See a Turkey Vulture and a Salamander

By James, Shane F., and Sean

Thursday, we had Ms. C. from the Wildlife Experience program. She will be visiting us five times before school is out and will share animals from North America. This is a complement to our science unit on Animal Adaptations.

We learned that a fly has a compound eye. That means it sees many of the same images at one time. Above is a picture of a fly's compound eye.

They are difficult to swat because they really see you coming.

She told us that snakes are reptiles, and that they shed their skin as they grow.

Here is the turkey vulture, the only bird in North America that can smell. It can smell something two miles away. It eats dead things off the ground. If you look closely at its right wing, you will notice it is deformed. He was injured when he got hit by a car. Luckily, someone called the Wildlife Experience group and they saved him. Its predators are bobcats and red tailed hawks. Because he had a hurt wing, he could not fly away and a predator could have killed him and eaten him.

The salamander is an amphibian that has holes on its body so it can breathe in water and on land. Interestingly enough, the salamander had tiger strips that were yellow and black. These beautiful stripes give it the name the tiger salamander. The tiger salamander had a long, lizard-like tail that the class got to stroke. The Wildlife Experience was fun and great for learning about animals from North America.

Have you ever seen these animals in the wild?

Do you know anything else about turkey vultures or salamanders?

If so, please comment!

Meet Louis Braille

By James

Below is the second in a series of biographies from Mrs. Yollis' Class. Each student researched a person, wrote an informative report, and created a sculpture of the historic person.

This pictures shows Louis Braille's brilliant invention used at our school.

I created a beautiful biography about Louis Braille, who is famous for inventing raphigraphy. Raphigraphy is a raised dot system (also known as Braille) so the blind can feel it, and the people who aren’t blind can see it. To go with the biography, I made a dazzling scupture of this character. Please enjoy the surprisingfacts about Louis Braille.

* * * * *
Meet Louis Braille

Do you know who invented raphigraphy? If you guesses Louis Braille, you are correct. Louis Braille was born on January 4, 1809, in Coupvray, France. Louis became blind by poking his eye with a dangerous tool. Eventually, in 1812, his eye became infected, and his infection to his other eye causing total blindness at the age of three.

Also in the early 1800s, France was at war with Russia. When Russia won, they invaded Coupvray and demanded to be housed and fed. Louis’s house now had Russian soldiers in it. As you can imagine living with soldiers was tough, considering young Louis can’t even see them.

In 1819 Louis was sent to live and learn at a blind institute. In this new school, Louis learned sonography, a raised dot system for soldiers so they didn’t need a lamp to read a message during war. Later, in 1825, Louis and his friend invented the first blind writing board so the blind could write too. The writing board was like a 3-D array of squares to help form something similar to a letter. A year, in 1826, Mr. Braille became a teacher for the blind institute.

In 1839, Mr. Louis Braille invented raphigraphy. Raphigraphy is raised dots symbolizing letters so the blind can feel them and the people who aren’t blind could see them. Raphigraphy today is also known as Braille. Unfortunately, Mr. Braille died on January 6, 1852, in Coupvray, France. Louis died from a horrible coughing disease called tuberculosis. Louis Braille was only 42 when he died and I wish he was still alive right now to see all of his success.

I enjoy learning about Mr. Braille’s system and I am happy it is still used today. Raphigraphy is even used here at my school. I think his six dot system, raphigaphy, changed the world because it made it easier for the blind to read and enjoy books as much as the people who aren’t blind.

Below is a presentation of my sculpture of Mr. Braille.

What do you think of James' report?
Do you have any questions for him?
Please comment!

Cheerful Chumash Assembly

By Taylor S., James, Lexi, and Jonah,

At our school, we experienced a fabulous assembly about the Native American tribe, the Chumash. In this assembly, we smashed acorns into flour, made string with yucca leaves, helped grind a Chumash bowl, tried to make fire, and created a rock art necklace.

Smashing Acorns

At the acorn station, we cracked acorns to make acorn flour. First, we took an acorn and cracked it out of its shell with two rocks.

Then we smashed the inside of the acorn into a powdery mixture.


Finally, we reached our goal… FLOUR!

(Warning: DO NOT EAT ACORN POWDER WITHOUT LEACHING IT. It's bitter!)

Yucca String

At another station we pounded yucca leaves.

After that, we soaked them in water for two minutes.

Once that was done, we separated the fibers and put them in a stack.

Later, we sat down all together and rolled the fibers together which made a sticky, but strong yucca string!

Beautiful Stone Bowls

The Chumash made their bowls by scraping sandstone with another rock. This was harder than it sounds though. A Chumash Native American would work on one bowl for a few years before it was finished!

They would start by searching for a round piece of sandstone. With another rock, they would scrape and scrape the sandstone until it was a deep bowl.


That’s a very long, but easy process. The powder from the rock looked like this.
Can you imagine having to do all that to have one small bowl?

Fire Station

At this station we used a spindle and a fire board to build a warm, cosy fire. First, we took the spindle and placed it in a hole in the fireboard. Next, we spun the spindle between our hands.

The friction caused the point of the spindle to heat up.

Unfortunately, or fortunately, no one was able to create a fire.

Rock Art

The Chumash were famous for their rock art. We were able to create rock necklaces using red berries (a red Sharpie) and coal (a black Sharpie).

Everyone drew their own unique design.

We even got to taste a few Chumash foods like chia seeds.

The terrific Chumash assembly was not only fun, but educational too!