Whether it be launching bikes or boards off ramps, testing the durability of our safety gear, waxing skis, calculating slopes, wandering through the forest identifying trees, eddying out in a river, or growing our own food, we make it a point to reflect on our adventures and learn from our experiences.
There’s no better lab than the one we have right outside our classroom. In physics this semester, we have focused on projectiles, collisions, and energy. Monarch Mountain has been a playground ripe for scientific analysis. We’ve calculated speeds and momentum down the slopes, determined potential and kinetic energy from the chairlift to the summit, and even calculated the occasion force of impact on the skier by the lodgepole pine! Whew. Thank goodness for helmets!
In Environmental Science, even through these recent darkest months, the fruits of our labors in the greenhouse have finally come to life! Here we are harvesting and enjoying lettuce, kale, arugula, radishes, endive, and spinach! As the days begin to get longer again, we have plans for an herb garden and tomatoes, cucumbers, and peppers!
Understanding the natural environment and our place within it has never been more important than here and now.
-Rick Bieterman, Science Teacher