Canaan Families,

It has been great to see some of the amazing work happening in the classrooms at Canaan. Students are engaged and showing so much growth in their classes! From students working on their writing using textual evidence to hands-on experiments, there is a lot of student engagement and positive energy within our classrooms. In 5th grade, our students have been reading Tuck Everlasting and used their writing strategies to create well-developed responses to different writing prompts. Students have also been refining their math skills in 5th grade as they work on fractions and decimals using hands-on activities that include interactive number lines and other manipulatives throughout the classroom.

In 6th grade, students have enjoyed working on the rock cycle and learning through experiments using AirHeads (they might have eaten a few as well). In ELA class, I have been so impressed with our student's ability to evaluate texts, identify the claims and arguments, and then support their stance with textual evidence. The discussions within the groups are fun to listen to and full of insight and perspective. Our students have done a great job of thinking critically and truly have amazing ideas and thoughts!

These examples are just a few of the lessons happening in your student's classrooms. I look forward to the rest of the school year to see the growth our students show as we move into the final three months of the school year!

Mr. Walter, Principal

Canaan Middle School

ELA: Students are continuing to practice reading skills as they read their fictional books. Teachers are reading aloud Tuck Everlasting and have been using this text to model reading strategies, such as interpreting figurative language, analyzing plot development, and recognizing themes in a story. Students should be practicing these skills in their own independent reading books as well. Please make sure your child is reading at least 20 minutes outside of class every day and that s/he is completing their weekly reading responses since these are not accepted late! The kids had this week off due to the short week.

Math: We have spent the last week working on the standard algorithm for multiplication and division. For multiplication, this included multiplying multi-digit numbers by other multi-digit numbers (ex: 495x187). For division, we divided by up to 2-digit divisors (ex: 493÷39). For students who still struggle with their math facts, I have really tried to have students write their facts off to the side. If they aren’t sure, then I encourage them to use repeated addition to find the next multiple. Once they have created their own list, they can simply go back and reuse it for other problems. Moving forward, we are going into Multiplying and Dividing Decimals.

Science: Students discovered that the sun and stars appear to move across the sky, but it is actually planet Earth that is rotating and revolving around the sun that makes this illusion. We made models to simulate what causes night and day, (Earth’s rotation on its axis), as well as models to simulate the causes of the seasons, (Earth’s tilt on its axis combined with the positions of the hemispheres while revolving around the sun). We will end our study of Rotation/Revolution of Earth with a quiz on Wednesday, March 1st. Notes taken in class in our science notebooks will prepare students for the quiz.

Social Studies: Students in social studies are continuing their study of early Mesoamerican civilizations. In Mrs. Hanson’s class the last two weeks, students researched an aspect of Aztec daily life and presented their topic to the class.

Tiers of Success Celebration: On Friday, February 24th all students who were eligible for the end-of-month celebration enjoyed watching a movie in the gymnasium. In order to qualify for the celebration, students need to consistently follow classroom expectations throughout the month and turn in their assignments on time. Students with no missing assignments or office referrals earned ice cream sundaes as an additional reward! Please make sure that you are checking Canvas regularly and that assignments are getting completed and submitted on time so that students can participate in our next celebration at the end of March! We’d love to have 100% participation!

Camp Oty'Okwa: More information coming soon!

6th graders will be heading to Camp Oty'Okwa near South Bloomingville, OH May 10th- May 12th - mark your calendars!

We will have our first camp meeting with students on Friday, March 17th. Permission slips and a letter containing lots of other important information and dates will be passed out.

6th grade Dance Information

Who: All 6th graders

When:Thursday, March 10th

Where: Canaan Middle School

Who are the chaperones? : 6th grade teachers and Mr. Clapham

What should students wear? Students are asked to come to school dressed nicely on the 10th as they will NOT have time to change throughout the day. Remember that school rules regarding dress code still apply. Often our girls choose to wear dresses/skirts and our boys choose to wear khakis and nice shirts.This is not mandatory though- Students should wear what they feel comfortable in and what they can comfortably dance in!

Should my child be asking someone to the dance? No, the purpose of this dance is to show off the dancing skills that they have learned in PE class!

Hello, this week I will be starting a new series where each week I will interview and talk to all the new members of Canaan Middle School so we can learn a little more about our newest members. This week I will be interviewing our principal, Mr. Walter. Now, instead of going and setting up meetings. I have put together a survey so the people I'm interviewing can do it on their own time. Here were Mr. Walter's responses to my questions.

In my first question I asked, What was your job before you worked at CMS and here's what he said, "I was the Junior High principal at Urbana City Schools." In my next question, I asked How Many people are in his family he responded," I have 4 total people in my family. My wife and two children." My third question was Do you have any pets if so how many his obvious response was, "I have two dogs." Do you like CMS he responded very enthusiastically, "I absolutely love working with the students and staff at CMS. This has been an amazing year and I look forward to the rest of the school year!". That last question will wrap up this article I would also like to thank everyone for giving me a chance at an article Goodbye and thank you for your time.

Griffin Keene

CMS 5th Grade

Commonsense Media

Commonsense Media is an online tool that can help parents and students make informed decisions regarding media use. This tool can be used for many types of media, including books, movies, video games, and apps.

Canvas

Canvas is a Learning Management System that is used in grades 5-12 at Jonathan Alder. You and your student will find a lot of information about the school and your student's classroom through this platform. It is VERY important to stay connected and log on to Canvas. This link should help you log on and explain Canvas.

NEWSIES musical tickets will go live for the public Wednesday, March 20 at 10:00 am. Tickets are available on our website. Jamb-arts.org

Music Booster meetings are on the 4th Monday of each month at 7:00 in the High School Choir room. We'd love to meet you!

Families: Please add the following dates to your calendar. Our staff will be taking part in Professional Development meetings on the following dates and students will NOT be in school.

Friday, March 3, 2023

Click on the School Flyers icon for updated community activities and events. PCABA ball sign-up has recently been added!