SLC sign-ups and Picture Day

Important Events Coming Up!


Student Led Conferences will be held October 13 through October16. Please sign up by clicking here.


Picture Day for 8th grade is Tuesday October 28 at 10:50.  If your student is unavailable at that time, make-ups are any morning between 10/27 and 10/30 from 8:30 to 8:55.  Final make-up date is Thursday November 20.

Week of Sept 22-26

Thank you to all parents who attended the 8th grade May 13-21 Northern CA trip meeting. We had nearly 2/3 of parents attend. Elise, one of our fantastic room parents will be sending out a recap of the meeting as well as monthly reminders for payments due. For an idea of what students have to look forward to, click here for last year's itinerary. The first $75 payment is due Nov. 1. For fundraising help and ideas, please contact Felicia, our other wonderful room parent.

• ST Math is back up and running for home practice. If your student has difficulty getting on the site, you may have to enter a new activation code:  INN73X-LKP-GF-4QH.
• Here is work assigned in math class to accompany our Bridge Strength and Length Problems 1.1 and 1.2 in our math investigations.   Students can work at home on these problems if they would like to move at a quicker pace. Starting on page 15:  Applications Problems 1,2     Connections Problems 7-26  Extension Problems(extra credit) 33,35
• We started Zingy Science, an online science program to reinforce our science curriculum. This week students started on Lesson 1: Structure and Matter. Students will then work on Lesson 8: Planets to complement their study of the Solar System in Wes' science class.  
• We are launching the 8th Grade Writers Workshop curriculum this week. Students are reading literature (novels, poetry, short stories, etc.) in order to understand, analyze and implement elements of fiction in their reading and writing.
• Students will work with Nikki, our art teacher this week to turn their Walk A Mile In My Shoes poems into a work of art. 
• We will add the element of compassion to our investigation on Diversity in the Community.  We will study current events as well as events from early U.S. history and look at the role compassion plays in influencing our actions.
  
  
  
  Student Led Conference and Picture Day is coming quickly!  Please look for details and sign-ups in next post.

Recap and What's Coming

  

Marshmallow Challenge

We had a very busy first few weeks of school!  We are still working on a means of communication through our school website for each of our teacher portfolios.  Look forward to this blog being linked to my class portfolio asap! 

Meeting our K/1 buddies

Our YMCA Teambuilding Campout was a huge success.  So many lessons were learned and transformations made.  Students accomplished things they did not know they were capable of doing.  The experience truly brought our class community closer through trust, responsibility, respect and fun!

This coming week we will concentrate on honing our social skills by practicing transition times and routines.  Because our class is large, it takes quite a bit of time to transition from room to room or subject to subject.  We will be coming up with techniques to better utilize our school time together.

We will also practice effective critique as we will be editing and helping others create their best work throughout the year.  Critique is best when it is Kind, Helpful and Specific.

Lego Ducks and Diversity

We will continue our Diversity in the Community Project, which is centered around the questions, "How do differences enhance community?" and "How can we use our differences to enhance our community?" We are exploring these questions through  reading Lord of the Flies, various writing activities, creating poetry, looking at current events and discussing how diversity can help or harm a community.  We will edit our Walk a Mile in My Shoes poems(click here for example and poem template) and discuss our own diverse traits and feelings.  The poems will transform into a beautiful piece of art in the next week or so.  We will also investigate compassion and how it relates to our class community as well as the world around us.

Our math program includes the Connected Mathematics 3 (CMP3) curriculum, a text and online based program that uses hands on activities to explore algebra concepts.  We will also use MathXL, an online program connected to CMP3,  and continue with ST Math. During our first unit on Thinking With Mathematical Models, we investigate linear and inverse variation class.  So far we have been exploring data patterns by investigating how bridge length and strength are related.   Students will determine rate of change from these investigations. They will learn how to take data from a table and a graph to predict rates of change and determine whether a system is linear or nonlinear.

Linear relationships: Bridge Building

                   




We learned about the Engineering Design Process and compared it to the Scientific Method.

Students built Starburst Arches and created Rube Goldberg Contraptions that are to be completed this coming Tuesday. Click here for the assignment specifications.

Engineering Design and Starburst Arches

For information about more science, follow Wes' blog in my "links I like" section to the right of this post --->

Welcome 2014-15 8th Grade Families!

Until further notice, this site will be the 8th Grade source for the latest news from our class. Today students brought home a weekly School/Home Communication Notebook that includes a journal entry of work done, accomplishments, challenges, reminders of upcoming events and any school paperwork and flyers. Please look over and discuss with your student about their week. Please sign at the bottom of each week's journal entry and feel free to comment. Usually the Communication Notebook will be going home on Thursday and returned back to school Friday.


I will update this blog every Sunday by 6:00pm. Feel free to email lisa@innovationsacademy.org with questions or concerns. I will respond within 24 hrs.


I am so excited to work with this amazing group of kids this year. I have already been inspired by our class and we have only just begun!