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Middle School
The last leg of our journey took us from McGrath to Takotna. This week we will ride with Charley Bejna and his team 23 miles to Ophir. When Charley arrived in Takotna with 14 dogs on the line and 1 in the bag, he planned on taking his 24-hour mandatory stop there but for a …
Last weekend the journey to the Iditarod became even more real for Iditarod rookies. The weekend of December 6-7 was the Iditarod Rookie Meeting. All rookies attend this mandatory meeting. A rookie is a musher who is running the race for the first time or who has never completed the race. Several topics are covered …
The 2015 Iditarod champion will win $70,000 and a brand new Dodge pickup truck. The amount of money mushers will spend on training, dogs, food, entry fees, supplies, or anything associated with sled dog racing easily surpasses that amount. It’s apparent that dog mushers don’t get into the sport for money. These athletes are in …
Many of the mushers will choose to take their mandatory 24-hour stop in McGrath while others will check into McGrath and move on to Takotna for their long rest. Still others will go further down the trail before taking their 24-hour break. For those who spend 24 hours in McGrath, they’ll leave for Takotna with fresh …
This week’s Iditarod Trivia Tuesday posed questions about Jeff Schultz, official photographer of the Iditarod. Continuing with the theme of photography, this lesson will focus on interpreting quotes and inferring their meaning while using photography. To begin this Common Core aligned lesson you will have your students brainstorm quotes they remember or often quote from …
1049 miles. This is the approximate distance of the Iditarod and Jeff Schultz gets to see every mile, every year. Jeff Schultz began snapping photos of the Iditarod way back in 1981. He was invited to photograph the race by none other than the “Father of the Iditarod,” Joe Redington, Sr. The first year Jeff …
No matter what age, grade, or skill level, analyzing the theme of a story or book is a difficult task. It requires students to make an inference. This higher order thinking skill can be quite challenging. A fellow teacher of mine noticed her Literacy students were having trouble grasping theme. She turned to something almost all …
It’s time to pack the sled and booty the dogs, and go onward to McGrath. As often quoted by Vern Halter, former Iditarod musher, “If you make it to Nikolai, you will likely make it to Nome.” By no means does this mean it is smooth running from Nikolai, it just means, statistically speaking, the …
Tomorrow will be a scorching 35° outside! How often have you heard a meteorologist utter these words? 35° can sound scorching if you’re from Norway or Sweden, but here in the United States it is actually quite chilly. 35° Celsius is approximately 95° Fahrenheit. The United States still measures temperature in Fahrenheit while many other …
June 29, 2014 was the first day mushers could sign up for the 2015 race. Each year on the last Saturday of June the annual Musher Sign Up/Volunteer Picnic takes place in Wasilla, Alaska. A majority of mushers will join in the festivities and sign up for the race. Signing up at the picnic gives …