This week the 2nd and 3rd graders started their skyscrapers study! They started by watch a video of a worker climbing a 1768 foot tall tower! The shared what the noticed, wondered, and were reminded of while watching the incredible feat. They then rotated through some thought-provoking station gathering their current understanding for the questions of "Why do we build skyscrapers, What benefits are there to building skyscrapers, what risks are there to building skyscrapers, and what makes a building a skyscraper?"

After lunch, we asked the question, "How much bigger are the world's tallest skyscrapers than Idaho's tallest building?" For this, the students were introduced to the concept of scale in order to create scale drawings of the Zions Bank Building in Downtown Boise compared to some very tall skyscrapers. For our first set of drawings, 1 paper = 100 meters.

To end the day, students learned that you can scale things up or down and saw how small of a scale drawing they could make of the skyscraper comparison using ratios as small as 1:100000!

UPCOMING: There will be no GATE the week of November 29-December 3.