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Dear Upper School Parents and Guardians,
Happy New Year - It’s the first Upper School newsletter of 2022! It’s been a wild two weeks, and we are trying our best to keep everybody healthy and in school. Thank you for your partnership and support, and for those students at home, please know we are thinking about them.
End of the Semester and Progress Reports:
Today marks the end of the first semester! 5th, 6th, and 7th graders will receive progress reports next Friday. 5th-grade families will receive a comment that highlights the child’s style as a friend and citizen within their class community, as well as a description of their approach to learning. You’ll learn about strategies that work to promote learning and participation for your child. Your comments will include checklists for each curricular subject that indicate where your child stands at this midpoint in the year regarding each benchmark.
6th and 7th graders will receive an end of the semester grade. Please share grades and comments with your Upper Schoolers and contact teachers and advisors directly if you have any questions. The narrative comments for 6th - 8th graders will be in March when we send out midterm grades and comments.
MLK Day
Our third graders reminded our community at School Meeting on Thursday that Martin Luther King Day is a day on and not a day off, and here is what they said followed by their suggestions.
We encourage everyone in the school to be great in the way that Dr. King defines greatness by helping out, trying to make things better, and making a difference. Here are some ideas we thought of. You can also think of your own, too.
We will donate money to Wellspring House.
We will donate toys or clothes.
I will not use as much plastic.
I will bring people’s spirits up by being kinder.
I will be cooperative to my parents.
I will help take care of my brother.
We will help out around our homes.
I will pray for people.
I will help my grandfather get around.
I will make food for my grandparents.
We will read about Dr. King and educate ourselves.
Everybody can be great, because everybody can serve!
Please ask your students about…
5th Grade (Outside of Homeroom Classes):
Science: What is an ecosystem, and what do ecologists do?
Technology: How was I able to code my own chase game in Scratch that played a sound and kept score?
Music: What is Tamboo Bamboo (rhythm skit)? And how are they participating?
6th Grade:
Geo (Abramson): Writing the first paragraph of our essay on Africa and finishing our preparation for the Africa map quiz
Geo (Burns): How we are preparing for our Africa map test and how our final social justice PSA turned out.
Math: How I did on my Transformation in a Coordinate Plane quiz, and how we did a poster on word expressions.
French: How to say what people have and what and where they do things.
Spanish: How I prepare for the unit test and what I need to think about when describing things.
Music: Learning new guitar chords and what songs they’ve played.
Science: My independent Space Research project
7th Grade:
History: How to make the Electoral College work better for all Americans.
Music/Theater: Began work on class play. Scenes 1 and 2 should be off-book by next class.
Math ( Carbo):: How to find simple interest when getting a loan and how I did on my Percent Chapter Test.
Math (Carver): Three ways to solve a system of equations
French: How to say what I do, just did and am going to do.
Spanish: How to talk about sports that people play and discuss the equipment needed.
Mandarin: How to say what I want, what I will, what I think, what I may.
Science: The Great Organelle Debate
8th Grade:
History: Starting up the mock trial and learning about how to try a case
Music/Theater: Learned about blocking a play. Students should know how to enter and exit and when/how to move on the stage during their part for the 8th-grade play.
French: The words and phrases that I can use to combine sentences and write at a higher proficiency level.
Spanish: Additional verbs I can use to talk about things in the past.
Science: Ionic and covalent bonding
Math: Two ways to represent linear equations. Who was Benjamin Banneker?
English: My picture book.
Save the Date: Next Thursday (January 20) is the 5th to 6th grade transition virtual lunch meeting from 12:00 - 12:45. Here is the link for the zoom call.
Have a great weekend!