Jonas Clarke Middle
News and Notes January 2018
From the Principal
Yearbook: It's that time to start thinking about purchasing a Clarke yearbook! Online sales will begin on February 1st so get your copy now. Yearbooks are $32.00 but the price will go to $35.00 up later this spring. Don' t miss out on a chance to see pictures from throughout the year. Order Yearbook Online Here
Clarke Night Out: The Clarke PTO is once again putting together a fantastic evening for parents and staff to come out and support the PTO and have some fun at the same time. Tickets will be going on sale in February. This year Clarke Night Out will take place on March 16, 2018 at Waxy O'Connors so make sure to save the date and get your tickets early before they sell out! Clarke Middle School receives so much support from your PTO membership and fundraising efforts. We hope that you will continue to support the PTO and I look forward to seeing you there. For more information, donations and to purchase tickets visit the Clarke PTO website
Recycling at Clarke: Thanks to our fabulous Green Team and the Leadership of the SGA (Student Government Association in conjunction with many helpful and interested students) We have started our "Slash the Trash" campaign at Clarke! Students will find recycling bins, and liquid buckets to encourage recycling and help reduce the amount of trash we produce each day in the cafeteria. Big thanks to many who have encouraged this program at Clarke especially Ms. Herbert who has led the green team and Mr. Murray - our head custodian who has been open to all of their ideas!
Upcoming Dates
Monday January 29 | 2nd Semester Begins
New 2nd semester schedules will be distributed in Homeroom
Thursday February 8 | Clarke PTO Meeting
8:45AM Clarke Cafeteria
Monday February 19 - Friday February 23 | No School
Vacation Week
Monday February 26 | Parent Forum: Going to LHS
7:00 - 8:30PM in the LHS Science Lecture Hall
Wednesday February 28 | Parent Forum: Going to LHS
9:40 - 11:00AM Lexington Community Center (39 Marrett Road, Room 139)
Thursday March 8 | World Language Week Potluck
6:00 PM Clarke Cafeteria (World Language Week - March 5 - March 9)
Wednesday March 28 | 5th Grade Parent Orientation
7:00PM Clarke Auditorium
Tuesday April 3 | "Screenagers" movie viewing
7:00PM LHS Auditorium Co-sponsored by the Clarke PTO & Diamond PTA
Author to Speak at LHS
From LHS Principal, Dr. Andrew Stephens:
I am very happy to announce a special event that will be occurring at LHS in the Auditorium on February 27, 2018. We invite you to join us for a night with author Yaa Gyasi, whose novel Homegoing was named 2016’s Notable Book by The New York Times and “Debut Novel of the Year” by National Public Radio. In their ELA classes, the entire sophomore class at LHS has read Homegoing, which traces the lineage of two half sisters from Imperial Ghana to modern day America. Ms. Gyasi will be speaking with the sophomore class during the day. During the community event, which is from 6:00-7:00pm (doors open at 5:00pm), Ms. Gyasi will discuss her work, read from the text, and answer audience questions. A book signing will follow the event. I am very appreciative of Lexington Education Foundation (LEF) and Lexington Community Education for sponsoring this exciting event and hope you will consider attending!
Follow this link to read more about Ms. Gyasi’s novel Homegoing at: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/533857/homegoing-by-yaa-gyasi/9781101971062/
To purchase tickets for the community evening event, please go to the link below:
https://www.lexedfoundation.org/gyasi
Shrek!
Shrek and Donkey
Lord Farquaad
The Three Fionas sing about their true love
BARK at Clarke - What's new?
A is for Acceptance
The Clarke school community continues to bring on our BARK and live out our core values of Balance, Acceptance, Responsibility and Kindness every day. Throughout the second quarter, Clarke focused on Acceptance.
Acceptance can be described as being open-minded to different experiences and people. Some ways to show Acceptance include the following:
Showing respect for all types of people, despite their differences.
Talking to and getting to know people of diverse backgrounds.
Standing up for others who are being put down.
Liking and respecting ourselves for who we are, with all our strengths and challenges.
Showing flexibility when things don’t go as planned or the way that we wanted, especially when we don’t have much control over the situation.
While there is a variety of ways to practice acceptance, the whole school participated in an activity that highlighted the acceptance of people’s differences last December. In middle school, students are often required to work with different people for group projects. As different students are brought together so are their different personalities and group work styles. For this activity, students completed a simple questionnaire that helped them identify their own group work style. Group discussion sought to facilitate students’ understanding of how the best groups, schools, and communities are made up of people with different styles by giving students space to reflect on their own strengths and challenges as well as the strengths and challenges of those who have a different approach to group work.
Having family discussions with your child about acceptance of others with different personalities and work styles can help prepare your child to fully experience the positive side of group work. Taking the time to have these discussions can help your child develop a greater appreciation for all their different partners with their varying learning style. Some questions to help facilitate these discussions include:
What are several strengths of your style? How does your personality type make you a good teammate?
What are several limitations of your style? How does your personality type sometimes challenge a group dynamic?
What style/direction do you find most difficult to work with and the easiest to work with and why?
Why is it helpful to have different personality/group work within a group?
News from the 7th Grade
Team Adventurer
In English, Adventurer students have just wrapped up our comprehensive study of setting, acknowledging it as a powerful literary element. As we read The Giver, We saw firsthand how setting can be the very cause of conflict. In addition, we’ve been focusing our efforts on responding to literature. We are crafting claims and context, and working very hard to find convincing evidence that we then thoughtfully analyze. On the grammar front, we now know how to correctly punctuate compound sentences; therefore, there is no reason to write those frustrating run-on sentences. : ) Up next is our literary unit on point of view.
