of technological devices will decrease very quickly.

"Though some of these jobs are of the hard-hat variety, this is not a bridge to nowhere; this is a bridge to the edge of the universe itself." (paragraph 11)

Lab Report Summary and Conclusion

The purpose of this lab was to separate the beads (yellow, blue, gray, and clear) by their densities.  We did this by adding more or less salt water to the beaker, then pouring the beads into the water and seeing which one floated on top. 

Our first trial was freshwater. We poured all the beads into the beaker, and found that the gray colored beads floated while the others sank to the bottom.  We fished the gray beads out of the water and found their mass was 2.6g out of 10.5g.  This gave us a percent composition of 24.7%

Our next trial was mostly salt water, but due to some difficulties, there was some freshwater in the salt solution.  We found that both  the blue and the yellow beads would float, so we decded to dilute the mixture to be approximately half freshwater and half salt water.  When we did this, the blue still floated on the surface, while the yellow sank down to the middle, and the clear beads stayed on the bottom.  Once again, we collected the blue beads out of the water and found that the blue beads had a mass of 4.0g out of 10.5g.  This gave us a percent composition of 38%

Our last trial was purely salt water.  During this trial, the yellow beads floated back to the surface of the solution, while the clear beads stayed on the bottom.  We collected the yellow beads and the clear beads.  We then measured them separately.  The yellow beads had a mass of 10.9 out of 10.5.  This is obviously wrong, but it gave us a percent composition of 103%.  The clear beads had a mass of 9.91g out of 10.5.  We got a percent composition of 94.3%.

In conclusion, by looking at this data obviously something went wrong.  The sum of the percents is over 100%, and sum of the masses of the beads do not equal 10.5g.  I think that one thing that went wrong was that we were not exactly precise about the amount of water used.  I think if we kept track of how much of the salt solution and how much of the freshwater we used, we would have had results that were more accurate.  I think that finding the mass of the beads while they were still wet definitely affected the mass of the beads, especially the beads we weighed after putting them in salt water.  Salt water is more dense, so it probably affected the mass moreso than the freshwater.  Either way, both the freshwater and the salt solution affected the mass of the beads.  We should have dried the beads before finding the mass.  I think a way we can improve this experiment is to add another color of beads.  Another way we could do this is to maybe test the beads in another type of solution, not including testing the beads in salt solution and freshwater.

Journal #5 Reflection on this quarter so far...

I am really happy about the grade that will show up on my progress report. I think blogging helps me a lot. I think blogging is a great way for students who do not really like to raise their hands in class (like me). It helps us to contribute ideas. Blogging also prevents boredom while doing homework because instead of taking monotonous notes, we are excercising our critical thinking skills.  I find that I almost never run out of things to write. However, raising my hand more in class is something I definitely need to do more often.

I think I have done well with my study habits so far, but I think there is room for improvement when it comes everything.  I think I will try to make flashcards, because for me this is a foolproof way for me to make sure I know everything I need to know before a test or quiz.  By doing this, I will be less nervous for tests and quizzes.   

Density Lab Report

Link to our density lab report.
katiefarychem.blogspot.com

Journal #4 Response to E-book Article

Personally, I do not find e-books useful to study from.  I find it harder to concentrate on what I am reading and often find it hard to relocate or summarize the information later.  It is even harder to take notes.   E-books take up more time and energy than simply reading from a textbook.   As the article states, "the process of locating information takes longer, they have less energy or other tasks, and their ability to maintain their desired levels of productivity suffers." (paragraph 14).  Reading from e-books is very monotonous and makes it tempting to do other things such as surf the net and go on social networking sites.  It enables people to put off doing work they know needs to be done.  Reading from a textbook is a little more entertaining without being distracting.  Reading from a textbook allows a person to pay more attention to what is written.  Another reason why I think it is better to study from a regular textbook is for medical reasons:  Staring at a kindle screen or computer screen ruins eyesight and causes headaches.  Textbooks ensure that a student will actually be able to do their reading or studying without the dilemma of a dead battery or technical difficulties.   

"The printed page continues to be a remarkably powerful reading tool, and it seems to be particularly well suited to the needs of students." (paragraph 15).   According to students at the University of Washington, many students were given kindles, but by the end of the school year, most of the students had become frustrated with them and stopped using them.  Obviously e-books are not as well suited for students as people thought.  I am slightly concerned about the idea that kindergarteners may be starting off their education using e-books.  In a world where my generation's writing and reading skills are being heavily influenced by texting lingo, and shortened reading passages, imagine how the use of e-books will affect the reading skills of kindergarteners throughout their education!  It will also be much harder for them.  If college students are having trouble using e-books, what makes anyone think 5 year olds will have an easier time learning to read with e-books?    

Even though I am against the use of e-books for studying, I do actually find technology a useful and beneficial part of my education.  I think that word documents are extremely helpful when writing essays, because they are easier to edit and are more organized.  PowerPoint presentations are also useful for projects,  presenting information, and student note taking.  They are used in classes to make them more entertaining and organized, rather than listening to a teacher's lecture while students try to keep up and take notes at the same time.   In some classes, such as American Sign Language, homework is mostly based off technology because it is easier to look up a video to watch how to do a sign than it is to read about how it is done.

 "New technologies are seductive, but we should always think twice before rushing to replace old tools with new ones." (paragraph 17)