Sheep Eyeballs Dissected

by Alex Grimaudo and Miles Nielson

December 22, 2009

On Wednesday Dec. 16, students in Audrey Moore’s third block anatomy class dissected frozen sheep eyes.  The classroom was full with “ew’s” and “ah’s” as the morsels were presented to the curious onlookers .As the dissecting process began, some students dove straight into the activity with full focus, while others joked with each other, commenting on how “disgusting” the process was.

First, the students precisely tear away fatty flesh in order to better examine the complex eyeball, ever so careful to not slip and slice open the delicate structure.  After, the students cut around the bare eyeball in a perfect loop in order to open the structure in half.

“I’m not really excited about it. I’m not really concerned about what goes on in your eye. I keep that stuff in my head,” Senior Madeline Vaiden said.

Multiple students held the same opinion. However, others were fascinated with the organ’s anatomy.

“I just think it’s interesting, and I want to be a doctor when I’m older, so it kinda’ has to do with that,” senior Lauren Gough said.

Before the lab dissection, the class learned about the different parts of the eye, including the sclera, cornea, iris, lens, and optic nerve, and what purpose each served. They didn’t have the opportunity to see the appendage up close and in person until Wednesday. But even with this great opportunity presented to the students to learn something new, some couldn’t get over the fact that what they were digging into was an actual sheep eye.

“I’m amazed how their eye could be so similar to ours,” said Senior Elizabeth Brosnan.

APUSH Classes Hold Immigration Day

by Rachel Beals, Emily Spong and Sydney Maltinsky-Wilson

December 22, 2009

When AP United States History teacher Molly Sandling was student teaching, she came across a project that piqued her interest – one that involved students portraying immigrant groups from various regions around the world. Now that she is again teaching APUSH, Ms. Sandling has adopted the project for her two classes.

For this project, which culminated on Thursday, Dec. 17, students wrote essays and created profiles of a late 19th century immigrants living in America. Each student created a character who represented  someone  from a particular cultural background– their names, ages, marital statuses and occupations.  Then, students “became” their characters for the day. 

 Ms. Sandling assessed students  on the quality of participation and their ability to capture the time period. For extra credit, students could also bring in food or dress up in clothes typical of their immigrants’ culture.
Junior Sam Thompson said he planned to take advantage of this extra credit opportunity.

“[This project] takes me out of the regular routine,” Thompson said. 
The project allowed students to break from their normal class activities of writing notes, extensive reading and analyzing historical documents. 

Ms. Sandling believes that history is more than just information in a textbook and this project is an important academic opportunity for her students to better understand life for immigrants in America.

“[It’s] a chance to bring the human side to the stories,” Ms. Sandling said.
Junior Geoffrey Grau, who portrayed a Slavic immigrant, also went all out for the event. Grau  researched his character in the library, finding several pictures of Slavic dress in preparation for the event.  He wore an authentic coat, top hat, and a weskit – a type of vest. He also brought bread made from a Slavic recipe that government teacher Richard Ambler, who is of Slavic descent, suggested.  

The Slavic people, along with Italians, Czechs, Chinese, Irish, and Greeks, are a few examples of the variety of groups who came to America in the early 1900’s and that APUSH students portrayed.

“It’s fun to do,” Grau said. “I don’t want to be one of those people who sits back and watches other people have fun.”

Ms. Sandling knows her students take their assignments to heart. But she also expects them to bring a little bit of fun into the classroom as well.  

“I trust [my students] to rise to the occasion,” Ms. Sandling said. “I’m used to a lot of chaos in my classroom anyway.”