Week of February 15

Projects: Parents are invited to view Rube Goldberg simple machines on Wednesday this week (8:30 to 9:40); other Oasis classes are set for viewing on Thursday

6th Reading: Summer of the Monkeys (read aloud); Iqbal Book Club (small groups); 5 minute fluency practice

6th Writing: Write and Give a Speech about a school or community problem; Journal free write; ixl language arts practice

8th Writing: Journal free write, ixl language practice; Classification research and writing "Why is a ____not a ____?"

STORES on Wednesday this week.

Week of Feb 8

Reminder: There will not be a Valentines Day Party at school.

6th Reading: Silent read a book of student choice; Read Aloud by teacher: Summer of the Monkeys; Book club reading and discussion of Iqbal

6th Writing: Using specific verbs, adjectives and adverbs to improve and enhance our desriptive writing. 6 Traits packet week 3. 

8th Writing: Is Your Uncle an Inca? Informative and Expository writing of humorous test questions, using research to create multiple choice and true/false tests.

Projects: Some classes are behind so we are allowing a little more time for students to develop and practice their Rub Goldberg Machine presentations. Theyw ill present this week. We will clean up our areas and prepare them for demos. Tuesday is a Vocabulary test.

Week of February 1

This week is Super Bowl Week! Let it snow!

All classes will be using various aspects of the Super Bowl and the Biography of Vince Lombardi for research, analysis, reading, writing, math and discussion---culminating in a one page paper on the Super Bowl, due Thursday. 

6th Read aloud is Summer of the Monkeys and book club book is Iqbal.

Specials this quarter is Drama---students are doing a modern version of Shakespeare. 

PE: if weather permits (having snow on the ground) we will learn and play the old fashioned game of "Fox and Geese"  

* Reminder that there will not be a Valentines Party at school and there will be a Presidents Day holiday on Monday, February 15th! 

Week of January 25th

Announcements: We will suspend the Maverick Mondays. We hope to try a taco Tuesday before the school year ends.

Week of January 25th

Projects: Students will finish up their Rube Goldberg-type machines on Monday and Tuesday. They will make a video &/or a slide show to present to the class. Their project must use at least four different simple machines to perform a small task in no less than 8 steps.They will collaborate to write up their presentation and practice it. They will also take a vocabulary test. Presentation will be February 2nd & 3rd (next week).

6th Writing: We will use figurative language (simile, metaphor, personification) and descriptive verbs, adjectives & adverbs to write Haiku and practice on ixl Language Arts.

6th Reading: Book club on Iqbal, a novel based on a true story about child labor in Pakistan. Five Minute fluency is a program that enables students to improve fluency and accuracy; we do this twice a week. Silent reading, daily.

8th Writing: Students are writing a classification paragraph, revising and editing. The final is due on Wednesday and they will read their papers aloud on Thursday.

Specials: Drama

January---let the quarter begin!

Wow! Half a year gone by already! New classroom jobs have been assigned.

Wednesday, January 20th is STORES.

Projects: We are studying motion and forces in science this quarter. Students are working in groups of four to create a Rube Goldberg type machine that has to have at least 8 working steps. This is a culminating project of the learning about simple machines and Newton's Laws of Motion (laws 1,2 &3). Your child has an assignment of materials to contribute toward the project.

6th Writing: We are focusing on writing descriptive informative and expository paragraphs using specific nouns, verbs adjectives and adverbs. They are using a thesaurus and improving their vocabulary. This week they are describing one of their favorite people.

6th Reading: Students have several interesting reading assignments. They have their choice of books for silent reading, a book club on the book Iqbal (ask them what it is about), and we are beginning a read aloud titled Summer of the Monkeys by Wilson Rawls. 

8th Writing: Students learned some specific skills in writing a good conclusion and then revised their concluding paragraph from their argumentative essay. This quarter is informative and expository writing, beginning this week with studying and writing a classification paragraph.

Specials: Drama, a new take on Romeo and Juliet

Attention! There will be no Valentines Day parties and NO passing out or exchanging valentines at school. Please direct your questions regarding this to the administration.
Thank you!

December!

First off, apologies, for not keeping the blog up this past month. My mother was gravely ill and I did a large amount of traveling, put 5,000 miles on my car, and have been crazy trying to catch up on everything I missed. My mom seems to be recovering, time will tell.

6th grade will go to the movie PAN, on Thursday---cost is $6 for movie, soda & popcorn. DO NOT let them bring any other money---they cannot spend it. Please email me if your child is unable to attend, so I can prepare an alternate activity for them. They will eat lunch early so they can still have their pizza for lunch.

8th grade is going caroling on Wednesday night. Students can bring a $5 gift for an exchange, if they so desire. 

Projects: your students know the Preamble to the Constitution---have them recite it to you. We have finished an inspiring unit on the American Revolution and the Constitution; they know the law of the land and all about their founding fathers and heroes of the American Revolution. 

6th reading: Students are completing a triarama depicting a setting from the novel George Washington's Socks 

6th writing: Students have been learning to organize their writing using various graphic organizers. They are writing persuasive and argumentative pieces.

8th writing: Students have written an argumentative paper, an explanation of how to do something they are good at. They are now demonstrating their skill and teaching the class how to do such things as: dance, braid hair, broad jump, repair a clogged fuel line, develop a sports skill, play drums, prepare foods, and much more! 

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!