Team 8-2 News
Mrs. Allen, Mrs. McKinney, Mr. Salser, Ms. Waxman
General News! Week of August 15-19
Our first full week is under our belts, and we all seem to be settling in. We have had a number of new students join us this week, so we may do some schedule changes within the team to help us balance our class size to provide the best instructional environment we can. We will contact you if this involves your child.
We really appreciate those of you who joined us for our 8th grade parent night last Thursday. Hopefully you were able to get some questions answered, and have a better idea of what your children will be working on this year.
Most of our students have completed both a Reading and Math Inventory to help us guide their instruction. They will take these again at mid and end of year, to help us track their progress and growth. We will be sharing this information with you soon.
If you are still having some questions or concerns about any of the suggested supplies, please drop one of us an email, and we will do our best to help get them squared away. Our team's attendance and tardies have been very impressive so far. We really appreciate having everyone here and ready to go...Keep up the great job!
Upcoming Dates to Remember:
August 23- Title I Stakeholder Meeting 6pm
September 1st- SMMS Yearbooks are on sale now for $37.00 ( order online at)
September 5th- Labor Day Holiday (No School)
September 6th- Title I Annual Meeting 6pm.
September 14th- 1st Quarter Progress Reports go home
Language Arts- Ms. Waxman
Greetings from language arts! I enjoyed the opportunity to meet and speak with those of you who attended our Parent Night. Thank you for joining us, I know how busy we all are.
This week we will really begin delving into our first novel, The Outsiders, by S.E. Hinton.
On Friday, students were able to read the first chapter where we met our main character, Ponyboy Curtis, as well as his older brothers and friends...the Greasers! Our focus this week will be finding textual evidence of our character's physical appearance as well as some of their personality traits. We will also review the basic elements of a plot.
For grammar and vocabulary,we will introduce "M.U.G. Shot Mondays" where we will analyze the mechanics, usage, and grammar rules so we can apply them in our own writing. "Rootie Tootie Thursdays" will be introducing root words, prefixes, and suffixes which can come in handy when you are trying to identify unfamiliar vocabulary. We have also introduced some 60's slang as our first set of vocabulary words. I have provided the students with a link for StudyStack, so they can practice at home in our Google Classroom. Students will be quizzed on these words early next week.
Your student should be reading independently each evening for approximately 20-30 minutes. Last week we took our first trip to the library, and most of the students checked out 2 books. If they have not already begun to focus on some independent reading each night, please encourage this practice. It is the primary homework they will have for language arts. I have asked the students to try and complete at least one of their books by Aug. 26th. This will help me have a better idea of their independent reading comprehension. The students also have access to books and stories online at https://myon.com/. Your child's login is their student number, and their password is myon.. Another resource is http://tweentribune.com/ , which are high interest, short non-fiction articles. Both would provide wonderful practice for your student.
Math- Mrs. McKinney
Thank you to all the parents who were here Thursday night! I enjoyed talking with each of you.
Concept for this week will be:
We will be finding the measures of angles this week. The students will be required to find missing angle measures. Some of the angles will have variables, so they will be solving equations this week. What fun! I am excited to see all the wonderful things they can do. Thursday the students will take a quiz on parallel lines and triangles. Tuesday they will get their first project that they have to have completed by the end of class on Friday. This will not need to be worked on at home.
Helpful links
Social Studies- Mr. Salser
This week we will be focusing on the first recorded settlements in Georgia by the Native Americans. We will discuss the four periods of development from the least technically advanced to the most technically advanced. Paleo period, Archaic period, Woodland period, and the Mississippian period. We will look at advancements in hunting, tools, weapons, housing, ruling class, artistic development, and religious development. Also, I will post the first words for vocabulary quiz 1 and the first test date will be established this week. As always, if you have any questions please feel free to email me. tsalser@camden.k12.ga.us.
Thanks and have a wonderful week.
Science- Mrs. Allen
This week in Science we will be doing several experiments as we explore inferences, non-visual observations, predicting, measurement, density, and graphing! We will have our first vocabulary quiz on Wednesday, and we will continue adding to our interactive notebooks! I look forward to everyone's attendance this week! :)
Teacher Contact Information
Mrs. Allen- callen@camden.k12.ga.us
Mrs. McKinney- dmckinney@camden.k12.ga.us
Mr. Salser- tsalser@camden.k12.ga.us
Ms. Waxman- bwaxman@camden.k12.ga.us
Location: 205 Martha Drive, Saint Marys, GA, United States
Phone: (912)-882-8626