Benjamin Franklin Stole the Lightning

• Ben Franklin was good at many things, like writing funny stories, arguing, swimming, music, drawing cartoons, and traveling
• he was also a soldier and politician (government)
• he helped to write the Declaration of Independence
• he helped start a hospital, a school,. and a fire department
• he liked to make inventions the best (helpful ideas that no one had thought of before)
• he used a kite to pull him in the water to help him swim faster
• he thought of daylight savings time,  and special glasses to help people see better (to see up close and far away)

• he invented a special chair to help him collect library books
• he invented a special musical instrument that played music very beautifully
• he said "an apple a day keeps the doctor away"
• he had many ideas how to help keep people healthy, like eating fruits and vegetables and exercising
• he discovered the gulf stream, a stream of warm water in the ocean that helped people sail faster over the ocean

 

• many people were doing crazy tricks with electricity
• Ben decided to try to steal lightning from the sky because he thought it was electricity
• he put a key on a string attached to a silk kite and flew it up into a storm
• lightning hit the kite and BAM!!  it shocked the key and sparks flew everywhere

 

• Ben decided to make his most famous invention, the lightning rod
• he put a rod of iron on top of houses with a wire to the ground
• now the lightning would strike the rod instead of the house and travel safely to the ground

 

• Ben also helped America become a free country by asking France to help defeat the British

 

Weathering and Erosion

• weathering-slow process that breaks down rock into smaller pieces (water, rain, wind)
• physical weathering-rocks change size and shape, but not type or rock (chemical makeup)
• flowing water makes rocks smooth

 

• freezing and melting water can split rocks apart
• plant roots can break rock

 

• chemical weathering-changes what rocks are made of (oxygen, CO2, acid)
• lichens (like mosses) can soften rocks
• transport (moving) or weathered rock is erosion
• flowing water, rainwater, waves, wind, gravity all cause erosion (carry rock to a new place)
• deposition-dropping off of weathered rock in a new place
• glaciers-large masses of ice and snow

 

• bottom of glacier freezes to rocks, tears them apart as it moves (can make valleys and scratches in rocks)
• glaciers leave debris (leftover rocks) can be large or small
• the glacier leaves most rocks at the end of it's downhill, or terminus
• a mix of glacial debris (rocks, pebbles, gravel, sand, clay) is called glacial till
• glaciers form hills called moraines
• people can change the land by mining (taking minerals or resources out of the land)

 

• landfill-place where people pile trash
• people cut down forests to make lumber (build homes and furniture) and paper

Reading and LA Review for Midterm

Animal Adaptations Quiz #2

My Diary From Here to There Quiz #2

Stealing Beauty Quiz #1

Stealing Beauty

• Xiaoli is a poor village in China.
• Most of the people in the village are farmers.
• It has become hard to make money at farming, so the farmers became tomb raiders.
• Tomb raiders steal beautiful and valuable artwork from tombs beneath the ground.
• Looting-stealing things of value to sell for money.
• Little Su, a doctor, paid for his education by looting.
• Thieves have broken in to 220,000 tombs in China.
• Looting is a major problem in other countries as well, like India and Cambodia.
• Many art pieces are sent to collectors in Europe and the USA.
• Many people believe that stealing art is like stealing a country's beauty and history.
• Interpol-an international police agency that helps prevent the buying and selling of illegal art.

Animal Adaptations Quiz #1

My Diary From Here to There Quiz #1

Mighty Jackie Quiz #1

Relationships in Ecosystems Quiz #1

My Diary From Here to There

•  overhead, opportunities, border, unions, strikes, citizen, boycotts
• Amanda overhears Mama and Papa talking about leaving their home in Mexico to move to California
• Papa lost his job and there is no work
• the boys are excited as there is all kinds of toys in the stores, escalators to ride, and popcorn to eat
• Amanda can't imagine leaving
• they decide to go to their grandparents house in Mexicali, right across the border from the USA
• Amanda is worried that she won't be able to speak Spanish and that she can't learn English
• She is also worried she won't come back or see her best friend Michi again
• Papa was born in the USA, so he is a US citizen
• he tells Amanda that she is stronger than she thinks
• Amanda takes a heart shaped rock to remember the times that she had in the park with her friend Michi
• Amanda's whole family welcomes them to grandmas house
• Papa has been picking grapes and strawberries to make money.  He writes in a letter that there are unions, strikes, and boycotts going on to make things better for workers
• Nana gives her a new journal to write in and tells her to always remember where she comes from, and to keep the culture of Mexico alive in her heart
• Crossing the border into Tijuana was crazy, people were pushing and fighting to be first
• their new house in the USA has airplanes overhead and trains running by
• everyday she thinks about home and holds her special rock
• Amanda says that just because she is far away from home doesn't mean that she will forget.  Home is always with her, in her rock, diary, and heart.