~Going on a Car Ride~ By Mallora “Huff...” I sigh as I turn to glare at England and America in the back seat of the car. “Stop arguing you two!” I yell, tired of their fighting already. Feeling an elbow in my stomach, I turn to glare at another family member. I sigh loudly yet again. Car trips were always a hassle, with all my family members – all of the countries – packed in our enormous car, truck, whatever you would like to call it. So apparently, some big important event was going on in France – the country itself not the person – which we couldn’t take a plane to. Suddenly someone yells my name loudly from the front of the car. “Peruuu! Something-a just went-a ‘boing’ in the car-a and the wheel isn’t-a working any more-a!” Frantic, I yell back to my little brother Italy, hoping the wheel problem was semi-permanent. “Turn off the car! Try to turn to the side of the road! Anything!” I sigh in relief as Germany takes the wheel of the car - I don’t know why he let Italy drive in the first place – and managed to push the car to the grass at the side of the road. The car being turned off, I get out of the car and rush to the front. Trying to move the wheel, it wouldn’t budge, and now we had one more problem to add to our list –the car wouldn’t start back up again. “Gosh darn it!” I yell in frustration, sitting down on the still dew covered grass next to the car. Hastily grabbing my phone out of my pocket, I dial up the nearest auto-repair company/tow truck service. I smile sympathetically at the tow truck driver as he hooks up the car to the truck, that’s going to be hard to tow all the way to the nearest town. I motion to all of the other countries, snap my fingers, and say “Like a good neighbor, whatever insurance is here!” causing a random person to snap their fingers and we get teleported to the nearest McDonalds for convenience. The instant I hear England sigh, I turn to glare, responding, “This is the closest fast food place. Deal with it. They have tea here.” and then turning to the rest of the crowd. “Bathroom and food break, try not to overwhelm the cooks.” I say, making a shooing motion. Hearing my phone buzz, I take it out of my pocket and head to a quiet spot. It was the tow truck service, I see, and sigh with relief. Waving a flag, I motion all of my family into one somewhat large crowd and tell the news. “The car was fixed, someone hit the lock button on the wheel and when we tried to turn it back on we didn’t have the keys in…” I softly glare at my little brother, knowing it wasn’t entirely his fault. Leading the crowd over to the tow truck service, which wasn’t too far from the McDonalds, I speak with the person that towed and fixed the truck. “Danke* very much, one of my little brothers was at the wheel and must’ve hit the lock.” I grab some money from my pocket and push it towards the tow truck driver, and then hop into the car and steer it over to the crowd, waiting for everyone to climb back in again. “Well, that was an exciting little adventure right there.” I say, getting back on the road. I think I saw everyone in the car nod their heads in agreement. ~The End~
April 22th, 2015 Dear Governor Pence, You need to keep on funding the Challenger Space Center in Indianapolis! It is rapidly running out of the necessary funds to keep on providing field trips. The Challenger experience applies crucial STEM and soft skills to real life events, making learning feel real. It’s not just reading how to ‘use time wisely’ or ‘do your best the first time’ in a book and passing it off as an ‘ok I need to remember to do that every so often’, but being in that situation in where if you don’t do your best the first time, or conserve your time, the whole mission could be jeopardized. As a Medical Team member, I found it harder than I thought it would be to perform the tests. This was because everything I had known about being a medic came from books I had read. The Challenger experience helped me grasp the reality of some situations that I had only seen on TV or in a book once or twice. I realized how important 3 of the 4 STEM skills were to being a medic, Science, Technology, and Mathematics. Now, I had read about these STEM skills in books, but I had never been in a situation critical enough to use them. This is one aspect of how the Challenger Center experience made my learning real. Another big concept I learned at the Challenger Space Center was how important soft skills are in reality. It also taught me how different reality is from what they teach us in schools. In school, if you’re doing partner-work and you don’t do your part, all you get is a scolding and a bad grade. At the Challenger Center if you don’t do your part in a team, you could seriously jeopardize the whole mission (to the moon). That’s how it is in reality as well. Say, if you’re a governor or mayor, and you don’t listen to the people, you’re probably not a very good mayor or governor. I also learned how important it actually is to do things right the first time. Once, I didn’t type in the correct information the first time on accident, so I worried my partners in Mission Control that there was an unhealthy person on the shuttle. These are all reasons why you should continue funding the Challenger Space Center in Indianapolis. It is an amazing learning resource to enforce STEM and soft skills that will help us greatly in life, but we can’t really learn in school properly. It’s not just fun and games. The Challenger Center is an important learning gold mine that should be open to more generations of children. Please choose to fund the amazing Challenger Space Center in Indianapolis! Sincerely, Mallora Lehman Klondike Elementary School
