Jonas Clarke Middle
News and Notes December 2017
From the Principal
Parent Conferences: Thank you to all who came out for parent conferences. We recognize of course that a 10 minute conference with your child's teachers is never enough but hopefully you were able to meet the teachers and see the learning spaces where your child spends their days as well as get some information on progress. Don't forget to log into the Aspen parent portal and check on Mid Quarter Progress Reports for your child this coming week.
A huge thank you to all the parents who donated the delicious treats and coffee for our conference afternoons! We also had some excellent helpers in the hallways helping parents and delivering treats. Thank you to all who were involved.
Book Fair: The Clarke Book Fair was a great success this year. Sponsored and organized by the Clarke PTO, the book fair was set up in the library for a full week giving teachers, students and parents the chance to browse for books, purchase some gifts and get down to reading. Thanks to all the parents that helped out and purchased books. Many of our teachers received gifts from students and parents and it is so appreciated! Thank you for your support.
BARK: Acceptance Activity: On Thursday December 21st, all students and staff will participate in an activity during WIN about Acceptance and what the means and looks like at Clarke Middle School. Thank you to the students and staff who have been working to spread our BARK message throughout the school year. We hope that all of our Bulldogs consider BARK (Balance, Acceptance, Resilience, Kindness) to be common knowledge here at Clarke! Check out the poster below designed by a Clarke student! What a beautiful representation of Acceptance.
2018 MLK Day of Service: On Monday, January 15, 2018 the Town of Lexington will commemorate Martin Luther King Jr. Day with a day of family-friendly volunteer activities supporting the underserved. Find out more info here. This year we are soliciting middle school students to submit short essays (200-400 words) on this topic: What is Martin Luther King's legacy on today's society? A few of the essays will be chosen to be read at the Opening Ceremonies at Cary Hall, as well as at various events during the day. If your child is interested in this opportunity, have them speak with their English teacher.
Thank you for all that you do to support our Clarke community. I wish all of you a wonderful holiday season and a happy new year!
ELL Literacy Night - Lex Go Camping!
On November 30th, Ms. Davidian our ELL teacher and Ms. Kelly, Clarke librarian along with the ELL teacher and librarian from Diamond hosted a special evening of games, stories and songs with a focus on building skills in English. Students participated in a vocabulary treasure hunt, made s'mores, challenged themselves to math word problems, chose the correct homophone and sat around a "campfire" listening to stories and reading. It was a wonderful evening for all!
Hour of Code 2017
On Wednesday, November 29th, students in Mr. Pelkey's classes became the initial Clarke Middle School students to begin their Hour of Code in 2017. Within 2 weeks, students on all 12 Clarke Middle School teams in all three grade levels had the opportunity to try out a computer programming activity in one of their classes.
Sponsored by code.org, an organization which promotes the instruction of computer science and programming in schools, Hour of Code is an initiative which is "designed to demystify ‘code’, to show that anybody can learn the basics, and to broaden participation in the field of computer science…” Students at Clarke Middle School joined millions of peers around the world in being introduced to these computer programming concepts and activities.
Special thanks to team teachers who led the Hour of Code for their teams and to Ms. Ong, Ms. Zides and Mr. Davey for helping facilitate these experiences. For those interested, voluminous opportunities exist to expand on their Hour of Code experience. Learners of all ages can visit code.org to explore this organization's offerings and to continue to learn to code.
Upcoming Dates
Monday December 25 - Monday January 1 | No School
Winter Holiday Break
Tuesday January 2 | School Resumes
Thursday January 11 | Early Release at 11:45 AM
Staff Appreciation Luncheon | Sign up Here to donate
Thursday January 11 | PTO fundraiser at Bertucci's Lexington
Dining for Dollars - Bring this flyer and support Clarke!
Monday January 15 | No School
MLK Holiday
Thursday January 25, 26, 27 | Clarke Musical
Shrek The Musical Jr. at Clarke!
Friday January 26 | Second Quarter Grades Close
Shrek The Musical Jr.
It's a "big bright beautiful world" as everyone's favorite ogre, Shrek, leads a cast of fairytale misfits on an adventure to rescue a true princess and find true acceptance. Once upon a time, in a far away swamp, there lived an ogre named Shrek. One day, he finds his swamp invaded by banished fairytale misfits who have been cast off by Lord Farquaad, a tiny terror with big ambitions. When Shrek sets off with a wisecracking donkey to confront Farquaad, he's handed a task – if he rescues feisty princess Fiona, his swamp will be righted. Shrek tries to win Fiona’s love and vanquish Lord Farquaad, but a fairytale wouldn't be complete without a few twists and turns along the way.
