Week of December 15

Gingerbread Challenge 

Rocket Week in 5/6 Science

Bottled Water Presentations to 3/4 Houses

Week of December 8th - 12th

TA’s Notes:

VOYAGER NIGHT HAS BEEN RESCHEDULED FOR WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 17TH!

Snacks and Mingling: 6:30-7:00 in the Dining Room

Performances: 7:00-8:30ish in the Auditorium

After school with Ms. Sherman:

Reading continues on Wednesdays. I am encouraging students to join us for some experiences with difficult readings to gain strategies. Last week was a very small group and am hoping to see more students this coming Wednesday, December 17th. Hope to see you there!

The Week in Mr. Merrill’s Room (⅚ Humanities):

In Reading Cafe students searched for Tier 2 words to add to their word lists and continued to write and reflect in the “Me as a Reader” section of their Reading Response Notebooks. In Current Events this week, we talked about the protests in Ferguson and NYC. Students discussed the differences between a riot and a protest, and wrote about peaceful ways in which they can protest and get their message out.

We are starting to focus on informational writing for the 2nd trimester. We used an article on American Indians to practice responding to text questions. Students spent some time revising their work from last week. Revision focused on responding to all parts of the question, citing evidence from the text, and explaining how the evidence supports the response. Students had some more practice with this later in the week.

For the last two weeks, we have been “setting the stage” for our study of Colonial America. We started by mapping and learning about the theory of how the first Americans arrived in North Ameirca. We then moved on to exploration, mapping the European claims to North America in the 16th and 17th centuries and discussing reasons for the claims. To wrap up the week, we completed two historical reenactments. The first was on the first contact between French explorers on Lake Champlain in 1609 and Algonquin Indians. The second was a reenactment based on Samuel De Champlain’s journal entry on the battle with an Iroquoian war party on the lake. Both events were extremely significant to the history of North America for the next 150 years. We will be processing the reenactments next week.

We will not be starting another literature group round until after the break. Now is a great time for your student to pick a great independent reading book to take them through the vacation.

Historical Reenactment - Champlain and Algonquins vs. Iroquois

The Week in Ms. O’s Room (⅚ Math & Science):

Math 5:  Students have finally wrapped up our unit on fraction addition and subtraction.  It was a unit filled with a lot of related math topics like finding a fraction of a whole number, using ratios to determine the better buy, and multi-digit multiplication.  I wouldn’t have seen the wisdom in combining all of these in a fraction unit, but I have to say, they complemented each other well!  Students have become much more versatile at solving problems, by having all of these skills and abilities.  This next unit will bring us more comfort in multiplying and dividing whole numbers and is an introduction to decimals.  Bridges will continue to build number sense by reinforcing the halving, doubling strategy, ten times more or less, etc.

It’s Computer Science week, so today, we decided not to use computers!  Of course, this one appealed to me!  After one person wrote code, the other person decoded the code in order to build a cup stack!  I decided to do this instead of a computer code, because I felt as though it would promote the ideas of coding while still engaging the body!  It was so fun!  Ask your student about it!

Moby Max is a really important part of learning for the week.  Many students lost valuable points on final grades first trimester because of low scores on Moby.  Please encourage this..students have 7 days to complete 1 hour of the program. About 10 minutes a day!  

Math 6:  This week, students took a final assessment for the Comparing Bits unit and ended the week practicing and mastering the traditional algorithms for multiplication and division of whole numbers.  We practiced and practiced, which I realize is so very important.  We need to practice more!  We have just wrapped up Comparing Bits and Pieces and are moving on to our next book, Let’s be Rational.  The goals of this book are:  to build proficiency in all operations with fractions.  It is implied that students have had enough work with addition and subtraction, so this topic is covered briefly.  The majority of the book focuses on multiplication and division and moves students toward the algorithms to solve any kind of problem involving these two operations.  

It’s Computer Science week, so today, we decided not to use computers!  Of course, this one appealed to me!  After one person wrote code, the other person decoded the code in order to build a cup stack!  I decided to do this instead of a computer code, because I felt as though it would promote the ideas of coding while still engaging the body!  It was so fun!  Ask your student about it!

Moby Max is a really important part of learning for the week.  Many students lost valuable points on final grades first trimester because of low scores on Moby.  Please encourage this..students have 7 days to complete 1 hour of the program. About 10 minutes a day!  

