Team 8-3 Weekly Newsletter
September 9, 2015
Mrs McKinney
I am a nerd at heart and love mathematics. I see math all around me and get excited when my students share my passion for numbers. I was a navy brat (actually a chiefs brat) so I understand what many of your children go through when they go to new schools or when a parent is not around all the time. Before I graduated high school I had been to thirteen different schools. Although I lived all over the country, Southeast Georgia has always been home to me. I have four grown children, two grandchildren, a husband, and a daschund named Walter..
I have a Masters Degree in education and have only taught in at SMMS. This year is my twentieth year and I have loved every minute of it. I have been teaching Gifted for sixteen years and enjoy getting students to realize some of their potential!
This Week in Class
Georgia Studies --- Dr Siekkinen
We will start Ch. 10 this week. The students started an exercise on the Salem Witch Trials using google classroom and freedomflix websites. We are tentatively going on our first field trip 1 October to visit Plains GA for Jimmy Carter Day’s activities. More to come on this later…
Science --- Dr. Bridwell
We are continuing our study of atoms and the periodic table. Students were given a “Catch-Up” and “Must-Do” day to get caught up on late and missing work last Friday. I also offered an extra credit project to blocks 2, 3, & 5. Block 4 received an extra credit activity today The students are completing an “Adopt an Element” project (research & electronic poster). It is due on Friday at the latest. Many students have already turned it in. Tomorrow we will review for the TEST on Friday. Keep checking on PowerSchool for missing grades. Students have 2 days after the zero is recorded in the gradebook to make it up.
Math --- Mrs. McKinney
This week we are focusing on exponents. The students in block 2 are learning and practicing the rules of exponents. In blocks 3-5, the students are having to apply the rules and explain what is happening. I am including some links that will help the students practice.
Upcoming Events
Exponents and Equations Mastery Assessment Wednesday 9/23/15
Progress reports Wednesday 9/16/15
Advisory groups 9/16/15
Hat Day 9/25/15
Parent Information Meeting Grades 7-8 parents only 9/22/15 from 10:00am-11:00am
Language Arts --- Mrs. Richardson
This week in Language Arts, we have been reading a short story by Carson McCullers. Tomorrow we will be having a Socratic seminar to discuss the text. Next week, we will be finishing up our personal narratives, working on commas, and learning about Eugenia Price. We will begin reading Lighthouse the week of September 21st. The students will have a comma quiz on September 17th, a prefix quiz (before, after, forwards, backwards) on September 15th and a vocabulary quiz on September 30th. The vocabulary words list can be found in their Bell Ringer notebook, or in Google Classroom.
Block 3 will have a prefix quiz on more, more and more on September 17th, a comma quiz on September 15th and a vocabulary quiz on September 30th. Block 3 has started reading the next novel called Empty by Suzanne Weyn. They will be taking annotations and working on writing short answer responses using RACES. RACES stands for restate question, answer, cite using evidence, explain, and sum it all up.