By Maryan Cammarata

These are the voices of Oceano Elementary. They wanted to share their experience with solar energy with you. There are more solar schools and more solar voices out there. The future looks to burn bright.

Joseph Garay

My name is Joseph Garay, and I’m in the 6th grade at Oceano Elementary School. I live in the town of Oceano. I live with my grandpa, grandma, and uncle in a two story house.

My class has spent a lot of time learning about energy. We have learned how solar panels work and what they do and what they are made of. We have learned about energy for two months. We learned about 3 types of energy called thermal, radiant, and electrical. Our class learned about different sources of energy: solar, wind, and fossil fuels. We learned new ways to save energy. We wrote an eight page energy guide and printed 1,000 copies for our community. We monitored the output of our new 1-kilowatt solar array. Our class wrote letters to the editor of our local newspaper about solar energy. A presentation by REC solar company was done explaining how solar electric systems work. I liked learning about energy because it’s interesting and tells you how to save money in the future. I liked it when we make s’mores from our solar cookers made out of pizza boxes and aluminum foil. This is what we have done for two months. I have become an energy expert.

Rafael Lopez

Solar energy rocks! My name is Rafael. I am in the 6th grade at Oceano Elementary School. The town is named Oceano. I live in a house with 3 rooms. I live with my dad, mom, 2 sisters, and my big brother. That is six people all together.

We have done lots of energy activities here in Oceano. We had lots of neat projects and more cool and fun things. We learned that there are lots of different types of energy. There is light, thermal, and radiant energy. We made energy guides. We had 1,000 copies made to educate our community. We also got neat solar panels donated form PG&E. We wrote a letter to the editor, and it was printed in the local newspaper. We had a guest from REC solar company. He showed us a lot of cool and surprising facts about solar panels.
It has been fun learning about solar energy and about solar panels. We got to make s’mores, solar houses and more. One thing I learned is that they test the solar panels by shooting high speed marbles at it. Our country will become a solar leader in the future.

Arlene Mendoza

My name is Arlene. I am in 6th grade. I go to Oceano Elementary School. I live in Oceano. I live with my mom, dad, brother and my sister. There are five people in my family.

This year we have learned about energy. We took notes about energy. The types of energy that we leaned about are thermal, radiant, and electrical energy. The different sources that we learned about energy are solar, wind, and fossil fuels. We learned about using less energy. We learned to turn off the lights when you are not using them. We wrote an 8 page energy guidebook. They printed 1,000 copies for the community. We have a one kilowatt solar system at our school. We wrote letters to the editor of our local newspaper about the solar system. We had a presentation by REC solar company explaining how the solar electric system works.

I learned that solar panels have to face south so they can receive sunlight all day. It was fun learning about energy. Maybe I can use this knowledge to work for an energy company someday.

Ilver Dominguez

I am Ilver Dominguez. I am in the sixth grade. I go to Oceano Elementary School. I live with my mom, my two little brothers, and my dad. There are 5 people in my family.

We’ve learned about energy. We’ve been studying about energy for 2 moths. We’ve learned about 3 different types of energy: thermal, radiant, and electrical. We made an 8-page guide. There will be 1,000 copies in the 5 cities area. We’ve learned ways to save energy like using solar panels, which will save our school about $500 a year on our electrical bill. A power strip will kill ghost power. You can get free light and heat from the sun by putting windows facing east, west, and south. We had a party with PG&E. We had questions to answer during to party.

Learning about energy has been great. I liked learning about the solar panels. Solar panels are made from silicon. The solar panels will work for 25 years. Our solar panels have offset 580 pounds of carbon dioxide this year, and the solar panels are saving us money for the school. PG&E donated our new solar panels. I had a fun time learning about energy.

Leslie Cerda

My name is Leslie. I’m in 6th grade. I go to Oceano School. I live in Oceano. I live with my mom, my dad, my brother, and my little sister.

We learned about the different sources of energy, like wind and solar. We learned about ways to use less energy. We wrote letters to the editor of our local newspaper about solar energy.

I like learning about energy because I learned so much about electricity and how to save energy. Thank you for teaching us about energy. I learned a lot.

Jessica Lopez

My name is Jessica. I’m in 6th grade. I go to school at Oceano Elementary school. I live in the city of Oceano, CA. I live with my mom, my dad, my cousin, my 2 brothers, and my sister. There are 7 people in our family.

We learned a lot this year. We had two months of energy. We learned about thermal energy, radiant energy, motion energy, and electrical energy. We learned about different sources of energy like solar wind, and fossil fuels. We learned how to use less energy. For example, we learned how solar panels could save money. We wrote an 8-page energy guide about solar panels to show how they work. We had a celebration at school when we got our new solar panels. We wrote a letter of thanks to an editor of the local newspaper for helping our school.

There are many things I enjoyed in the Unit. I liked to see the little house with the fan we made with my solar panels because I like the little fan moving. I liked helping the community. I learned a lot of things about energy.

