Muskego Lakes 8th Grade Newsletter
November 2021
Absent? 8th Grade Agendas!
Agendas are the tools students will use when they are absent to stay caught up. The expectation is that students access each agenda and complete the listed tasks for their classes. If your student is unable to complete the tasks for any reason, please have them contact their teacher directly to let them know. Click on the links below to check them out!
Literacy:
Math:
Social Studies:
Science:
CLASSROOM CATCH UP- LOOK TO SEE WHAT'S HAPPENING IN 8TH GRADE CLASSES THIS MONTH!
Literacy - Tome, Koeller, Lehmann
November in Literacy: Students finished up writing a reflective essay and have just begun our Holocaust unit. This is a truly engaging and powerful unit, sometimes moving and emotional, and always triggering a reaction in students to try to understand and learn more. So far, we’ve been building background knowledge, to understand the context of what was happening during this time. Early in December we’ll begin reading our main text, a play version of “The Diary of Anne Frank” focusing on inferences, text evidence, and how dialogue propels the plot.
Current Standard we’re focusing on: “Choosing the text evidence that best supports an inference.” This standard is more of a challenge than the others we’ve focused on so far this year, but we are already getting lots of practice in using poetry from our daily spirals and weekly task list practice.
- You can track your students’ progress with the SOF tracker that students will be sharing with parents. You can see your child’s scores from pre-test, check-ins along the way, to our final “Standards Mastery” assessment. We’ll get there 8th graders!
December iReady for Literacy coming next week!
November 30th and December 1st, with makeups December 2nd
Goodbye to Mrs. Janusz and Welcome Back Mrs. Koeller!
We’re thankful for the opportunity to have worked with Mrs. Janusz! She’s done a great job filling in for Mrs. Koeller while she’s been on maternity leave. We’ll miss her! At the same time, we’re excited to have Mrs. Koeller back in 8th grade at Muskego Lakes, starting the day before Thanksgiving break!
Math 8 - Vogler & Michalski
November Recap:
We just completed Unit 2, Transformations, which is our second Standard of Focus
Be on the lookout for:
SOF Trackers
Transformations Unit Test
Upcoming in December:
Unit 2: Angles (Our third & fourth Standard of Focus for the school year)
Targeted skills:
Find angle measures created by a transversal through parallel lines
Find interior and exterior angles of triangles and other polygons
Solve real-life problems applying the idea of similar triangles
Important Tools:
Tool for students to familiarize themselves with vocabulary for each unit
Algebra - Vogler
Students recently finished up their unit on linear functions and will spend the rest of quarter 2 focusing on systems of equations and properties of exponents. Students have been exposed to both of these units before, but will expand their understanding this year in algebra.
Social Studies - Tsakonas & Koeller
November Recap
Road to Revolution
Students learned about the many causes of the American Revolution.
So many cool, creative, and thorough projects were done!
Upcoming in December:
The Revolution!
The battles, the strategies, the ups + downs, the leaders, and the influencers. How does a ragtag volunteer army in need of a shower, somehow defeat a global superpower? We will find out this month :)
Valley Forge: Would you have Quit?
We will work through our first DBQ (Document Based Question), analyzing primary and secondary sources in order to answer the question, and develop claims supported by evidence and reasoning.
Science - Goldberg & Tome
Throughout November, we explored speed, acceleration, and gravity. We are now applying those concepts to roller coasters. In December, we will be applying our understanding of physics to car crash safety. Topics we cover include:
Momentum and impulse
Conservation of energy
Balanced forces
Forces within car crashes
Newton’s Laws
Car safety devices
We will be building cars that can hold and protect a raw egg during a car crash. A focus will be on seat belts, air bags, and crumple zones to reduce the amount of force upon the egg.
Daily Assignments
8th Grade Syllabus
8th Grade Website
This is a website worthy of being bookmarked! This is a great tool to get your questions answered.
Here are some items that are found on our website:
- Syllabus for each core class
- Rolling Agendas
- Contact Information
- Daily Assignments (What your students should have in their assignment notebook!)
- Monthy Newsletter links
Encore Newsletter
Important Dates Ahead
December 7 & 8: Math iReady Testing
Tuesday Emails from Your Child!
1. Current grades in Core Classes
2. Missing Work Updates
3. Areas students are proud of
We hope that receiving this communication will help you stay up to date on what is going on in your students 8th Grade world. As teachers, we feel it provides such a great talking point and area for parents to follow up with students and truly feel more in the know! If you have additional feedback regarding the Tuesday emails, please reach out to your child's resource teacher! Thanks so much for supporting!
8th Grade Staff Directory
8th Grade Staff Directory
Need to contact your child's teacher? Look below for a complete 8th grade staff contact list.
Cassie Vogler - Math 8 and Algebra: cassie.vogler@muskegonorway.org
Brittany Michalski- Math 8: brittany.michalski@muskegonorway.org
Heather Goldberg- Science: heather.goldberg@muskegonorway.org
Angela Janusz (Koeller) - Literacy/Social Studies: angela.janusz@muskegonorway.org
Amy Lehmann- Literacy: amy.lehmann@muskegonorway.org
Laura Tsakonas- Social Studies: laura.tsakonas@muskegonorway.org
Nicole Stevenson - Learning Strategist: nicole.lowe@muskegonorway.org
Kristen Thimmesch- Spanish: kristen.modica@muskegonorway.org
Beth Brown- Speech: beth.brown@muskegonorway.org
Stacie Capstran- Spanish: stacie.capstran@muskegonorway.org
Mitch Hasey- Phys Ed: mitch.hasey@muskegonorway.org