Since September, the cast and crew of Clarke’s production of Shrek have been hurriedly painting and splattering, sewing and cutting, measuring, singing, dancing and acting and will present the show on the following dates:
Performances
1/25/18 7:30pm
1/26/18 7:30pm
1/27/18 1:00pm & 5:30pm
Tickets are $10 and are available online starting on Monday, January 8, 2018: www.ShowTix4U.com. For more info: ClarkeDrama@aol.com
On January 10th, the cast and crew of Shrek will have a very special visitor from the original Broadway production of Shrek - Haven Burton! Haven, who played the “Sugar Plum Fairy”/”Gingy” in the original Broadway production and “Fiona” in the national tour, will be spending the day with the cast and crew of Clarke’s production. What a special opportunity for the Clarke students to workshop and learn from a cast member of the original production!
News from the 6th Grade
Atlantis Team
* * * ATLANTIS ADVICE COLUMN * * *
Atlantis students are now veteran 6th graders! They were asked to take some time to consider what they are doing either at home, at school, or both to be successful here at Clarke. Here are some of the awesome tips for success as shared by our Atlantians…
1. Listen when the teachers are talking so you are not lost when you try to do your work.
2. If you are confused about anything ask a teacher for help.
3. Share your ideas! Teachers love when you share stuff related to what they are
teaching.
4. Don’t leave your old friends! Keep the old ones AND the new ones.
5. Balance your social life and school life by getting together with friends to do HW
together. You can go to HW Club with friends.
6. Take some time and do your personal interests or hobbies after school work. It feels nice and happy to get some outdoor time too.
7. When you get home don’t say “I’ll do my HW later”, because you won’t.
8. Try to do your fast easy HW first, and your hard HW last.
9. Make sure you try your HW. Most of it is an effort grade, so it does not have to be perfect.
10. Using your agenda helps! Try to write down all of your HW. When you get home, read it and plan what order to do it.
11. If you’re stuck and unsure about the HW call a friend from your class. This helps you understand the problem and get it done faster.
12. Make flashcards to help study for tests and quizzes
13. Do extra credit when it’s offered to get extra points.
14. Try not to go to sleep late on school nights. It helps you wake up in time to get ready in the morning, eat a good breakfast, and be on time for school.
15. If you are absent, find out what you missed and catch up over the weekend.
16. Don’t give up on a problem after taking one look at it. Some problems seem hard at first glance, but after you re read it, it may not actually be so hard.
17. Take some time every once in a while to organize your binder.
18. Don’t put things in the front pocket of your binder, it makes it harder to find your work.
19. Write sticky notes in your locker to remember to bring stuff home.
20. WIN is one of the best ways to be successful. When you are tense or stressed you can get some outdoor time. When you know you are busy after school you can get HW done.
21. Atlantis Air is the best activity to do at WIN, but only if you are not falling behind in a subject.
22. If you don’t see a seat when you walk into the caf, pretend to go get a fork so you don’t look awkward.
23. Be a good Bulldog! Be kind and follow the Golden Rule – Treat others how you would like to be treated.
24. You are only in 6th grade once so enjoy it!
Columbia Team
The Columbia Team is excited to wrap up 2017!!!
There were many exciting educational happenings on Columbia Team as the weather turned cooler. We went to Hale Reservation and, even though it was rainy, we had a fun time doing team-building activities, a nature walk, and an epic battle of the bands! As a team, we also participated in the Hour of Code. We spent some time learning how to use Blocky and Scratch (Web-based coding programs) to navigate characters from Frozen, Minecraft and Star Wars through various obstacles.
In science we learned about Pangea and how Alfred Wegener (geophysicist) was thought to be wrong in his theories, and was viewed as a laughing stock by the whole scientific community. It wasn’t until the discoveries made by Bruce Hessen and Marie Tharp was he vindicated. Ask your child for more information! Currently, we’re creating our own travel plans to venture to places that are affected by different plate boundaries; convergent, divergent, and transform.
