WILLIAMSTOWN -- A new event called "Grade Six Energy Day" had Williamstown Elementary School abuzz on Friday.

Members of the Center for Ecological Technology, the Williamstown COOL Committee, and students from Williams College led a day's worth of activities and workshops on energy and energy conservation for 69 sixth-grade students and their teachers.

"It kind of makes me think twice about leaving the lights on," said student Greta Savitsky.

Her classmate Hannah Fein said she learned that 90 percent of energy generated by a standard fluorescent lightbulb translates into heat while only 10 percent is light.

"Now if I turn the lights off, I know that I can make a difference in the amount of energy used in the world," Savitsky said.

Throughout the day, students heard guest speakers and rotated through three different workshops.

Students used a watt meter, which they learned they can actually be borrowed from their local library, to measure the amount of energy being used in classroom appliances from overhead lights, to televisions and computers, to an electric pencil sharpener. In one classroom, a VCR in "off" mode still used nearly 8 watts, about a fourth of the wattage used when turned on.

CET Associate Director Nancy Nylen helped the students make charts that converted energy use into dollars spent to show the savings in energy conservation.

Retired sixth-grade teacher Richard "Dick" Steege returned to the school to lead a workshop

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on insulation, convection and renewable energy.

At the end of the day, students took a walking tour of the school and performed an energy audit and experimented using natural light in classrooms.

"You could probably take out some of the lights here to save some energy," observed student Matt Wiseman.

Sixth-grade teacher Jane Culnane said energy continues to be part of the school and the curriculum. This year, the school got a grant from the Williamstown Elementary School Endowment Fund to support a field trip to the wind turbines at Jiminy Peak ski resort and the energy day.

"We've learned a lot. A lot," said student Gray Kaegi. "It's pretty cool because it's our future and about what our homes are going to look like."