We hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving! Prior to the break, the school came together for a celebration led by the Middle School. The program included the presentation of the elements, class gratitudes, singing “Light a Candle for Peace,” cultural blessings, and sharing bread. It was a wonderful way to send us off for the long holiday weekend.
This week brought the first glimpse of snow for most of us. Middle School students enjoyed being outdoors, especially throwing snowballs. Students are welcome to bring in snow gear whenever we have snow so they can enjoy being outside. We suggest all students have a spare set of gloves left in their lockers for the spur-of-the-moment snowball fight.
Here’s what went on in classes this week:
6th-grade Humanities continued working on their class novel, Out of My Mind. Students had smaller group discussions, which they led themselves, and participated in large group discussions surrounding the assigned chapters. They will continue in the book next week. The 6th grade also worked on writing this week. The class completed editing practice, continued conferences with Mrs. Lamb, and began their longer December writing assignment based on a few prompt choices. One of the choices, to write a persuasive letter to Mrs. Lamb with a plan for the Middle School trip, was a favorite choice. The students are still working on them and will read aloud once completed.
The 7th-grade Humanities class is devouring the book The Giver by Lois Lowry and, with it, discussing the notion of Utopia. This fictional dystopian novel sparked a conversation about what is not perfect, what might be perfect, and what would need to be perfect in order to make Earth a utopian place to live. Students are almost finished drafting pieces that speak to this idea. Next, students will imagine their own Utopia in an interesting group project called The Community Project.
The 8th-grade Humanities class completed their first novel, If I Ever Get Out of Here, by Eric Gansworth. In the end, the themes of friendship, loyalty, belonging, and growing up stood out among students. They led discussions this week using questions they developed. Additionally, the 8th grade workshopped their thesis statements for their “Reimagining History” essay. They will spend next week researching and drafting.
Separately, the 8th grade worked in Leadership to create more of the Fraser Woods annual ornaments that they will sell at the pop-up shop before the winter concert. They also tried to finalize the design for their latest item, a charcuterie board.
Math
Pre-Transition: This week, the class dove right into Chapter 4, “Using Subtraction.” Students learned all about three different models for subtraction: the takeaway model, the slide model, and the comparison model. They also used fact triangles to find related facts for addition and subtraction. The class closed out the week by taking the Chapter 4 quiz.
Transition: This week, the class began Chapter 5, “Patterns Leading to Addition and Subtraction.” They applied properties of addition and subtraction to simplify expressions, learned rules for adding positive and negative numbers, discovered how to calculate the absolute value of a number, and used fact triangles to depict relationships between numbers. The class wrapped their week by taking the Chapter 5 quiz.
Algebra: This week, Algebra students jumped head first into Chapter 5, “Division and Proportions in Algebra.” They came up with definitions for algebra and fractions and put them together to discover what an algebraic fraction is. Then, the class practiced multiplying, dividing, and simplifying algebraic fractions. They concluded their week by taking the Chapter 5 quiz.
Geometry: This week, students started Chapter 5, “Proofs in Congruence.” They discovered how to justify conclusions about congruent figures, identified and determined measures of parts of congruent figures, and practiced making one-step proofs. Students took the Chapter 5 quiz on Friday.
Science
6th grade:
Students began the week by making their very own fossil casts. Students made salt dough and used objects around the room to simulate how casts are made. Everyone had a blast, and learning took place during the process. The latter part of the week focused on plate tectonics. Students were introduced to the topic using our techbook and then the topic was reinforced with a partnered webquest. It was a great first week back from Thanksgiving break!
7th grade:
This week started off discussing states of matter. The class talked about how matter changes from one state to another, and we learned the proper vocabulary terms for each. Students then moved on to discuss the properties of each state of matter and how the molecules move in each state. This brought us to define the difference between atoms and molecules and led to the class’ first look at the periodic table. Friday’s class ended with an introduction to An Interesting Molecule project, which we will work on next week as well. Be sure to ask your student which molecule they are choosing to research!
8th grade:
This week focused on photosynthesis and cellular respiration, the processes that sustain life on Earth. The class analyzed the equation of each reaction and was able to see how each relied on the other as a singular cyclical event. The week ended with students researching experiments to show the relationship between photosynthesis and cellular respiration. Next week, students will design and execute their own experiments to show how this cyclic relationship ensures a constant exchange of gases and energy between living organisms and the environment.
We hope you had a wonderful weekend!
