Activity extra, end of school 2006

Around the world in 20 questions

Directions
Find the locations described in the odd numbered questions. Find a location between each of them, create an even numbered question that characterizes the place, and tell where it is. Be sure that your question for number 20 refers to the same city as does number 1.
1. From the largest city of the Empire State
2. To _______________________________________________________
3. To the city known for the Eiffel Tower
4. To _______________________________________________________
5. To the capital of the country between Russia and Sweden
6. To _______________________________________________________
7. To the city which has both the Wailing Wall and the Dome of the Rock
8. To _______________________________________________________
9. To the capital of the country the Dalai Lama calls home
10. _______________________________________________________
11. To the capital of the country once ruled by Ferdinand Marcos
12. To _______________________________________________________
13. To the capital of the country where sushi originated
14. To _______________________________________________________
15.To the country whose indigenous people are the Maoris
16. To _______________________________________________________
17.To the western-most Canadian province
18.To _______________________________________________________
19. To the city on the southern shore of Lake Michigan
20. To _______________________________________________________

Possible answers
1. From the largest city of the Empire State (New York City)
2. To the capital of the Emerald Isle (Dublin)
3. To the city known for the Eiffel Tower (Paris)
4. To the capital of Hans Christian Andersen's homeland (Copenhagen)
5. To the capital of the country between Russia and Sweden (Helsinki)
6. To the island country south of Turkey (Cyprus )
7. To the city which has both the Wailing Wall and the Dome of the Rock (Jerusalem)
8. To the capital of the country east of Ethiopia (Mogadishu )
9. To the capital of the country the Dalai Lama calls home (Katmandu)
10. To the country once known as Siam (Thailand)
11. To the capital of the country once ruled by Ferdinand Marcos (Philippines)
12. To the capital of the country of which Hong Kong is now a part (Beijing)
13. To the capital of the country where sushi originated (Tokyo)
14.
To the capital of the continent/country where the Great Barrier Reef is located (Canberra)
15. To the country whose indigenous people are the Maoris (New Zealand)
16. To the capital of the 50th state (Honolulu)
17. To the western-most Canadian province (British Columbia)
18. To the province where Calgary is located (Alberta)
19. To the city on the southern shore of Lake Michigan (Chicago)
20. To the city where Wall Street and Broadway are located (New York City)
This activity appeared in the June 1999 issue
Previous issues

Spring 2006: Math books
Have fun for Math Awareness Month with this arithmetic activity that has elementary students substituting titles containing numbers to solve the equations. While most have only one possible answer mathematically, there are many potential books that can be chosen.
Since the puzzler will have students using key words to find titles, this is also a wonderful way to celebrate National School Library Media Month -- mastering the use of the automated catalog. (Anyone with a card catalog can have students locate titles with numbers in the first word. Scanning your shelves for others, you can put them on display to help students.)

Sample worksheet
Directions: Solve these problems for the missing number. Find titles that include that number within them. Fill in the titles so that the problem is complete. You may use number variations such as "fourth" or "trio."

__________ + 3 = 6
2 + __________ = 7
__________ - 2 = 1
2 x __________ = 8
12 - __________ = 5
__________ divided by 5 = 2
8 divided by __________ = 4
__________ + __________ = 9
__________ - __________ = 3

Possible answers

The Three Billy Goats Gruff
Five Little Monkeys Wash the Car
The Three Little Pigs
Four Stories for Four Seasons
Seven at One Blow
Ten Red Apples
Two Bad Bears
Many possibilities depending on whether 3+6, 4+5, or other equations are chosen.
Many possibilities depending on whether 6-3, 8-5, or other equations are chosen. This article appeared in the April 2001 issue. <
Winter 2006: Valentine, be mine
Personal Valentine's Day greetings are rarely written today, but middle grade students and up may be motivated to do so after trying this activity which will boost their vocabularies as well as remind them of basic dictionary and thesaurus skills. Encourage them to go beyond words they already know that begin with the letters in the puzzle and make an effort to discover new terms that just might show up on some future standardized test.
You can turn this into a quick display by covering the bulletin board with red construction paper and attaching pink hearts, each heart spelling out one letter in the message V-A-L-E-N-T-I-N-E-B-E-M-I-N-E.
Inside the first heart, have students write the qualities that they have located for the letter "V" and continue with the remaining letters.

