NHJA -- Blogmeister

Living in space is a big adjustment from living on Earth, from zero gravity to the way astronauts take showers. The area where the astronauts live is very small, with 3-7 people in every mission, so it’s crammed in their! In the living quarters there's no gravity, so the astronauts just float around carelessly. When they come back to Earth it takes a while to get used to because they do not have to use their muscles in space. As you can imagine, astronauts need a break at times, so even though they work hard they get the weekends off of work too! While in space astronauts have a big agenda of work. They do things like perform science experiments, release and take back satellites, and help assemble the space station. Astronauts also work on making medicines for humans, as some of the medicines we use were made in space! Before the International Space Station existed people could only stay in space for a few weeks, as the space shuttle cannot stay in space for longer than that. The astronauts work very hard in space, but also they must sleep! Astronauts can sleep in any direction because there is no up or down, but they must be tied in while they are sleeping so that they don't bump into something. One thing remains the same in space, people get hungry! Astronauts eat three meals a day, just like on Earth. Some foods are eaten normally, while other foods you have to add water. An oven is provided in space, but there is no refrigerator so food must be prepared properly. Food in space comes in packages just like Earth, and the packages help to keep it from floating away. Food amounts needed in space are similar to Earth; a small woman 1,900 calories a day, and a large man about 3,200 calories per day. Clothing that the astronauts will wear in space is chosen months in advance. In the space station clothing is worn for about 10 days before it is changed, or 3 days of exercise. In the space shuttle, clothes are changed daily. Outside of the space shuttle or rocket, astronauts wear space suits. The clothes that are worn in space get burnt when the rocket reenters the atmosphere. Taking care of your personal hygiene in space is very different than on Earth. Showering is done by using rinse less shampoo. The astronauts are allowed to bring their own products that they prefer to use, like toothpaste, shaving cream etc. When astronauts need to go to the bathroom they must be tied to the toilet, which has a vacuum to suck in the waste. Even though astronauts in space, they still get time to relax and do what they want too. The astronauts in space get weekends off just like on Earth. They can look out the window at Earth below, play games, watch movies, or talk to their families on Earth. In addition time is scheduled for astronauts to exercise in space too! Living in space would definitely take a while to get used to, but everything is planned out to astronauts get what they need!

I'm walking out to the mound, the pressure of the entire season is on me. All of the eyes of my parents, friends, friend's parents and towns people are fixed on me. All of them ready to perform, against the almost unstoppable Dodger team. Every step takes so much effort as I know, every time I put one foot in front of the other I'm just that much closer to the start of the game. I have finally made my way to the mound, with the umpire and my catcher waiting for me. Then the umpire hands me the ball, I have a quick chat with my catcher, and now it's game time. I'm so nervous but what's driving me to do well more than anything is my determination to win. Here goes nothing... I start the pitching motion and I fire in the first pitch for a strike. That one strike, fills with confidence.

I really enjoyed hearing Mr. Gianforte come in and speak to us about astronomy. I found it really interesting when he talked about how we can find planets in other solar systems. Astronomers can find new planets by measuring how bright a star is, so if a stars light decreases for a period of time, they believe that there is a planet crossing in front of it. When a planet crosses in front, the starlight will not decrease enough for the human eye to see, they must use tools.

Mr. Gianforte showed us how he has found planets himself, with his own telescope in his backyard. I also found it interesting that the closest star to Earth other than our sun is about 4 light years away! Its name is Alpha Centauri and can only be seen from the southern hemisphere of Earth.

Mr. Gianforte showed us how he has found planets himself, with his own telescope in his backyard. I am really fascinated by Mr. Gianforte's profession in Astronomy and would love for him to come back sometime.

Recently we had the Moon rocks in our classroom.

