Jim Gilbert Home Page Challenge Questions Today's News Spring's Journey North Report Your Sightings Teacher's Manual Search Journey North return to: A/CPB

Tracking Changes in Photoperiod Around the Globe Introducing Mystery Class # 4 Quispamsis, New Brunswick, Canada 45.433 N, 65.950 W Lakefield Elementary School 4th grade Click on image to enlarge Hello everyone! We are a class of 32 grade 4th grade students at Lakefield Elementary School, in Quispamsis, New Brunswick, Canada, near the city of Saint John, on the Bay of Fundy. Quispamsis is an Indian word for "little lake in the woods". Our province is the only officially bilingual one in Canada, which means many of our people speak English and French. English is our first language and we are taking 30 minutes of French every day here at school. New Brunswick is one of ten provinces in Canada. Our province's Quispamsis Click on image to enlarge capital city is Fredericton. Some of our "Claims to Fame" include: We are the second largest exporter of peat moss. The inventor of the ice cream cone came from here. Old Sow Click on image to enlarge The largest tidal whirlpool in the Western Hemisphere lies off the shores of our southwestern mainland. It's called Old Sow. Nackawic has the biggest axe in the world (15 metres high). In 1910 Arthur Ganong got tired of cleaning up the mess of melted chocolate in his pockets so he invented the world's first chocolate bar. The foghorn was invented here as well. We have the highest tides in the world. Our tides rise and fall by as much as 15 metres twice a day. A boat bobbing by a wharf at one point in the day, six hours later could be lying on the ocean floor. We are typical 9 and 10 years old from anyplace around the world. We spend our spare time in sports--hockey, basketball, soccer, biking, baseball, skating and swimming mostly. We go to church groups, Girl Guides of Canada and Boy Scouts (Cubs). We listen to Our Lady of Peace, Spice Girls, Nirvana, Hanson and Back Street Boys. We play Nintendo and Play Station Games. Our school has 560 students from kindergarten to grade 5. Our teacher is Mrs. Seamans. We have 5 computers in our classroom now, but we usually only have two. We are growing canola seeds under grow lights. Some seeds, the experimental ones, flew into space with Canadian astronaut Robert Thirsk aboard the space shuttle Columbia in June, 1996. The others, the control group, did not. We are seeing if there is any difference in the way in which the two groups grow. We have four distinct seasons here. We are into spring now. We have many rainy days with temperatures ranging from 5 to 15 degrees Celsius. Late May and early June we start getting nicer days--time to think of planting the gardens. Summer temperatures average around 22 degrees with temperatures being cooler in the evenings. Towards fall the temperatures drop and we can expect frost in October. Snow doesn't usually come to stay until late November or December. In January, the temperatures may average around -5 degrees. It is colder further inland than along the coast where we live. This is the first time we have participated in Journey North. We are enjoying the Monarch Butterfly Migration as well as the Mystery Class project! We invite anyone to email us at: seamanal@nbed.nb.ca Back To Today's Report Copyright 1998 Journey North. All Rights Reserved.