St. Vrain fair exhibits tech’s appeal

Westview Middle School sixth graders Michael Claice and Toma Ide recently have been flying around the world — at least in a virtual way.

The two boys created a travel movie featuring sights, sounds and interesting facts about places around the world is part of a social studies classroom project. They also entered their movie into the middle school’s Jan. 21 technology fair, where it earned one of two top spots. That accomplishment gives them the chance to compete in the St. Vrain Valley School District’s technology fair on Feb. 6.
“I’m really excited about getting to go to the district’s fair,” Michael said. “We can’t wait to show our project.”

The district technology fair was started in 2006 — 2007 school year as a way for middle- and high-school students to compete and showcase the ways they use technology for learning. The fair expanded in 2007 – 2008 to include elementary school students. Winners in the three categories — elementary, middle and high school — compete for first, second and third place and can win classroom technology stipends. The grand prize winner also receives a $1,000 classroom technology stipend and the travelling trophy for the winner’s school.

The theme for the upcoming fair is “Making Meaning of the World Around You.”

Holding its own school technology fair appealed to Westview Middle School staff since the school has a technology focus, said assistant principal Jeremy La Cross. The school also sponsors a technology club in which students can explore and create using various types of digital technology. The focus on technology inspired about 40 students to start projects for the school technology fair; about 16 actually entered the fair, according to tech club advisor David Kline.

“The students learn even if they don’t quite finish their projects,” Kline said.

Michael Claice and Toma Ide are friends and knew they wanted to work together on a project.

“We talked a lot about what we wanted to do, and we ended up using Toma’s idea for our movie,” Michael explained. “Then we did some research and wrote our script, used Google Images and iMovie to film, and used GarageBand for the music. We got together on four days to film and edit the movie.”

Westview sixth grade students Gretchen Devereux and Keira Hook also made a movie about far-flung places, but they added a twist — they incorporated folk songs that they played themselves as part of their movie’s soundtrack.

The girls, who earned the other top school spot with their project, knew that they wanted to work on a technology project that would allow them to play their instruments. They decided to focus on a movie project where they could supply the soundtrack.

“We play the flute and the violin, so we looked through our band and orchestra music books to find folk songs to play together,” Keira said. “We had to rewrite the songs to play them in the same key.”

The girls used iMovie to film themselves wearing costumes and playing their pieces, and added background photos of different countries from Google Images.

“It took us two sleepovers to film this project,” Gretchen said. “We had a lot of fun.”

Preserving the pristine beauty of Colorado is the focus of the entry from Fall River Elementary fifth grade students Shiloh Berger, Chelsea Engelhard, Edie Gilbert, Alyssa Fischels, Doug Peairs and Noah Svensson. The group is creating a commercial about keeping Colorado beautiful as their entry, and their theme is “Don’t Be Mean, Go Green.” The project builds on fifth grade classroom work about conservation, said Kristi Ekern, the fifth-grade teacher serving as project sponsor.

“The kids have identified problems they see and have come up with some ideas to solve them,” Ekern said. “They are doing research, writing a script, taking digital photos, creating a PowerPoint presentation, making the commercial and using GarageBand to add a soundtrack.”

“I wanted to get involved because I started to notice a lot of oil tanks and wells near homes and farms, and in fields with cows and horses and crops,” said Alyssa. “I counted one day and saw 57 oil tanks along Colorado Route 52 and East County Line Road. That’s a lot.”

Edie and Chelsea said they noticed junk and litter along the roads, and that influenced them to participate in the project.

“There was an old couch just sitting on the side of the road, near a field with some horses,” said Edie. “It wasn’t being recycled or reused, or even thrown away correctly.”

“People just throw stuff out of their cars along the highway,” Chelsea said. “That’s just disgusting.”

The group hopes that their project can remind people to keep Colorado clean.

“When people see our commercial, they may treat Colorado better,” Shiloh said. “They need to remember how special Colorado is and how lucky they are to live here.”

Email: kcglasscock@comcast.net