Dear Mom and Dad,

We have just completed Module 1 in math class, which is our first section of the year. The module began with us learning when it's appropriate to use a line graph or a bar graph. Then we learned how to make a frequency table. A frequency table is a table that has three columns: outcomes, tallies, and frequency. After we'd learned about bar graphs and frequency tables, we then practiced creating one of them using the other.
In this unit, my favorite thing that we learned was number tricks. Number tricks are equations where you start with any number you pick, then multiply, add, subtract or divide a certain number of times and your answer comes out to a certain fixed number. The way we proved that the number trick works with any starting number was by showing the equation using variables. We then used our knowledge about variables to help us with another aspect of math. We used equations with variables to find a certain term in a number sequence. This let us find any term we wanted using the certain rule we found for that number sequence. I think this was a nice introduction to learning about algebraic equations later on.
The rest of the unit was mostly review for me. We went over exponents in standard form and exponential form. Using exponents make an equation easier and quicker to write. For example instead of writing something in standard form like: 4 x 4 x 4 x 4, you can write it in exponential form: 44. After this we learned how to estimate probability by comparing with 0 to 1. 1 being definite, 0 being impossible. We also compared experimental and theoretical probability by looking at experiments we performed.
We concluded Module 1 by learning about order of operations. The abbreviation: PEMDAS (parentheses, exponents, multiplication, division, addition, and subtraction) is an easy way to remember the order to calculate each operation. Module 1 was concluded with a test about everything that we learned. Overall, module 1 has been a good review for me, and taught me a few new interesting things.

Love,
NHJA

State: New Hampshire
Region: New England/Northeast
Country: United States of America
Continent: North America
Hemisphere: North/Western
Planet: Earth
Solar System: Sol, Sun
Galaxy: Milky Way
Cluster: Local
Super Cluster: Local
Universe

Hibernation:

My house is my shield

It protects me from outside world danger

Like my cave that I spend my endless hibernation in

My winter sleep lasts much longer than a bear's does

I am always awake, just not fully there

I am detached from other people

Always in my house, shielded from the war zone beyond me

Spring:

As I slowly start waking up from my sleep

I become less distant

I put my shield down

I've slept through the war

The flowers are blooming

Spring has finally come. . .

I started my long journey through the rock cycle as magma deep below the Earth’s surface. Down there I was surrounded by rock, and because that rock was so dense, I decided to leave. When I left, I started to cool down. When this happened, I started to form crystals. That caused me to turn into an Intrusive Igneous Rock.

The main types of Intrusive Igneous Rocks are Granite, Gabbro, and Diorite. The reason they called me intrusive is because I was taking over the space that some of the older rocks had been occupying. Meanwhile part of me shot up to the Earth’s surface in a volcano. When I reached the surface, I started to cool and crystallize. As I cooled, I hardened, and turned into Extrusive Igneous Rock. Some types of Extrusive Igneous Rocks are Basalt, Rhyolite, and Andesite. Igneous Rocks are called that because they come from hot magma, and Igneous means fire or heat.

When I was up on the surface being an Igneous Rock some of the elements were pretty harsh. After fighting the conditions for a very long time, they eventually took over and started transporting me. When they were done moving me around, I made myself comfortable and settled in. This part of me turned into Clastic Sedimentary Rock. This means that I was broken down by weathering, into pebbles, sand, or clay. Types of Clastic Sedimentary Rocks include Conglomerate, Breccia, Sandstone, and Shale. The other part of me turned into Nonclastic Sedimentary Rock. That part of me had been formed by chemical reactions that usually happen in the ocean. Gypsum and Limestone are two different types of Nonclastic Sedimentary Rock. When Sedimentary Rocks are in water, the sediments build up into different layers. Sedimentary Rocks are the only types of rocks that turn into fossils, which are key for scientists to study so they can learn about thing in the Earth’s past.

When I was done compacting into a Sedimentary Rock, I began to slip back into the Earth. The amazing pressure of this provided me with death defying pain. As the metamorphism occurred, I started to change shape. My shape changed because at times there was more pressure in one area than in another. As this happened I turned into Foliated Metamorphic Rock. Some different types of Foliated Metamorphic Rock are Slate, Phyllite, Schist, and Gneiss. Another part of me was being compressed in an area near where igneous intrusions occur. That part of me was under much less pressure. Also the pressure was not in just some places, it was even throughout my body. During this step some of the minerals in my body recrystallized and became larger. This crammed together the atoms inside me, and caused me to become denser. This part of me was Nonfoliated Metamorphic Rock. Some major types of this are Quartzite, and Marble. After that I either got uplifted towards the Earth’s surface, or started to melt and turn into magma once again.

During the different stages I was in, many other things could have happened. In the magma stage, I could have uplifted towards the Earth’s surface. When I was an Igneous Rock I could have gone through metamorphism. This would have caused me to become Metamorphic Rock. When I was a Sedimentary Rock, I could have been uplifted and gone through the steps to return to being one again.

The rock cycle can take thousands to millions of years just to go through just one stage. Rocks are always being formed, worn out, or changing. They appear almost everywhere on Earth, from mountain tops, to the deepest trenches in the ocean floor!