6/27/2002

GPGC 2002

Freshmen Science Week 3 Review

Mr. Newman

The freshmen science students explored the importance of communication in science. They examined timelines in both the humanities class and in science. The various types of graphs were also discussed and illustrated. The students became archeologists by completing the Hannibal activity. They deciphered the Egyptian Hieroglyphics Message and realized the importance of the finding of the Rosetta Stone. They broke the Japanese Code in the WWII activity and determined a mathematical key that would apply to this code. They linked the importance of understanding angles with angle of incidence equal to the angle of reflection by trying to solve the Satellite Communications Problem using the flashlights and mirrors and the giant red ball (See picture above right). Let’s look at some of them in action.

WWII-Japanese Code Trying to solve the Japanese Code.
Hannibal What did those strange artifacts stand for found in the pouches from the remains of the Roman scouts?
The students separated these items several different ways and came up with several possibilities. (There were several different size and colored pebbles found at the actual site. I substituted poker chips and marbles of various sizes and colors.)
There were 5 white chips, 3 red chips, 1 black marble, 2 blue marbles, and 4 orange marbles.
“Were these used as money?” “Were they used as weapons?” “Could they have been used to mark the trail so the scouts would not get lost?” No—No—No
The scouts were trained to not only look for the enemy, but to count them as best as they could. These scouts counted 42,531 men in Hannibal’s army. They placed pebbles in their pouches to total this count, but never made it down the Alps to warn the Roman Soldiers that Hannibal was coming to attack by surprise from the Alps.		There was 100% participation all week long for all activities and assignments. Great work. Parents, here are some Brain Bucks for you for having such wonderful children!!
Each orange marble counted as 10,000 men. Each blue marble counted as 1,000 men. Each white chip counted as 100 men. Each red or maroon chip counted as 10 men. Each black marble counted as 1 man. This procedure was one of the early abacuses. The Chinese had used one similar to the one that Patrick is holding earlier than the Roman way of counting, but their cultures had not made contact with each other at this time. The students did eventually use deductive and inductive reasoning to figure out what the pebbles were!!	No, Robert is not sleeping. He is thinking of how he could get 15 mirrors lined up so that he could shine a flashlight into one and have the beam of light reflect through the remaining 14 and hit in a circle on the opposite side of the earth (giant red ball). He used a protractor to draw the angles in his blueprint.
Egyptian Hieroglyphics “Those Egyptians sure had a weird alphabet. I wonder what this says?” Answer: ‘Science Rules’		“I wonder if the Egyptians ever misspelled any words!!”