Blog Archives - Button's Place

Day 119

2/28/2014

The end of February and it comes not a moment too soon. Do you ever notice how happy teachers are on the last day of the month and especially when it falls on a Friday? It's pay day!!
The chemistry students flew their rockets today. It was a blast - pun intended. Congratulations to Gracie Maxwell's group who launched their rocket into Room 1204 history by having the farthest flight.
The AP Biology students learned more about animal characteristics and the significance of Lucy. You know what's weird? Most educated people know who you are talking about when you say "Lucy" in a biology context. Lucy, of course, is the famous fossil of Australopithecus afarensis, our distant relative from 3.2 million years ago. Who are more famous Lucys anyway? Lucy from the Peanuts cartoon? I love the one when Snoopy mimics her. Cracks me up every time.

Day 118

2/27/2014

We only have 62 more days of school. This year is flying by!
The chemistry students saw a demonstration of the mini rockets they will build and launch tomorrow. We also measured the rockets' volume so that we could manipulate the ratios of hydrogen and oxygen gases in order to achieve maximum blast off effect. It's gonna be great!
The AP Biology students continued their discussion of animals and the characteristics we share with all animals. Like the presence of muscle and nervous tissue.

Day 117

2/26/2014

Oh boy! It's explosion day for chemistry! I can hardly wait!
Yes, in chemistry, we mixed hydrogen gas and oxygen gas that we collected and lit that mixture on fire. There really wasn't a fire. It was more like an explosion. Check it out:

The AP Biology students learned that cephalization is the concentration of sensory organs in the anterior end of an animal. Boy, that's a mouth full and if you really know what "cephalization" means, "mouth full" takes on a whole new meaning. We learned some new terms as they apply to animal structure and function, our new unit of study.

Day 116

2/25/2014

I'm back. I still don't feel that great but I'm willing to go through severe pain for my students.
The chemistry students created hydrogen gas by magic! Just kidding, you can only make unicorns using magic. They made hydrogen gas by using a simple chemical reaction and collected the gas. Then we lit it on fire which is really fun and slightly dangerous. Tomorrow is the big explosion day!
The AP Biology students started a discussion on different classification systems. We learned that we are also known as Eukarya/Animalia/Vertebrata/Mammalia/Primates/Hominid/Homo/sapiens. Yes, that's us. Good ol' Homo sapiens.

Day 115

2/24/2014

I stayed home today. I felt horrible. Our dumb neighbors came over on Saturday for dinner and brought their weird germs and got me sick.
The chemistry students reviewed their work on the ratios of gases for the big Explosion Lab.
The AP Biology students worked on the next homework assignment, the Reading Guide for Chapter 26.

Day 114

2/21/2014

Another Friday! And a rally schedule! What fun!
The chemistry students did some work on the explosion lab. Question: what is the ratio of hydrogen to oxygen gas that produces the most efficient explosion and, thus, the loudest explosion? The students got in groups and worked through some problems that, hopefully, led them to the correct answer. Certainly, we will see if that is the case on Monday.
The AP Biology students had a look at the short answer questions from last year's AP Biology Exam. We went over, in some detail, a couple of the questions: one of the lengthy ones and one of the questions that requires just a few sentences to answer. The exam is tough but all of my students are capable of passing if they put in the seat time!

Day 113

2/20/2014

I'm a lucky man. Great family. Nice house. Some cool stuff. And I really like my classes. A bunch of nice kids.
The chemistry students got used to the gas collection apparatus today by collecting a sample of pure oxygen gas by adding a catalyst, MnO2, to hydrogen peroxide. The day of the explosions is fast approaching.
The AP Biology students finished the multiple choice section of the practice AP Exam. Tomorrow we will look at the short-answer section of the exam.

Day 112

2/19/2014

What a great day. Not sure why. It just was.
The chemistry got a big demonstration today on the combustion of hydrogen gas in air and the combustion of hydrogen gas in pure oxygen gas. Boy, it there a big difference. Check this out.......

The AP Biology students had their second look at a full AP exam today. We took it in groups of 4 students. We answered 35 questions during the period and quickly corrected the exam. Tomorrow we will finish the multiple choice section.

Day 111

2/18/2014

Back after another 3-day weekend. I kinda felt like this this morning...............

....but then I had coffee and I felt way better.
Both of my classes had exams today. The chemistry students took the Unit 6 exam on Nuclear Chemistry and the AP Biology students took the Evolution Exam. I am confident that a lot of students did really good!

Day 110

2/14/2014

Happy Valentine's Day! Hug your loved ones even if they feel uncomfortable with such public displays of affection.
Both the chemistry and AP Biology students spent the day reviewing for their exams on Tuesday! Hurray!

