On March 30-31, Marshal School teachers and staff attended an in-service presented by Gary and Cheryl Cooper from Delta Junction. They had been here once before three years ago and did such a good job that they were asked back.

During the two day in-service, the Coopers presented innovative ways of teaching science to both high school and elementary teachers and support staff. Gary presented the high school segment and Cheryl did the elementary part of it. Teachers and staff really enjoyed the workshop, and had the following comments:

Frank Keim: I especially liked making the climbing bear and balloon-powered car. I've already used some of the ideas in my classroom.

Barbara Sandlin: One of the best parts was getting science activities to do with the students. The activities will help the students learn science concepts while having fun.

Janice Olsen: My favorite science activity was "mining for gold". We chose a tool to "mine" in cookies for chocolate chips, etc. We assigned values to our "minerals," and, guess what, I won! Then we ate the cookies. Yum!

Flora M. Evan: The in-service gave me many great ideas that I could use in my classroom. I enjoyed making our projects and sharing with the group what we made.

Richard Olsen: The in-service provided many interesting ideas for teaching science concepts. These could also be used with writing activities in Language Arts.

Guy Sandlin: The hands-on activities and the thought-enhancing approach to science were the highlights for me.

Olga Soolook: The best thing for me was making something that moved in two ways.

Gail Fitka: I liked doing hands-on experiments and seeing what science is all about. The best part was the feeling of being vacuumed in a trashbag.

Clara Shorty: I liked making objects that had two ways of moving. I wish we'd had more time to do the experiments.

Max Lunt: One of the most beneficial parts was demonstrating fun methods of teaching science to our students. In education we are always looking for new ways of turning students on to science.

Donna Best: The best thing for me was the chance to learn hands-on science activities that will get kids excited about learning.

Our presenters
Gary and Cheryl Cooper

The Lower Yukon Academic Pentathlon was held in Marshall on March 27th and 28th. There were teams from Alakanuk, Emmonak, Kotlik, Marshall, Mountain Village, and Pilot Station competing.

The Academic Pentathlon is a very difficult competition. In order to compete, the participants must read the Sunday Anchorage Daily News from the beginning of October until the end of March. The participants must also write and deliver a speech, take tests in science and math, write an essay about two novels which they were assigned to read, and be able to answer both oral and written questions about current events. All of these are difficult, but the students who participated had worked very hard and were well prepared. They even managed to have fun and meet new friends in the process.

The two students on the Marshall team were Henrietta Coffee and Jacob Turet. These two students had been preparing and practicing since last October for this two day event and both did very well. We are proud of our team.

The first place trophy went to the team from Mountain Village, second place was awarded to Emmonak, and Marshall earned third place. Twelve students from the first and second place teams will travel to Anchorage at the end of this month to represent our district in the Alaska State Academic Pentathlon.

This wonderful event was coordinated by Deanna Petru from Mountain Village. Deanna, the coaches, the Marshall volunteers, and the students all worked hard to make it a huge success.

Donna Best

I wonder if people remember Earth Day anymore? It seems, with all the hustle and bustle and dissension over academic standards, high school qualifying tests, school budget formulas, and the usual student boyfriend-girlfriend problems, we've forgotten about the most important thing of all and the one that sustains all the others, the environment. All around us the environment continues to degrade while we focus on what amount to trivialities.

So let's try to put things back into perspective again. Let's remember our Mother Earth for what she gives us every day, especially here in Alaska. And let's celebrate her during Earth Day on April 22, and during the whole of the week, April 22-24, with activities especially devoted to this purpose.

There are many things we can do to accomplish this. Try the three R's, for one. Reduce your consumption of goods from the store. Then reuse what you do consume as many times as you can. Also, recycle as much as possible, and use products that are made from recycled post consumer materials. Something students could do is a personal research project on an environmental issue or problem in their community, and then report the results back to their class and their family.

And, remember, in our daily lives let's try to make every day Earth Day.

Frank Keim