Did you know that Legoland wouldn’t exist if it wasn’t for the poinsettiaplant? A poinsettia plant is a small Mexican shrub with large scarlet bracts. Poinsettia plants are native to Mexico and Central America where they grow in moist, wet, wooded ravines and on rocky hillsides. In 2002, Congress passed an act that made Dec. 12 National Poinsettia Day. That date was chosen because it was the day Joel Roberts Poinsett died.
I recently had the opportunity to interview Oro Valley K-9 police Officers Roger Reynolds and Mike Gaare with their dogs, Risu (pronounced E-su) and Vader. I wanted to interview them because I like dogs and the opportunity sounded awesome. Risu means ‘Squirrel’ in Japanese. Officer Reynolds named Risu that because his attention span is low, kind of like a squirrel.
I was interested to know why the Officers wanted to be policemen. Officer Reynolds responded that he was drawn towards a career in law enforcement because he wanted to serve and help people.
In 2020, it is easy to overlook other scientific discoveries with COVID-19 totally dominating everyone’s minds. However, on Oct. 6, the Nobel Prize for Chemistry was won by two female scientists for their amazing work involving CRISPR-Cas9. Emmanuelle Charpentier, a French professor and researcher in the fields of microbiology, genetics, and biochemistry, and Jennifer Doudna, an American biochemist, won. This marked a great advancement in gene editing technology, and also was the first time two women were laureates for the chemistry Nobel Prize.
The newspaper has come a long way. In fact, the newspaper has changed a lot during the years. Before, the newspaper was very different from how it is today. For example, the newspaper would only be available in paper, but now you can find it online.
Bear Essential News , however, has continued to give out their articles in paper, but if you go to Bear’s website you can see the stories there as well. Bear isn’t the only newspaper that continues to print, many other big publishers also publish in paper and online.
My family and I recently went camping at the Bog Springs Campground in Madera Canyon and we had a great time. Madera Canyon is just south of Tucson and it does not take long to get there.
Campers can camp at Bog Springs for up to two weeks at a time. We located a site at the campground and set up our tent. While we were there we saw many deer and some turkeys.
I interviewed Christopher Rodarte, author of the book “La Llorona: Ghost Stories of the Southwest.” He explains that he has always been very interested in the legend of La Llorona, a popular tale in Mexican and Southwest cultures. Rodarte’s book retells people’s tales of the weeping woman of the Southwest.
At the last Bear Essential News Young Reporter Zoom meeting, we met Gary Shepard. Shepard attended the Zoom meeting to tell us about his job as art director for Bear Essential News and to answer our questions.
His adventures with Bear began 24 years ago. In 1996, Bear’s editor Stephen Gin asked Shepard if he knew anyone who would be interested in creating kids’ art for Bear Essential News . Shepard said he was interested.
Being a Bear Essential News Young Reporter is teaching me to be creative, have a strategy, and to use my time wisely. I learned that you can use these same tools in chess when I joined A Tale of Two Kings, a chess academy in Tucson.
It offers individual and group lessons, chess camps, tournaments and now with coronavirus, it also has online options. Chess is almost 1,500 years old but it is still a very popular game around the world.