Julieta Espinoza

My name is Julieta Espinoza. I am in 6th grade and I am 12 years old. The school I go to is Oceano Elementary school. I live with my family in Oceano. I live with my mom, dad, brother, and my 3 sisters in Oceana. We all live in a medium sized house.

I have learned a lot this year. We have taken notes on energy for 2 months. The types of energy we have learned about are thermal, radiant, and electrical energy. The different sources of energy we have learned about were solar energy, wind energy, and fossil fuels. We have written an 8-page energy guide. We printed 1,000 copies for the whole community. We had a solar celebration too. We have monitored the output of our new 1 kilowatt solar array. We also wrote letters to the editor of our local newspaper about solar energy. We had a presentation by REC Solar Company explaining how the solar electric systems work. These are just some of the things we have done this year with energy.

The thing I really liked this year was the solar celebration. We did that with PG&E. We answered some questions, did some activities using computers and solar balloons, and we got to eat cake. The cake was awesome. But I liked solar-cooked s’mores too. We had a fun time with the solar celebration. I really like all the things we are learning about energy, and doing activities with PG&E, and REC this year.

Liseth Moreno

My name is Liseth Moreno. I go to school at Oceano Elementary school. I’m in the 6th grade. I live in the city of Oceano, California. I live with my mom, my dad, and my brothers.

We learned a lot this year. We had a two month unit about energy. We learned about thermal energy, radiant energy, and electrical energy. We also learned about solar, wind, and fossil fuels. We learned ways to use less energy. My class wrote an eight page energy guide. There were 1,000 copies printed for the community. They’re in English and Spanish. We had a solar celebration, and we had solar cookers, solar balloons, and some people from PG&E came to our class to talk about solar energy, and there was cake. We wrote letters to the editor about solar energy and sent to our local newspaper. We had a presentation by one of the workers of REC solar company. He explained how solar electric systems work.

I liked learning about energy because we do fun projects that include solar energy. My favorite project was the solar cookers. We made s’mores with them. Solar energy saves people. I will never forget that. All of this has helped the community. Maybe someday I will live in a solar home.

Kyla Salisbury

My name is Kyla Salisbury. I’m in the sixth grade and I go to Oceano Elementary school. I live with my mom. She is 31. My brother and my sister is 17, and I’m the youngest. I’m 11 years old. I live on the Mesa in a community neighborhood. It’s almost like a city inside a city.

When my class wrote an energy guide, I was very happy that 1,000 copies were going out all over the place. The guide tells you how to save mony and gives you helpful tips about the cost of solar panels. It tells you how the sun makes electricity. When Seth (the solar specialist) came to our class, he told us what he does for a living and what he used to do for a living. I think his job is important for the environment. Thank you for teaching us about energy.

Angelica Gagliano

My name is Angelica Gagliano. I am in the sixth grade and attend Oceano Elementary school in Oceano, California. This year, under the guidance of Mr. DeCecco, or class has been studying about energy. I live with my mom. Her name is Karen. She is 48 years old and with my brother. His name is Taj, and he is 5 years old.

Our studies this year have included learning about the different types of energy which have helped our class understand about ways to save energy and money at the same time. We are learning about some of the most important types of energy like: thermal, radiant, and electrical. We are also learning about the different sources of energy such as: solar, wind, and fossil fuels. We have discovered ways to use less energy. One example would be before leaving on vacation with your family instead of leaving the refrigerator empty, place jugs of water into the refrigerator. It will save money and energy.

Our class calls our teacher Mr. “D.” Mr. D’s sixth grade class wrote the first ever Oceano Energy guide. One thousand copies went into circulation throughout our community. Recently our school hosted a solar celebration. We did a lot of cool things which included eating s’mores that were made using solar energy to melt the chocolate. Employees from the PG&E company came to our solar celebration and added to our solar education by talking about saving energy and money by using the sun. Our school, Oceano Elementray, has a one kilowatt solar system that was installed in November. We have offset 586 pounds of carbon dioxide into our atmosphere. Our class wrote letters to the editor of the local news paper about solar energy. We also listened to a presentation by REC Solar Company explaining how solar electric systems work.

I enjoyed writing the Energy Guide. The Energy Guide includes useful tips on how to save our district energy and money. I have learned a lot and found it very exciting to write about what I have learned. I enjoyed educating my family and being part of the “Solar Generation.” Solar panels are very cool. And I am amazed by what I have been able to learn.

Jessica Landeros

My name is Jessica. I’m in 6th grade, and I go to Oceano Elementary School. I live in Oceano with my family of 6. I live with my parents, and two siblings, and my grandmother. I enjoy living with my family in Oceano.

Our class has learned many ways to save energy. We took notes on how to save energy for two months. We have learned about the different types of energy such as thermal and radiant energy. Our class learned about different sources of energy, like solar, wind, fossil fuels and more. Our teacher told us that we can save a lot of money by using energy wisely. Our 6th grade class have written an Energy Guide to get published. We are very proud of these projects.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 9th, 2009 at 12:24 pm and is filed under District of Columbia . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.