Using Tennis Court To Teach About Coordinates and Graphing

Today we used the tennis courts to teach about graphing and coordinates. We used chalk to draw the x and y axis. We numbered both axis in meters. After a brief explanation about how this is just another way to organize things we had the students draw the court with the graph. We then plotted the students on their diagram. With 5th grade we talked about making lines. We had the kids make parallel and perpendicular lines with the other students. We used a tennis ball to show how we could plot the line that it rolled on. We showed the students the difference between a ray and a line segment.We talked about how when we serve the tennis ball we always serve to the opposite side quadrant.

Harvesting The Garden

Our students got their hands dirty. When we were caring for our plants the learning moments were multiplied. The questions the kids asked were focused and led to many discussions about the science. One 4th grade student asked me, "How does the water get into the plant?" I told her that to understand that she needed to learn about the cell." A couple of days later she brought in two pictures of cell diagrams that she had researched on her own.

Our School Garden

We started a school garden back in September. In conjunction with LSU Ag and 4H we planted a great garden. Kids need to realize that pushups are not the only way to get exercise and get healthy.