Charles Darwin was an amazing man. He came up with the theory of evolution. Evolution is the way that an entire population changes. Charles Darwin made an incredible journey almost completely around the word to learn more about his they of  theory evolution. He went all over the world but mostly in South America.
       While he was on this trip he came up of another idea. This idea is called Natural Selection. One way to describe this is survival of the fittest. he thought that if one animal is born with some unwanted trait it will die off before it can reproduce. This is a good thing because if the orgamism with the unwanted trait it will be passed on to the offspring and  soon that trait can be passed on to the whole population. 

    The Grand Canyon  is very old. If you look at the Grand Canyon you will see that it is made up of many different layers. The very first layer at the very bottom is the oldest. This make sense because one layer has to be there for the next one to form on top of the other. Sometimes scientists find fossils in the different layers. Since we have the layers we are able to know how old the fossil is
Since we have fossils, we are able to find out how different animals change and develop. This is called evolution. Lets take birds for example. Lets say this bird eats insects from the ground and out of trees. Lets also say that one bird  born with a longer beak and It survives better than the rest because of that longer beak. THis bird with produce offspring with a longer beak. Over about 1000 years the entire species will have that beak. This is called natural selection.    

      When you have too many of one species or even too many different kinds it is called over population. This can be good and bad. Mostly bad though. Lets take moths for example, You have way too many living one  area. This can be harmful to the moths. Having so many in can make it harder for them to get food and find a place to live. Witch can lead to the population to die off. 
        After many years of overpopulation, the spices will begin t change so that they have a better chance of surviving. This is called evolution. One example Is the Tortoise  If the Tortoise lives on a wet area the neck will be rounder so that it can eat grass. But a Tortoise hat lives on a drier island its neck will have a slight turn-up so that it can reach up to higher plants and fruits. when an area is over populated the animal will slowly change to make it easier for them to live in the situation that they live in 

In science we are learning about genetics. Genetics are your traits. like what you look like. We are learning that you can be either homozygous or heterozygous . If you are homozygous is when you have two of one trait. If you are heterozygous tall, you have one tall chromosome and one short one. Lets say that Bob is       Heterozygous tall and Patty is herezygous tall. Will thier child be tall or short.
 This is were the Punnent squares come in. This is a type of square that is broken up into four parts. They mom's traits go on top and the dad's traits go on the sides. This will show the child's chances of being tall or short. You fill in the square The capital letter shows the tall genes and the lower case letter show the short gene. If you have two capital letters or just one you will be tall if you have two lower case letters you will be short. This child has a 75% chance of being tall and a 25% chance of being short. 

     A while back (before winter break) we made some cute little ornaments out of beads that look like DNA. It was a time consuming project. The first thing that we had to do was get the beads. Mrs. Poole set up stations and we went around counting and collecting our beads that we needed. WE also needed to get some wire to put the beads on
     Once we got all of our beads and wire  we sat down and Mrs. Poole taught us how to do it. She turned on the overhead and She showed us step by step instructions. We had a certian amount of each color beads. We had small yellow and white beads and long red,blue and green beads We used a spiecal techinque to twist the wire and ut beads on until it looked like DNA. Once we got all of the beads of the wire we finished it by tieing it and then adding a loop, so we could hang it on a Christmas tree put it on you backpack , whatever you want. Mrs. Poole even made it into earings. I put mine on my Christmas tree. This project help me to learn what DNA looks like. I really enjoyed it. 

     Now that we are done with the first semester, we will be starting some new things. Looking back at the first semester some thing have been challenging.I think the hardest thing from the first semester was learning about the parts of the cell. I think that this was hard for me because we had to memorize all of the parts of the cell, what it looks like and what it dose. What helped for me was looking over the study guides and studying for a long period of time. 
       In science we have also completed a lot of fun activities. One of my favorites that we did in class was building a model of DNA. We use something like Legos. We worked with a partner and we first made a model and then we took it a part to help us learn the process of the way DNA replicates. Since our class what not paying much attention we couldn't do the DNA  extraction lab. So  I did it at home for extra credit.We smushed up strawberries and we mixed it with  water and soap in a clear jar and then we poured rubbing alcohol on top strawberries and put it in the fridge. We then could see the DNA parts in that had separated from the rest of the strawberries on top in the rubbing alcohol.I had a lot of fun and it brought my grade up! I hope that this next semester will be successful.    

     Is Santa and his reindeer real? there is a slight, maybe possibilitity that there could be flying reindeer. We recently read an article that told us the exact facts about Santa and his reindeer. They calculated out the exact amount of kids that he would have to give presents to. On average most Christan homes around the word have about 3.5 children and assuming that at least one of them is nice he would only get about 1/1000 of a second if he wanted to give gifts to every child. So he would have to have some really fast reindeer. If Santa did eat all of the cookies that we think he eats he would be really fat. they calculated that if he eats  one cholate chip cookie and dinks one eight ounce glass of milk he would be over 200 tons. That is a fat man .
     Even though people have done all of that research and proved that he for sure can't possibly deliver all of those presents and still be alive I think that its about the Christmas magic. Think back to when you were a little kid, on Christmas morning you would get up super early and run to the living room and see all of those nicely wrapped presents,and you couldn't wait to play with all your toys and spending it with loved ones that's what Christmas is all about. Not all of the science and proving that Santa and his reindeer are real or not. So I think that we should stop trying to prove it and go to spend time with you family and enjoy the Christmas spirit 

     Before each cell divideds the DNA must be copied so that each cell has some DNA. When DNA gets copied, the DNA spilts right down the middle. After it splits, it gets paired up with another strand. Since thymine gets paired up adineme and cytosine gets paired up with guanine they have to find the correct strand. 
    To learn how this works we created a model with something like legos. We each had a partner and an instruction booklet. We had to create a compelte modle and then all the parts to make the second one. We put the first on together and then we took it apart. WE split it right down the middle. Then we attached a new strad of DNA to the old one. We then had two complete sets of DNA.   

There are many parts of DNA. DNA is the things inside the neulous  that makes up your genetics.DNA takes the shape if a double helix. Inside of DNA there is equal parts of T to Gand A to C. DNA is very important because it makes up your traits.
    Many people have studied DNA, people  like Rosilnd Franklin. She was on of the first women to make a difference in the science world. DNA looks like a double helix or a twisted ladder. The since in DNA everything is in pairs DNA is easily "zipped" apart,and it is able to make an identical copy of the first so now  you have two pieces of DNA. This happens during  interphase. In class we made a model of DNA to help us learn about DNA 

     The way that we grow is by cells dividing. The way that cells divide is called mitosis. Cells go through many stages during mitosis. The first stage is interphase. Most of the time cells are in interphase. During interphase, the cell grows to its full size and makes copies of your DNA. Prophase is next. Prophase is when chromatin condenses inside the nucleus and the nuclear membrane starts to break down. Metaphase is when chromosomes start to line up in the center of the cell. During anaphase all the chromosomes break apart and move to each end of the cell. Telophase is when the chromosomes stretch out and a nuclear membrane begins to form at each end of the cell. The last phase is when the cell breaks in two and each cell start to form new cell walls, which is called cytokinesis. 
     After the cell comes apart you now have two new daughter cells. The new cells begin to go back to coping DNA a starts to become prepared to go through mitosis and make new cells. Without mitosis, you would not be able to grow and thrive. This is the main way that animals grow. Other single-celled organisms do not go through mitosis. Single-celled organisms are only made of one cell and don't need to make more.