Possible answers:
V: virtuous, valiant vivacious
A: animated, altruistic, adventurous
L: laudable, lovable, learned
E: endearing, enchanting, emphathetic
N: nurturing, nerveless, non-judgmental
T: trustworthy, tolerant, tender
I: industrious, impressive, individualistic
N: noble, nonconformist, notable
E: ntertaining, exciting, eleemosynary
B: old, bubbly, beguiling
E: educated, effulgent, effervescent
M: motivated, mannerly magical
I: independent, imaginative, idealistic
N: nonchalant, natural, neat
E: enterprising, exemplary, energetic

This activity appeared in the February 1998 issue.

Early winter 2005: Welcome to our biosphere
Exploring the biomes that make up the planet earth has become one of the more popular science units from elementary grades through high school. Design one on the various ecosystems for use now or for Earth Day in April.
Before developing the project, review your print collection. While reference materials reflecting the changes in science are available, many books on the topic are very dated and don't use current terminology. Be prepared to equate jungle with rain forest. Several biomes have not been covered at every level, and you may need to go to country books to find the information.
Organizing the project
Decide with teachers which biomes should be researched. The basic ones are: desert, grasslands, rain forests, tundra and wetlands. Others, such as coral reefs, taiga and deciduous forests, are frequently explored as well. Prepare Information Sheets to help students focus on what needs to be found. Using the same form for all groups will help in compare/contrast discussions. The first questions have to do with temperature and rainfall, the factors that determine the nature of a terrestrial biome. If coral reefs are included, the group researching them will omit that section but can explain the ocean temperature range that coral reefs need to survive.
There are many excellent resources on the Internet in addition to any electronic databases you might have. Refer the youngest students to the Enchanted Learning site. High-quality Web pages for intermediate and upper grades include Berkeley's The World's Biomes and Missouri Botanical Gardens' MBGnet: What's It Like Where You Live?
Culminating projects
Require students to look for pictures that can be photocopied or printed. (Access to a color printer allows much better results.) The visuals should be used in their oral presentations along with a model of their biome. As part of their assignment, groups must put color-coded map tacks on a map of the world indicating all the places on earth where their biomes can be found.
Once all oral presentations have been given, have the entire class engage in a debate about saving threatened biomes. The first question is whether or not the biome should be saved. The second is how to do it.
Through their presentations and following discussion, students will become aware of how all biomes are interconnected. They will realize the cost for saving a system and the cost for letting it crash. By deciding for themselves which approach is best, they take another step toward becoming responsible adults.
Supplemental materials

INFORMATION SHEET
Biome:
Temperature range:
Rainfall:
General description:
Areas where this biome is located:
Specific area selected:
Typical animals:
Typical plants:
Adaptations of animals and plants to this biome:
Importance of this biome to our biosphere:
Threats to this biome:>br>

This article appeared in the April 1999 issue

Fall 2005: On the go
Marking the many journeys families make to get together for Thanksgiving Day, a number of important events in the history of transportation occurred in November. Have students in grades four through eight explore these milestones and assess their implications.
Divide students into seven groups. If you would like an eighth, have them investigate the contribution of Robert Fulton who was born on November 14, 1765. Encourage those researching water-related occurrences to meet with each other. Do the same for land and air. Use this worksheet as a guide.
While students may need to use search strategies to locate some of these events, online resources such as infoplease.com are helpful. In addition to information you might have on New York City, these two sites have background on the Holland Tunnel.
Let groups present their findings orally. If time permits, have them include visuals. During the concluding discussion, be sure they bring out the economic motivations.
Answers in brief (There will be variations in results)

