Projects at Whitman Post Elementary, Rockton Grade School provided educational fun

By Marianne Mueller

REPORTER

Students at Whitman Post Elementary (WPES) and Rockton Grade School (RGS) captured great interest during the 2023 Project Fair, held on April 5.

This year’s event was coordinated at RGS by Para Professional, Mrs. Sally Burie. Around 85 projects filled the cafeteria at Rockton Grade School.

At WPES 80 participants created 65 projects, each holding the interest of family or friends who stopped by to view them.

Third grader Kylee Lingle chose to do her project on “Classifications of the Ocean.”

“I really like the ocean and think that it is so interesting,” Kylee said. “I knew that animals are in the ocean and decided to show where they swim.”

Another fun and cool project was the creation of “Scrub Botts.” These are made out of materials used as dish scrubbies, with one end built with a massaging mechanism.

Many stopped to check out “Brutis the Vortex Cannon.” This imaginative contraption was made out of a garbage can, that was painted and named “Brutis.” Adding to the can were lights on the lower part on the sides.

Dressing the part of Mario from the Mario Brothers series of games was Ethan Backus. His display featured various video games and components.

Rock and Roll fans were in for a treat at Ryker Hunt’s project area. A fact board was accompanied by a “Kiss” guitar.

Bay Ganbaafai, and Lucy Bwyer explained how they produced pieces of abstract art. On the canvas strings were laid down first then they were placed in the paint. These were left and a hot glue gun was applied.

Whitman Post student Max Salazar explained what he learned “How Planes Fly.”

Max said, “When you look up in the sky airplanes fly by traveling on wind flow and have specially designed wings that create a force lift which keeps the plane up in the air. Four forces of this lift are lift, weight, thrust, and drag; when these forces work together it equals speed.

“Lift pushes the plane up and the way the air moves around the wings gives the airplane lift.”

Salazar talked about the importance of a captain and the crew, “You always need a captain,” he said.

Detailed boards gave further explanation of how planes fly.

Imaginations soared on each project that was completed. As a bonus students received an excellent education on each subject matter that was studied.

“We had some really great projects, and they covered a variety of subjects,” Mrs. Burie said. “The kids did an amazing job, considering that none of them have ever seen a project fair before this one. The last one we had was in 2019.”