Columbia students have been busy in our humanities classes with lots of research and literary analysis. We also explored concepts such as theme and perspective, and the decisions authors make about them, by examining short fantasy stories. Recently, we concluded a mini-research project in which groups learned about archaeologists who made major discoveries in understanding the earliest humans. In parallel, for English, we have been reading and examining characterization in realistic fiction novels via literature circle groups and targeted mini-lessons. This is a precursor to writing the sixth grade’s traditional essay on how a dynamic character changes in response to pressures in a given book’s plot. Coming up next will be a research project that will culminate in groups creating educational board games about the major early hominid species and their specific traits!
In Maths we have finished up our exciting unit on ratios, rational numbers and equivalence. Now we are entering the world of decimals and continuing into fractions!
We will continue to focus on having a growth mindset, working in groups collaboratively, working on being active listeners and being able to ask and answer questions to further our understanding of key concepts. Students should be working to grow their mathematical minds by asking themselves questions such as:
1) Could there be more than one answer? 2) Could I solve this another way? 3) Could I use a visual representation to model my thinking using the problems that I’m working on? 4) Could I explain this to someone that does not understand my thinking?
We look forward to 2018! Happy Holidays and best wishes for the New Year!
Quest Team
In Ancient Civ. Class, students are learning about the evolution of early human species. This unit is always a favorite. Students will practice their observation and inferencing skills while analyzing real-life models of early human skulls. They will also work on their first history research project, which will teach students how to use the resources in our IMC to conduct high quality research.
Math class is wrapping up our second unit on ratio relationships, fractions, decimals and percents. Our next unit will be operations with rational numbers and applying these to real-world problems.
In English, students are using their close reading strategies as they read their chosen book club novel. The students are working towards writing their first literary essay in which they will explain how and why a character changes.
In Science, students have just finished their investigation of plate tectonics. They will now use their new skills and understanding to create travel guides for some of the most geologically dangerous places in the world. After that we will explore the rock cycle by investigating rocks and minerals.
Students: This term’s goals are:
Actively listening to the speaker
Staying organized and planning WIN blocks according to your needs.
Take risks and make mistakes! Challenge yourself by thinking deeply about topics and listening to your classmates’ different ways of thinking.
Parents/Guardians: Here are some suggested conversations you can have at home.
English: Ask your child about his/her book for December’s book club discussions: How does the author convey the character’s personality or character traits through what the character says and thinks? What do the character’s actions reveal? What about the character’s effect on others?
Science: What do you notice? What are you wondering?
Math: Discuss fractions, decimals, percents in our everyday lives. Cook together, practice calculating taxes, tips, and estimating costs.
Social Studies: Ask your child about the early hominid groups and the fossil skulls they analyzed in our class. Ask your child which species of hominid they are researching and what they have learned about the species so far.
Voyager Team
English
In Voyager English, we’ve recently wrapped up our graphic novel unit where students bridged what they learned about plot structure and theme with characterization, which is our current focus in class. We’ve just begun reading Natalie Babbitt’s Tuck Everlasting, and students are doing a phenomenal job identifying symbols and determining their significance. Students are also beginning to understand how authors develop characters as they track how our protagonist grows and changes through the novel.
History
With an understanding of what it takes to be an archaeologists firmly under our belts, Voyager Historians set off on a magical tour of early humans. Members of Team Voyager will soon be able to identify the several stages of evolutionary development and the major changes and progress that early humans made throughout the years.
Members of Team Voyager will also be sharpening their research and writing skills as we will be practicing identifying reliable sources, note-taking, and outlining. The team eagerly awaits the live broadcast of Hominid Idol: Season 7 “Return of the Stone Tool”. The competition will be fierce, but our students are up to the task!
Math
Students love using pixel art. It’s basically paint by number. In our study of ratios, proportions and percent, voyager students designed pixel art using Google Sheets, then estimated the percent of each color they used. Next they used a spreadsheet formula to calculate the actual percent of each color used, then compared their estimates to their actuals. Want to try making a pixel art drawing of your own? Go to this spreadsheet and follow the directions on each of the four tabs at the bottom of the page. It’s fun! Make your own pixel art
Science
Voyager science has been quite exciting over the past couple of weeks! Students traveled to the center of the Earth and learned about the crust, mantle, outer and inner core. Each voyager scientist wrote their own version of “Journey to the Center of the Earth” and shared their stories with the class. We have moved on to learning about plate tectonics and how earthquakes and volcanoes are formed. Soon, students will be creating their own travel brochure to one of the Geologic Wonders of the World.