Erie Canal : Went from Buffalo, NY to Albany, NY. Linked the Great Lakes to the Atlantic Ocean via the Hudson River providing easy transportation of agricultural products from the West and settlers and manufactured goods from the East. In the short term it reduced freight costs from Buffalo to New York City by 90% and made the city the nation's leading port, it recouped its costs many times: over the long term railroads began reducing its importance in 1865, by the early 1900s voters decided to make it part of a modern waterway known as the New York State Barge Canal system.
Suez Canal : Located in Egypt, it joins the Mediterranean and Red Seas. It shortened the important route from Great Britain to India by 5,000 miles. From the first it has been the busiest international inter-ocean waterway; although an 1888 international convention agreed the canal was to be open to all nations, at various times, countries have been barred from using it as an economic sanction or a wartime strategy.
Panama Canal: Cutting across the Isthmus of Panama, it connects the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. Reduced the distance boats had to travel between New York and San Francisco from 15,100 miles to 6,100 miles. In the short term, Theodore Roosevelt, who considered it one of his greatest achievements, supported a revolutionary government who took over Panama, recognizing it so that a treaty was signed giving the U.S. control over the strip of land it needed to dig the canal; since Dec. 31, 1999 the canal belongs to Panama and is still an important military and commercial water route, although the largest tankers cannot go through it.
Canadian Pacific Railway: Goes from Montreal to British Columbia. Building a transcontinental railroad was British Columbia's condition for joining the confederation. Short term results known as the Pacific Scandal began in 1873 when Conservative leader Sir John A. McDonald's government was forced to resign after being accused of taking money from Sir Hugh Allan whose syndicate wanted the contract to build the railroad; this eventually led to the rush by settlers to the fertile Canadian prairie; still in operation today and run by a conglomerate, it has extensive rail lines across southern Canada.
Holland Tunnel: Links downtown Manhattan with Jersey City, NJ. By the end of WWI ferries were struggling to cope with the ever increasing traffic between the city and NJ and a tunnel was needed. Engineering creativity solved the ventilation problem; when it opened the toll was fifty cents and was the longest underwater tunnel in the world carrying 51,694 vehicles on its first day of operations; today it caries over 17 million vehicles annually; the Lincoln Tunnel and George Washington Bridge were built later to also connect the city with NJ.
1st flight over the South Pole : From Bay of Whales to the Pole and back in under 16 hours. Part of a 1928-1930 expedition by Richard Byrd to explore Antarctica. In the short term, they established a base, Little America, on the Ross Ice Shelf; in the long term it led to more research expeditions which continue today.
1st trans-Pacific airmail flight: Pan American Airways flew from San Francisco to Honolulu, Midway, Wake, Guam, and Manila. Increased speed is the obvious purpose. In the short term over 20,000 people saw to the "China Clipper" begin its 8,000 mile journey with 110,865 letters on board, landing 59 hours and 48 minutes later in Manila; the route was extended to Hong Kong in 1937 and to Singapore in 1941 only to be halted for several years by WWII; today airmail is a standard form of long distance delivery world wide.

This activity appeared in the November 2000 issue

School begins 2005: Discover Dewey
Use this quick "Jeopardy-style" opening for an activity to engage students' attention and interest as they learn the ins and outs of your media center.

Directions
Explore all sections of the media center's collection including all 10 large Dewey subjects, biography, reference, and fiction. Set up a four-column table with DISCOVER DEWEY running down the side as shown at left (only the letters DISCO are shown but you can spell out the whole thing). In each section, select an answer that uses one of the letters listed in the first column and give the Dewey or other section number where that answer can be found. Example: O/ Odin /293 and on a separate sheet, your question, "Who is the Norse king of the gods?"

Answer/ Dewey Number/ Question

D

I

S

C

O

Divide the class into groups of two or three. Review directions. Ask students to keep a separate sheet for questions they think will fit the answers they found. (Giving page and title in addition to call numbers makes checking easier.) Suggest that when they choose answers for each section, they make certain that the Dewey number (or call number for fiction, biography and reference) is specific enough for those looking for a question to have a chance to find it. Remind them that any book in the 000s, 100s, etc. is acceptable.

This activity appeared in the September 1996 issue.