Science ⅚:  We have had an interesting week of learning about gravity.  After dropping objects, keeping detailed logs of which object hits the ground first, attending a scientists’ meeting, watching Felix Baumgartner jump 2 ½ miles from Earth, and discussing how gravity affects masses, we are all feeling better about knowing just a little bit more about this invisible force we call gravity.  Our long block this week was an opportunity to pull things together, read a little, view educational videos in order to transfer our understanding of gravity here on Earth to how gravity works in space.  Have you ever wondered why the moon has less gravity than Earth, or how we know that gravity is a two way attraction, or just why it is that no matter where you are on Earth, things fall downward (or toward the center of the planet)?  These are the kinds of questions that students have been trying to answer.  Next week, we are building rockets and launching them on Thursday.  If you did not receive the first email to come, join in, help out, you are still of course welcome to come. We will put you to work!

The Week in Ms. Wesnak’s Room (⅞ Humanities):

This week has been filled to the brim with poetry practice and beginning our study of WWI!

Our morning time together has been spent studying poetry. This is a great 2 week unit that will finish up just in time for the Winter Break. We started this week by reading some of the classics by poets such as William Carlos Williams, Maya Angelou, Emily Dickinson, and Robert Frost. By looking at these poems we were able to get great insight into how different all poems can be. They do not all have to be profound or rich in detail. Some poems can be simple, short, and still provide imagery or a message to their audience. We have been starting each class with poetic journal writing, followed by practice of new poetic forms, and finishing with group challenges. All of this in-class practice has been in preparation for our poetry quiz on Friday! After taking their poetry quiz students will be given their “Poetic License”, which will give them creative freedoms when working on their poetry books next week. Students have been writing some wonderful pieces of poetry with details that have painted beautiful images. I’m really looking forward to their poetry books next week!

During our afternoons together students have been working hard on their WWI projects. The 7/8 community is working in groups of 3-4 to create a museum exhibit focusing on a topic related to WWI. Students are using photographs, maps, creating great posters or trifolds, and some are even creating artifacts or models. This will be a great showcase of work! Some of the topics students are studying for their WWI exhibit are the Battle of Argonne, the Treaty of Versailles, the Zimmermann Telegram, Inventions, Weapons, Participating Countries and Why, and The Life of a Soldier.  All of these topics and more will be displayed in Voyager’s first, History and Space Museum! The museum will be open on Friday, December 19th and parents, guardians, and families are welcome to come! The museum will also feature our, “Faces of America” exhibit featuring our American portraits and definitions of what it means to be an American. During the early opening, from 7:45-8:15, we will have coffee available for adults who are stopping by on their way to work! Please join us at the museum opening!!

The Week from Ms. Q’s Room (⅞ Math & Science):

CMP8

The past two weeks have been busy ones.  We completed our “Looking for Pythagoras” unit where we learned to use the Pythagorean Theorem to find an unknown side of a right triangle. We constructed both a visual model and learned why and when to use the a2 + b2 =c2 equation. We played a bristling game of jeopardy and took the unit test on Tuesday.  We are now moving into quadratic equations; another type of nonlinear function that are parabolic in shape.  We began by investigating the similarities and differences between these functions and linear, inverse variation and exponential functions.

CMP7

We have been hard at work in our 7th grade math class finishing up our “Stretching and Shrinking Unit”.  Students are using ratios/proportions and scale factor to find missing lengths of geometric figures. We also investigated the connection between scale factor of similar images and the change in area.  We experimented with using mirrors in order to measure the height of an object indirectly.  Next week will bring our unit test and our “Blow it Up” project.   

Science 7th/8th

Students have been working in teams of four to create a space exhibit that tells a story or asks and answers an essential question with pictures, interactive models and words. Some topics include: What are stars? What are black holes or wormholes? What are exoplanets? Our classroom will become a walk into space and the museum opens on Friday, December 19th  7:45- 8:15 a.m. as part of the Voyager 7th/8th History and Space Museum.  Come stop by on your way to work!

Water Bottle Sales Pitch

Week of December 1

Report Cards

Please look for grade cards today!  Please return folders if indicated.

Water Bottle Project

5th, 6th, and 7th grade students on Voyager have worked hard to put their learning into action!  Enter the bottles!  Students designed and ordered these bottles as a community action in order to reduce single use water bottle purchases.  

Cost:  $6.00

Checks:  Make out to WCS

Ordering Details: Students should complete a slip and deposit in Ms. Fieldsend’s in box.  Water bottles will be delivered, once order and payment are received.

Thanks for your support!

Week of November 17th - 21st

TA’s Notes:

Advisory:  Thanks to all advisory members who donated food for the Thanksgiving Baskets Voyager is donating to the food shelf in Williston.  It is thoughtful of you to consider those in our community who can use a little assistance.  We will take a picture of the baskets before delivery on Tuesday!

