8th Grade Lock in- Ms. Sherman and Ms. Wesnak are happy to report that the 8th grade lock-in was a success! A big thank you to the 8th grade for making sure everyone stayed safe, had lots to eat, kept the building clean, and most importantly, had fun. We were both impressed with your abilities to keep going with positive energy all night and even more amazed that we could stay up all night as well...though both of your teachers slept the day away on Saturday to recover. Nice job 8th grade!!!
Extended Day- This coming week is the last week for students in our current round of extended day services. The core teachers and special educator will discuss what the next area of study will be and we will invite specific students to come and join us for some additional instruction. The extended day program, on house, meets every Tuesday and Thursday, from 3:05-4:20. The time allows for students to take the activity bus home, which leaves the school at 4:30. If your son or daughter is selected, you will receive a phone call, within the week. If you have questions about the program, please feel free to contact me, Courtney Sherman. My extension is 5643.
FAP Scholastic Book Fair - All Voyager students will be attending the book fair on Thursday (12/6). Students will have the opportunity to purchase a nice variety of books.
Trimester Closing: Can you believe that the first trimester is complete? We certainly can’t! It feels like only yesterday we were doing introductions in the Kiva :) Today was the last day to get work in for the 1st Trimester. If you happen to check Jupiter Grades over the weekend and some of your children’s classes are listed as “offline” or something of that sort, it is because all teachers will be finalizing grades and grade reports. Report cards will be out at the end of next week!
Ms. Q’s Corner
Math 7
Through a variety of walking and t-shirt rate problems students explored rates of change and the meaning of the y-intercept. We started using the y= mx + b format and made the connection between the term “coefficient “, slope, and rate of change. We looked for points of intersection between two lines and how to figure out if a random coordinate point can be found on a given line. This trimester is coming to a close, however we will continue on with our “Moving Straight Ahead Unit” into next trimester.
Math 8
Sally decided to select some seashells at the seashore and she needed to find a car rental company that would give her some driving distance up and down the coast. Students reviewed points of intersection of two linear equations and how to solve these problems by means of graphs, tables and solving it algebraically. We also considered the conditions under which one company would be better than others. Next we dabbled in solving linear inequalities. This trimester is drawing to a close and we will continue with our “Shapes of Algebra” unit into the next trimester.
Science ⅞
What will the future hold for us? Students pondered and completed their news articles from the year 2012. Cities painted white, ew forms of energy, U.S. citizens migrating to Canada, people living on boats and in floating cities are a few of the many news topics that students wrote about. Students read articles on the current science behind global warming and climate change. We ended the week with sharing our articles and began our new unit on Thermal Energy.
Mr. Merrill’s Wrap Up
⅚ Language Arts -
Following our Reading Cafe on Monday, students reflected on the author’s craft, writing about the techniques that the author uses to make them like the story. In Writers Workshop, we practiced the editing process with our argument papers. Students provided feedback to a partner on organization, evidence, and GUM. On the following day, student took that feedback, along with a teacher conference, and worked on a final draft. In vocabulary class, many students played a game (similar to Catch Phrase) to learn the new words for our next lesson.
⅚ Social Studies -
This week we kicked off our new unit “The Constitution”, with a variety of class and small group activities. The goal was to answer the question, “How does the Constitution organize our government?” We took a very close look at the Preamble, to determine the purpose of our Constitution.
This Week in Ms. Wesnak’s Room
7/8 Language Arts:
This week our 7th and 8th graders worked really hard to finish up their in-class work for the Shells for the NJ Shores project. We have already sold many shells, and have received some very generous donations from staff and students across the school. We are really starting to see all of our hard heArt-work come to a beautiful and beneficial close. We also continued to learn about poetry and the different forms it can take. We watched an inspiring video of Sarah Kay performing two of her most well known poems. We also took a look at 20th century art-work that inspired various poets to write some truly wonderful pieces of poetry.
7/8 Social Studies:
This week students wrapped up their research and projects on Global Governments. They presented to their table groups on Thursday and took in a WEALTH of knowledge. It was very cool to walk around the room house and sit in on a variety of presentations. It felt as if I was travelling the world with all of the beautiful images, maps, and of course Fun Facts presented. Today students reflected on their learning from this mini unit and we started a video on different cultures around the world and the similarities and differences between them. The video sparked some great conversation in both Social Studies classes, and in the end we are still left wondering why it is we all just can’t get along? Spark up some conversation of your own with your child and talk about culture and how it varies across the globe!
News from Ms. O
As we come to the end of the trimester, I hope that you will share in my appreciation for the hard work of our support staff. Barb Giardi, Bob Mitchell, Rebecca Spencer, and Elizabeth Percy have become partners to me, and the Voyager students, and deserve kudos! If you see them, please thank them for all of their hard work!
5th Grade Math
Cris Milks, the Enrichment Teacher, has joined our classroom as a resident mathematician! She is co-planning and co-teaching each class with me for the next 2 weeks, in order to inspire differentiated learning in the classroom. Students have really come around in the department of multi-digit multiplication and seem ready to move on to division. Thanks to 5th graders for their flexibility and willingness to learn from all adults in the classroom.
6th Grade Math
We spent our week investigating decimals and their relationship with fractions. We unpacked many challenging tasks that pulled at our understanding of fractions and decimals, including a studio day, which took place today. 5-8 teachers were really impressed with the culture of learning in the classroom and felt as though students know how to be accountable mathematicians and deep metacognitive thinkers! Thanks to the 6th grade students for being so open to having so many people in the classroom. We will continue our adventures next week with decimals and begin some percent work.
5/6 Science
We are wrapping up our density work on Monday with a quiz on density. Students may use any resources in order to show understanding of this property of matter. Student completed an open inquiry activity in which students chose an investigable question, fulfilled the investigation and documented their findings in a scientific write-up. Students learned about writing scientific claims, statement of scientific opinion based on evidence. This will be scored in this first trimester reporting. Ask your child about his/her float/sink activity. They learned a lot!
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