Adventurer entrepreneurs are finishing their big Africa project. Their job is to showcase their knowledge of Africa by proposing a new business that would succeed in their country - either by utilizing local resources or by meeting a critical need. There are some great (and practical) ideas! After Africa we're moving next door to the Middle East.
Before December break, Adventurer students learned about ecology. They used computers and various tools to explore a virtual ecosystem (EcoXPT). By using evidence they had collected, students tried to figure out why the fish died, understanding the principles of eutrophication. Then, as a culmination to the ecology unit, we enjoyed an engaging field trip to the New England Aquarium. Students had fun interacting with invertebrates, and "petting" rays in the touch tank. They learned more about organisms in different ocean habitats, and viewed a 3D film about life in the Galapagos. After break, students have been exploring the complexities of DNA using Edgerton Lego kits (see photo). In our next unit, students will learn about heredity, including setting up and solving Punnett Squares. During an end-of-the-unit activity, kids will show how different characteristics are passed from parents to offspring by assembling "Crazy Creatures".
In math, we have finished our ratio, proportion and percent units. Students enjoyed going on a mock spending spree that highlighted their work with percents dealing with tax, discounts and markups. Currently students are exploring how to represent a linear relationship in a table, graph and equation. We continue to work on students’ skills of critiquing the work of others, sharing ideas, and working together to solve challenging math problems. We are looking forward to our lessons in the spring when we can explore more of our geometry standards and probability.
Students have taken the first assessment that will be used for the placement process. In March, students will be taking a Mid Year exam that will be based off of the topics we have covered in class. Students will have multiple ways to review before the test, review in class, homework reviews, and creating their own review.
Team Endeavor
World Geo: During our Africa unit in Endeavor World Geography class, the students are exploring resources throughout the continent as they create an ideal country based upon the physical and human resources in the region. The photo shows the students during the construction phase of the project after they completed their research. Also, we will explore stories of adolescents, similar in age to the students, in different environments. They will meet Adam from the Tuareg tribe during his "Desert Odyssey" and Salva and Nya during their "Long Walk to Water". These stories are good topics for conversation starters as
the students likely will be intrigued by the different experiences.
Science: We have finished studying all things cellular including cell transport, cellular energy processes, and cell division. We are about to embark on the next phase in our understanding of life by examining the structure and function of DNA, the blueprints for life. Be sure to ask your Endeavor Student about the giant DNA model we made! From there we take a look at genetics, and begin to understand the work of Gregor Mendel and attempt to understand why we look the way we do.
English: In English students have been studying how setting impacts character and conflict. Students explored setting through the young adult novel, The Giver, and learned to write claim statements and find strong evidence to support their claim. Next we on to perspective and point of view.
Math: In math, we have finished our ratio, proportion and percent units. Students enjoyed going on a mock spending spree that highlighted their work with percents dealing with tax, discounts and markups. Currently students are exploring how to represent a linear relationship in a table, graph and equation. We continue to work on students’ skills of critiquing the work of others, sharing ideas, and working together to solve challenging math problems. We are looking forward to our lessons in the spring when we can explore more of our geometry standards and probability.
Students have taken the first assessment that will be used for the placement process. In March, students will be taking a Mid Year exam that will be based off of the topics we have covered in class. Students will have multiple ways to review before the test, review in class, homework reviews, and creating their own review.
FOLLOW US ON TWITTER…
We would like to acquaint you with the Endeavor Twitter page where you can see what is going on in our classes. You can access this feed in any one of three ways. You can find the link on the Endeavor Team website by clicking on the tab on the left side of the page titled “Twitter”. If you have a Twitter account, you can follow @ClarkeEndeavor. If you do not have a Twitter account and would like to be notified of new posts on your phone, you can send a text message to “FOLLOW @ClarkeEndeavor” to #40404.
Team Entetprise
Team Explorer
We have been working hard on Explorer team in January on all sorts of new concepts. Check out what we have been working on in our different classes...
World Geography
In World Geography, we have been learning all about Central Asia (Russia and the Eurasian Republics). Along with the concepts in this region we have delved into learning about different types of governments. We continue to enjoy watching the iMovies that students made during our Country Profile Unit in the region that they are located in. We are currently exploring Africa’s political, and physical geography and look forward to learning all sorts of new things about this continent.
Math
In math, we have finished our ratio, proportion and percent units. Students enjoyed going on a mock spending spree that highlighted their work with percents dealing with tax, discounts and markups. Currently students are exploring how to represent a linear relationship in a table, graph and equation. We continue to work on students’ skills of critiquing the work of others, sharing ideas, and working together to solve challenging math problems. We are looking forward to our lessons in the spring when we can explore more of our geometry standards and probability.
Students have taken the first assessment that will be used for the placement process. In March, students will be taking a Mid Year exam that will be based off of the topics we have covered in class. Students will have multiple ways to review before the test, review in class, homework reviews, and creating their own review.
English
In English, we're about to start a new unit in Explorer English. We'll start reading the novel Stargirl, by Jerry Spinelli, and analyze how point of view and perspective can shape a narrative. Public speaking will be a new focus this unit, and students will participate in multiple student-led discussions called Socratic Seminars.
Science
In Science, with an overall theme of "why you look like you whereas I tend to look like me", Explorer students have been hard at work investigating DNA and genetics. After learning about the structure of the building blocks of life (and constructing some awesome 3D models) students are now examining inheritance of traits through Mendelian Genetics.