Week Four of the Grade 6 Summer Transition Program at West Rocks Middle School brought rising sixth graders face-to-face with remarkable animals, challenged them to become engineers, and included a lively outing with new friends.
Earthplace returned to West Rocks with an assortment of reptiles and amphibians, including a skink, snake, turtles, tortoises, and frogs. Students observed the animals up close while learning how their physical characteristics and behaviors help them survive. The visit introduced concepts such as adaptation, habitat, and animal defenses through the kind of hands-on experience that makes science memorable.
Based in Westport, Earthplace is a nonprofit nature center and wildlife sanctuary that brings curriculum-based natural history programs to schools throughout Fairfield County. Its visiting animals gave students an unusually vivid opportunity to study the natural world—not through photographs or textbooks, but through direct observation and conversation with knowledgeable educators.
Students then turned from natural adaptations to human engineering for the week’s STEM challenge: designing and building their own roller coasters from cardboard and pool noodles.
Working collaboratively, teams planned tracks featuring height, loops, twists, and turns. They learned how potential energy stored at the top of a hill becomes kinetic energy as an object travels downward—and how gravity, momentum, friction, and structural design determine whether a coaster completes its course.
Each test provided immediate feedback. When a coaster stalled, jumped its track, or lacked enough speed to complete a loop, students had to identify the problem, revise their designs, and try again. The challenge transformed abstract principles of physics into something students could see, build, and improve together.
Week Four also included a trip to Bowlero with students from the Ponus Ridge Middle School Summer Transition Program. Bowling and arcade games offered a chance to relax, socialize, and become better acquainted with peers who are making the same important transition into middle school.
Led by Summer Transition Program Director and West Rocks Grade 6 Social Studies teacher Michael Richards, the program helps rising sixth graders enter the new school year with greater confidence. Through science, engineering, recreation, and shared experiences, students are already discovering that middle school is a place where curiosity, teamwork, experimentation, and new friendships can thrive.
