Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Day Two by Marissa Blake

Hey hikers! Today we went on a two hour hike in our field group. It was tiring and a fun! Camouflage is a game is that most people enjoyed. Today we could make ice cream, build shelters, and take a survival class! There were many other classes too. Building shelters was popular. The survival class was 4 hours! All the other classes were 2 hours. Those survival students were very, very tired .In the shelter class there were amazing shelters. People were very creative in the nature sculptures. Monster’s mushroom class was popular too. We enjoyed a night experiment activity after dinner. Today was a great day!

The Second day at the Exhilarating Natures Classroom By Britt Keller

Today we got up bright and early. My roommate and I got up at around 6:50ish. I really didn’t want to get up because my sleeping bag was really warm and today was very cold. Hannah got up and took a shower and I finished my Nature’s Classroom journal, which I still have to do after I type this. But anyway, after that we all got up and went to breakfast. We had scrambled eggs, muffins and potatoes. We ate and then we had entertainment. After that we did the Ort report, which is leftover food. The Nature’s Classroom teachers weighed it and it cam out to be I do believe 11 pounds. That is really good actually seeing how we have 200 plus kids.

After breakfast we split into our field groups. Toast took my group on a hike up Sunrise Mountain. She said it is the steepest and hardest climb on the property. She was right. It was so difficult because towards the top it was so steep that we had to almost crawl up. (Not really but still) Once we got to the top though it was really worth it because the view was breathtaking. We were all awestruck at the beauty of Lake George that flowed ahead of us. I mean it was like a whole new world. My mind started journeying to a whole new world. I left all my thoughts of everything behind me on that mountain and focused ahead of me. But as soon as it was there it was gone because we were gone. I whispered “goodbye beauty” as I walked back down the agonizing mountain that laid in front of me.

After that we had transition. We pretty much hung out in our rooms the whole time.

Then we went to lunch. We had fish. I think it was Cod. It was so GOOD! I wish I could have brought it home I with me. I think I was the only one at my table that actually enjoyed the main meal. But, whatever, more for me. Our “Ort Report baby Sh- Zam!” (That’s what we say when they announce the ort report) went down to 9 and 3 quarters. We were so happy. My table came up with a chant to say we had no ort. It was “Yee-haw table 20 has no ort! Get down ye doggies! Bing!” When we said that everyone stopped and stared. We all started laughing like crazy.

After lunch we went to our first class. My first class was with Chickadee. We built an actual life-size model of a suspension bridge. After that we all got to test it. It was awesome. My social studies teacher Mr. Demarco went on it too and I think he was a little scared it wouldn’t hold him. It did though.

After that we went to our next class after a half hour transition. My next class was doing activities with our senses with Casey Jones. We went out to a point and sat and talked about our senses. Did you know we rely on our eyes the most? Not very interesting huh. But anyway we played games that involved our senses. It was pretty fun.

After that we had another transition and then off to dinner. We had chicken, biscuits, corn and mashed potatoes. No one seemed to care for it much but it was ok. I didn’t mind it much. The best part was the chicken. For desert we had freshly baked BRWONIES. YUM!

Then we had transition AGAIN. After that it was finally time for our nighttime activity. We sang our songs first tonight. We sang “Umbrella” by Rhianna, I can tell we’re gonna be great friends” by, well I don’t really know who. We also sang, “Yoshimi battles the Pink Robots” by someone. And last but not least we sang “I’m Yours” by Jason Maraz. It was very relaxing. Then we had a nighttime experience. We did experiments that involved the dark. We didn’t get tot do tem all because it wasn’t dark enough. But they were still very cool.

And now here we are in our rooms. All the girls and guys have gone to bed. That’s where I’m heading. Today was very fun, but exhausting. We did our activities and everyone was having an awesome time. Make sure you check out the other blogs and we are all going to keep you updated. This is my last blog but I hope you enjoy everybody else’s! My last comment is Nature’s Classroom is very fun and I cannot wait to get home and tell EVERYONE about it. I LOVE NATURE’S CLASSROOM!

