GPS class and "water day"

We're down to the last few days of school.  Books had to be turned in over a week ago.  Kids have all turned in textbooks.  The classrooms need to be totally packed up so classrooms can be reassigned next year.  

Finding a clue hidden in a tree

Finding a clue hidden under a swing

Units had to be completed over a week ago so that "outcome cards," an ancient system we use here to keep report students' grades, can be turned in and centrally entered into the system.  So what to teach?  At Life Academy and Oakland International, our schools in Oakland we used to teach at, we did postsession for the final three weeks.  What a grand idea -- and kids get credits for the classes that they take all day with us!  I don't think this system is ready for that, but we did have a mini-version of it this week.

For two days I taught a geography class using GPS technology.  Students had to find geocaches that my co-teacher Dave and I had set up around campus and the neighboring community.  So, for example, students had to answer the question like "Amorgós, an island in the Aegean Sea, is part of which group of islands?" or "Which country does not border the Red Sea: Jordan, Sudan, Djibouti, Ethiopia, or Eritrea?" and then go to the teacher listed on the clue to see if they had the right answer.  If they did, they got a clue, Amazing Race style.  The clue then might send them to 43.20935°N, 76.81440°E or 43.20966°N, 76.81827°E where, if they look "up, down, in, under, through, beneath, an any other preposition you can think of" they would receive another geography question to answer.  It was lots of fun for all and Dave was kind enough to bring cold drinks and ice cream for students to enjoy when they finished running around under the sun.  It was good for all.
On Thursday, we had field day, which should probably be called "water day".  I volunteered to do the water bottle fight station and was absolutely soaked for hours by the multiple groups of students who passed through this area.  Many of them were my students who, I think, were feeling like they were getting revenge for a year's worth of essay-intensive curricula.  Others I didn't know at all, yet they still attacked with ferocity.  I have to so I had a bit of my own revenge.