CCSD news: Home-building class back on schedule

Churchill County High School

This year CCHS has reinstated the Construction Home Building class for 11th and 12th grade students, which is being taught by Dave Dakin.

Students will build a home from the ground up to completion. This class was once taught by Louie Mori and phased out when he retired. Principal Tim Spencer has been working tirelessly with Dakin to bring this program back.

“This is such a special project for our students and something they can work toward and look forward to when they come in as freshmen,” Spencer said.

This year students are building a 1,500 square-foot house on Discovery Drive by Numa Elementary School.

“The class will be doing most of the labor, from the concrete, through the framing. They will learn from the various professional subcontractors that will have a part in this build,” Dakin said.

Students started the building last week with the layout of the house. This week they will be starting the foundation. Spencer said he’s thrilled CCHS is able to offer this class again and he looks forward to seeing the completion of the home.

“It is going to be something these students will always be proud of and will hopefully open up a new pathway for all of them for a future career,” Spencer said.

Churchill County Middle School

Students in Randi Orong’s sixth grade STEAM class were introduced to the Engineer Design Process by completing the Storm Drain Challenge. They were challenged with building a device that would retrieve items that fell into a makeshift storm drain. Students brainstormed, collaborated, and problem-solved to retrieve the items.

“I want to extend a heartfelt thank you to Louie's Home Center for the use of the paint buckets to make this project possible for my students,” Orong said.

Numa

Students in Vanessa Burch-Urquhart’s, Dominique Johnson’s and Shannon Matheson’s classes investigated various methods of physical weathering last week. They discovered the effects of freeze-thaw by freezing full glass bottles and abrasion by shaking granite and conglomerate in plastic jars.

“It was really neat to sit back and really observe their reactions. The powder exiting the containers amazed them,” Burch-Urquhart said.

E.C. Best

Third-grade students in Stacy Stults’ class read “How to Eat Fried Worms” and then ate worms.

“We used this book to cover story elements, character traits, point of view, and context clues,” Stults said.

The characters are perfect for studying character traits and there are fun vocabulary words to define using context clues such as indignant, jostled and antidote.

“Students do not believe me when I say they can eat worms, technically baked mealworms, when we are done reading it,” Stults said.

Students chose between barbecue, Mexican spice and cheddar cheese, or they could try them all. Student Kennedy Pargett did not care for the worms.

“They did not have a good flavor at all and they had feet,” she said.

However, the reviews were not all bad. Student Kayden Porter said they were good.

“They were almost sweet. The Mexican spice was definitely the best,” Porter said.

Student Ava Bailey agreed.

“They taste like chips,” Bailey said. “The BBQ ones were nice and crunchy.”

Stults said she loves making these memories with her students.

“Having them eat worms is an unforgettable experience and always a fun story to tell,” Stults said. “I know it is one of those things we do that sticks with them.”

Lahontan

First-grade students in Stacey Manning’s class learned about sound.

“Students got to actually hear and see that sound is caused by vibration,” Manning said.

They participated in a few activities and explored sound in various ways to help them gain a full understanding of how it works.

“My favorite thing was getting to watch the rice pieces jump all over the place when the little plate would vibrate. They would go crazy,” student Kennedy Downs said.