First Day by Britt Keller

The bus ride to Nature’s Classroom I would have to say kind of stunk. We were all very squished, because we this year we had regular school buses. It was also very loud. Between the radio, the screaming boys, and the squealing girls, it wasn’t the best place for my bus mate/roommate Hannah to sleep. Somehow she managed to look like she was sleeping. The bus ride was spent playing cards (George and Sean’s game went on for I believe a half hour), reading books and magazines, and writing. I actually wrote my rough draft for the bus ride, on the bus. But it really didn’t matter because we got here.

Once we got there an hour and a half later, we went to lunch. We had chicken patties, chips, and stuff from the salad and fruit bars. It was pretty good. After that, we were to our rooms. Our counselors set down the ground rules after the boys headed up to the second floor. (HAHA! Sorry boys, =]) After we got all unpacked in the beautiful rooms, we had a fire drill and the commander in chief Ashley, gave us the speech of what and what not to do. And everything else.

After the speech, we went into our field groups and came up with chants. Emily (A.K.A Eggs) from my field group was the only one who really actually tried to come up with a chant. It came to us putting our hands in the middle of our circle, raising our hands and shouting, “Go field group four!” It was good enough I guess. Then we were assigned our field group leaders. Field group four’s leader was Toast. Not a piece of toast. Her name is Toast. We picked the classes we wanted to take. I took Earth Art with Chickadee. Yes, he is a counselor. We went into the woods. He explained to us that we could only use stuff that wasn’t dead, like, we couldn’t cut down trees. (Like we would. But of course, he was fooling around.) My friend Brooke and I made a tiny tepee out of miniature sticks and made a miniature fire pit in front of it made with the tops of acorns. We threw what looked like pine needles in, with little leaf balls, and birch bark. Chickadee lit it on fire and it actually worked! It was really cool.

The day progressed. We ate pizza for diner and celery sticks and carrots. We had cookies for desert. After that we went over to the Morse Hall. All the counselors did science experiments. Some of them included burning money and flour. We had a lot of fun. After that, some of them put on a show. It was about some weird sea creatures with stars on their stomachs. It was pretty funny.

After the show, Monster and Casey Jones played their guitars to the songs “Here Comes the Sun”, “Umbrella” and “Yomishi fights the robots” or something like that. It was all really relaxing and comfortable. It didn’t matter if you were boy or girl, adult or kid, as long as you liked to sing and have fun and hang out, that’s where you belonged. You were family. I didn’t care if I wasn’t sitting next to one of my friends, singing those songs with everyone made me feel “This is Nature’s Classroom. I’m here to have fun. So lets do this!” And here I am. Writing this blog. This is really fun. Love you family.

Wow The First Day at Nature’s Classroom By Amanda Diaz

When we, the sixth grade students, were at school it took a long time for the luggage to load because there were several big and heavy bags. It took about one hour for the entire luggage to get on the truck. While the truck was loading the students in Ms.Detrick’s room, aka Ms.Moehler, were receiving their table and field group numbers. Some students shared their numbers to see if their friends were at the same table or field group. Then when the truck was finally loaded we got onto the bus. The bus ride felt so long because we all wanted to get to Nature’s Classroom so quickly. On the bus it was loud everyone was looking around to see where we were going and what was around us.

When we were almost at Nature’s Classroom we were looking at the woods around us. We saw wooden houses, boats, streams, trails, trees everywhere, trail markings, ponds, little lakes, a beaver dam, parks and a picnic area, and swamps. As we got closer about 10 miles away the road was hilly, twisty, we went fast and then slow. Lot’s of students ears popped, everyone was so excited when we arrived in the driveway. After the buses arrived in the driveway a N.C staff member came on the bus to introduce him or herself and give us some directions. We helped unload the luggage by getting into lines we called them luggage lines. After we got the entire luggage out we went into the dining hall to eat lunch. For lunch we ate chicken patties, chips, and they had soup and salad bars.

After lunch we found our luggage and went to find and checkout our rooms. After we unpacked we had a floor meeting and we had a practice fire drill. We talked about the rules of N.C and got into our field groups. Next we got to choose from lots of fun and exciting classes like salamander gander and a class on how to build structures. Our night event was a science fair we learned so much. Then we sung songs and we ate cookies after we got ready for bed. Well I have to go to get ready for field group.