Let S Start Off with Headlines, and First Up, Severe Storms and Tornadoes Rolled Through

Scott: What is up? Thanks for those teacher appreciation shoutouts. It is Thursday, May 7. I am Scott Evans and Channel One News starts right now.

Let’s start off with headlines, and first up, severe storms and tornadoes rolled through parts of the South and Midwest this week, causing widespread flooding and destruction.

Dueling tornadoes raced across farms and a highway in northern Texas, sucking up just about everything in their paths. Further south, streets turned into streams in Austin. Highway officials had to shut down several roads.
Relentless downpours also caused severe flooding in Oklahoma. Many drivers had to push their cars off the road.
The rain hammered hillsides in Colorado causing major concerns for homeowners. A sandbag brigade jumped into action to protect homes from flooding.
Cole Mcfarlen: This is like helping out. And helping out is like better than thinking about yourself.

Scott: Next up, investigators are now revealing that the German co-pilot, who intentionally crashed a plane into a French mountainside six weeks ago, rehearsed his plan on an earlier flight the same day.

In the first official report since the March disaster, crash investigators said the co-pilot Andreas Lubitz practiced his suicide mission on the same plane just two hours earlier.
He put the plane into descent mode, five times in four and a half minutes, and then brought it up again.
Just like during the fatal flight, the captain appeared to have left the cockpit. Cockpit data shows the plane did not drop sharply, suggesting people on the flight from Dusseldorf to Barcelona might not have noticed any change.

Just two hours later, with the same crew and new passengers headed back to Dusseldorf, investigators say Lubitz carried out the same maneuver. But this time, he deliberately crashed the plane, killing himself and 149 others.
Now it is time to see what you said. And you guys responded big time to our story about police wearing cameras in the wake of Baltimore and Ferguson.

Now, we asked you, should cops be required to wear body cameras? Seventy-two percent of you said yes, and 28 percent said no.
Chloe said, “I think cops should wear body cameras because like the Michael Brown shooting, it took them like two months to find out what happened. And if they had a body camera, they could have found out faster.”
Sata said, “I believe that cops should be able to wear body cameras so they don’t get accused of something they didn’t do, and so the facts can be straight.”
But Meredith said, “I don’t think they should because it is a waste of money. Because don’t they already have a dash cam in the car recording everything that’s going on around them?”

Thanks for sharing your thoughts. We love hearing from you.
Alright, now coming up, it is a classroom that gets flipped upside down.

One high school is turning the typical teaching method on its head, where students are getting lessons at home and doing homework in the class. Tom Hanson takes a closer look.

Tom: When students walk into this biology class, they know it won't be an average lesson.
Girl: I probably have not even opened my textbook.

Tom: No more flipping through pages. They are flipping classrooms upside down at Lamar High in Houston, Texas.
Kimmie Myer: Not just sitting at a desk listening to the teacher talk.

Tom: Here's how it works. Teachers record their lessons on video and then upload them online so students can access them from any device, at any time.

Now, advocates for flipped classrooms say that it leads to better learning experience for the students. But critics say that there's no evidence of that. Still, the trend is catching on across the country.

Noah Scantelbury: Homework's changed completely.
Tom: What used to be homework, now done in class, while the lessons educators used to teach in the classroom, now posted online and watched at home.
And here at Lamar, now every student has a laptop, equal access to the online lessons.
Myer: That's the easy part. They can stop, they can go at their own pace. And when they come to class they are actually applying it.
Tom: The hard work happens in class. Students solve problems or answer questions together. And that's how flipped classrooms are designed.

In the past, if students got stuck or couldn't move past a problem, there'd be no one to help at home.
Female: You actually have more individualized instruction.
Tom: It eliminates the frustrations students often felt when tackling homework after school.

Boy: I learn a lot better here because I can ask questions when I need to.
Tom: And parents are also adapting to the new way their kids are learning. Noah Scantlebury says his mom doesn't always believe his homework is really watching a video taped by his teacher.
Noah: She's confused at the fact we don't get as much homework on paper.
Tom: It is a 21st century education, changing the way teachers teach and more importantly, the way students learn.

Tom Hanson, Channel One News.

Scott: And to check out some other cool and unusual teaching methods, like hip-hop class lessons, just head to Channelone.com.
Alright, now coming up after the break, a surprising call to action to save one of the great apes.

Now, we are wrapping up our look at the struggle to save the orangutan. And today, Maggie Rulli shows us how the island nation of Indonesia is using faith in its fight.

Maggie: Made up of nearly 18,000diverse islands, Indonesia is a country filled with different cultures, traditions and more than 700 languages; a diversity that’s also seen in nature, the only place on earth where rhinos, tigers, orangutans and elephants live together.
Rizky Aulianda: These animals are important because they are so rare.
Maggie: And becoming even more rare as Indonesia has one of the highest rates of deforestation.
Rizky: It's important to preserve the knowledge for future generations so they know about these animals and flowers.
Maggie: So now in a radical new plan, this diverse group of islands is joining together to protect their natural resources by tapping in to one of the country's other great resources, its religion. As nearly 90 percent of the country practices the religion of Islam.
Ma Le: It’s guidance. It’s a way of life, and it’s comfortable to have God.

Rizky: It fulfills my spiritual need. You just need to pray sometimes.

Maggie: More Muslims live in Indonesia than in any other country in the world, so religious leaders here are calling on their people to use their faith to defend the environment.
In a groundbreaking announcement, the top Islamic leaders in Indonesia issued a fatwa to protect the environment, the first of its kind in the world.
Rizky: a fatwa is a statement stating that this thing is forbidden, this thing is allowed.
Maggie: It decides how ancient Islamic law should be interpreted for today’s people and today’s environment.
Pak Din Syamsuddin: We work complimentary with the government. So, we provide the government with the advice in the Islamic matters.
Maggie: Pak Din Syamsuddin is the chairman of the country’s highest Muslim clerical body, and a driving force behind the fatwa.
Syamsuddin: The protection of endangered species, to protect the balance of the ecosystem.
Maggie: The fatwa states, “Any activity that results in wildlife extinction without justifiable religious grounds, that includes the killing of wildlife or taking them as pets, as well as the destruction of their habitat, is strictly forbidden.”

Syamsuddin: We encourage everybody, the central government, the local government, the businessman, the Islamic law. It is our obligation to protect the animal and protect the forest.

Maggie: Because ultimately, this fatwa is for the people of Indonesia.
Syamsuddin: The fatwa means, if it protects any animal, eventually it will protect the ecosystem. And if you protect the ecosystem, you protect the people.

Maggie: But it is a protection that must rely on faith, not law.

Female: Fatwa has no legal binding authority whatsoever. Fatwa is something like, if you want to be a good Muslim, then you follow it.

Maggie: While not legally binding, Pak din says a fatwa has influence that’s perhaps even more powerful, divine binding.
Syamsuddin: In a developing country, the corruption is so high. And people can escape from this by you know, bribery. But they cannot escape this God law here.

Maggie: If you know about a fatwa, will you follow it?

Aufar: If I want to go to heaven, which everybody wants. So, it will be a safe bet for me to follow the fatwa.

Maggie: Using faith to fight against extinction, and local people to save the people of the forest.
Maggie Rulli, Channel One News.
Scott: Thanks Maggie.

And that's going to do it from us. But before we get out of here, here’s some more teacher appreciation shoutouts from you guys.

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