Day 109

2/13/2014

Day 109 and February 13th. This is what I remember about this day 25 years ago. I was sitting on the couch and Jamie came through the door and looked super pale. She said, "I think it's time". A nervous ride in the car and a couple of hours later Roy came into our life. What a great day! I bet Amber's parents feel the same way! Happy Birthday Roy Button and Amber Ransford!!
The chemistry students began their review for the Unit 6 Exam on Nuclear Chemistry on Tuesday, February 18th. We went through a bunch of problems and despite a cell phone or two interrupting our work, I think it went pretty good.
The AP Biology students completed the day 2 observations on the Inquiry section of the Natural Selection Lab. Then we started a review of evolution stuff for our exam next Tuesday. We had a great conversation on the demise of the .400 hitter in baseball. Evidence suggests that this disappearance is the result of stabilizing selection where extremes in a population are eliminated. Awesome intellectual stuff.

Day 108

2/12/2014

Day 108 is just Day 180 scrambled up. And we all know about Day 180, don't we?
Today was a Collaboration Day which means college!! We talked about CSU Long Beach, FAFSA and the cost of college. A lot of important info!!
The AP Biology students did have time to complete their Day 1 observations of their own experiments on the poor brine shrimp.
The chemistry students did see the Calutron, the device that separated U-235 from the more common U-238. Go Bears!! Do you get that reference? First one to figure it out gets a prize!

Day 107

2/11/2014

Back from a rainy 3 day weekend. If you check the video below, you can see how stir crazy a 3 year old lab can get in a couple of days.
The chemistry students completed their review of alpha and beta decay equations using isotope notation. I think it's pretty easy and a bunch of students got it right away. We also discussed the use of particle accelerators and how it applies to that famous equation: E=mc2. Kids are so smart these days!
The AP Biology students began the inquiry section of the Natural Selection lab. We are still using brine shrimp and measuring their hatching success under a variety of conditions. We also did a bit of review for the Evolution Exam which is scheduled for Tuesday, February 18th.

Stir Crazy Dogs

2/10/2014

Day 106

2/7/2014

Here comes a 3 day weekend. And a lot of rain. Might be the kind of weekend to sit around and watch old movies. That and study for the AP Biology Exam!
The chemistry students reviewed 2 things today. First, we did several half-life problems. The good news? Students are getting these types of problems correct better than 90% of the time. We spent so much time making sure everybody could do these problems we didn't have enough time to work on radioactive decay problems. We'll do that on Tuesday.
The AP Biology students spent the period planning for the inquiry activity in the Natural Selection Lab. On Tuesday, the students will execute their own experiment using the brine shrimp and variables of their choice. What fun!

Day 105

2/6/2014

The school year is officially 7/12ths done. We only have 5/12ths left! God, I love fractions!
The chemistry students reviewed half-life today and we did some problems reagrding half-life. Try this one on for size: You have 10 grams of a radioactive substance with a half-life of 27 years. How much time has passed when you have 1/16th the original amount? How many grams is this? Send me the right answer and win a prize!
The AP Biology students finished the Guided Activity in the Natural Selection Lab today. We made measurements on the hatching viability of brine shrimp in 5 different saline solutions. Boy, that sounds smart!

Day 104

2/5/2014

So you may have noticed I made a change in the images of the people that head this blog page. I took out Woody Allen. I took him out not because I think his movies are bad; I still love them. It does seem, however, there is mounting evidence that he is indeed a pedophile or the very least misogynistic. In light of this, I have replaced him with a boyhood hero of mine. Who is it?
The chemistry students completed the activity today on half-life. We will do some problems tomorrow that will illustrate that some radioactive material can hang around for a very long time.
The AP Biology students completed their 24 hour observations on the brine shrimp in the 5 different solutions of varying salinity. We will complete Part 1 of this lab on Natural Selection tomorrow.
We also discussed grades in all my classes today.

Day 103

2/4/2014

I'm back from a long weekend and a real crappy Super Bowl. Even the commercials were bad.
The chemistry students did an activity that illustrated the concept of half-life. They took 100 pennies and "tossed" them until all the pennies turned tails. Each toss represented one half-life. Some radioactive material has a really long half-life. Like thousands of years. Anyway, the most important thing about today was that the students know that half-life is the time it takes for 1/2 of a sample of radioactive material to decay. We will finish this activity tomorrow.
The AP Biology students began the Natural Selection lab by putting brine shrimp eggs in 5 different salt water solutions. We will check these tomorrow for any eggs that may have hatched. We want to find out which solution is the most favorable for hatching brine shrimp eggs.

Day 102

2/3/2014

I wasn't here today. I was with my wife in the Bay Area. Her toe (true story) is messed up. A ligament is torn and she has a thing called a neuroma and it's painful and she is a yoga instructor so it's doubly painful and she complains about it a lot. Even more than about the stuff I do. Anyway, I went to the Doctor's office with her like a good husband.
The AP Biology students worked on their homework assignment which is due on Wednesday.
The chemistry students did a review activity on nuclear decay.