Voyager Community- We on Voyager work hard to make everyday a fun, invigorating, and educational experience. Sometimes we have amazing units happening in our classrooms that would be even more enhanced by providing out of the classroom experiences. We’re talking about field trips. But….field trips take support and funds. We would love to continue to provide rich, hands-on experiences for students. We need your support! Every year, the Williston Annual fund requests a one-time amount of money from families to support these causes. This year, less than 20% of Voyager families submitted to this fund. We urge you to send in your contribution to help support our efforts.                                                                                  

Washington DC Trip Update:  We are excited to have contracts in for 8th graders attending the DC trip.  Ms. O will be meeting with students after the break to discuss contracts, work completion expectations, and a basic itinerary for the trip.  We have a Capitol tour and Holocaust Museum plan in motion, but are awaiting scheduling these experiences due to booking policies at both locations.  We should have both of these opportunities scheduled by January 15.  More info to follow...got to get my head around it!  Ms. O

Ms. Sherman:

The after school organizational club has come to an end. Thanks to all the great kids who stayed after to work on these skills.

The next session starts in December, after the Thanksgiving break. The next session’s topic will be about tough reading. Students are sometimes presented with reading material that is difficult for them to read. These sessions will look at strategies to use when the reading is hard. It’s a great way for kids to get more confidence even when faced with text that is “above” their level. If your child struggles with reading informational text, this would be a great opportunity for them to gain some new skills. Below is the schedule for Reading club:

Wednesday, December 3→ 3-4:00

Wednesday, December 17→ 3-4:00

Wednesday, January 7→ 3-4:00

Wednesday, January 14→ 3-4:00

The Week in Mr. Merrill’s Room (⅚ Humanities):

This week for the wrap up of our Reading Cafe, students updated their Reading Response Notebooks for the end of the trimester. Notebooks should show evidence of ongoing reading, reflections, responses, and new vocabulary. For current events, we have been spending time practicing with news sources to find local, national, and international news. Students have also been working with large maps in the classroom, and charting where important news stories are taking place, which we will continue throughout the year. We have been talking about events in the Middle East, U.S. and local elections, and the G20 summit. Students are encouraged to continue to watch the news and read the paper over break, to share with the class when we return.

On Tuesday, we continued our work on a mock trial using the Pro Se Court format.  Each student prepared for their role (judge, attorney for the city of Chicago, or attorney for Jesus Morales), with a group of students with the same role. They then judged or argued the case on their own. Judges made a decision at the end of the hearing. We discussed the results of the actual case, and that the Supreme Court’s ruling was a close 6-3 decision in favor of Morales.

On Wednesday, we had a visit from the author of the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series, Jeff Kinney. He spoke about his journey as a writer/illustrator and the process he uses to create each book. It was a really cool event!

On Thursday, we took a look at the system of checks and balances for our government. Students completed a diagram and prepared for a quiz on Friday. We also had a chance at the end of the day to play an icivics game - Supreme Decision. This is a great online game that brings the student into the decision making process on a Supreme Court case. Try it at home and see how you do!

The Week in Ms. O’s Room (⅚ Math & Science):

Math 5-Students worked hard this week to bridge the divide between finding fractions of a number and using that understanding to add and subtract fractions with different denominators.  Students used double number lines, number lines which have two scales on them - a fraction of the whole scale and the number that indicates one whole.  So in a problem like this one...A man sets out for a week long hike that is 100 km long and walks ¼ of the way the first day and ⅕ of the way the second day.  How much of the trail has he hiked?  students can use ¼ + ⅕ ( unlike denominators) as the problem to solve, but do so using their understanding of ¼ of 100, which is 25/100 miles and ⅕ of the trail which is 20/100 miles (a common denominator) and now add for 45/100 which is the same as ¼ + ⅕ = 9/20.  Perhaps it is too hard to share this idea, so please ask your kiddo to show you a double number line.  Students practiced using a triple beam balance for finding the mass of objects.  They did a great job.  What a focused class period this was!

PLEASE DO MOBY MAX OVER BREAK!

Math 6-This week, students worked on understanding decimals.  We reviewed the Base Ten place value names, practiced saying decimals, placing decimals on number lines, comparing decimals and even determining decimals between decimals.  I’m always reminded of how important preliminary discussions are around this topic; place value is a really important foundation in math, and I often underestimate the gaps students have in this area.  This investigation also introduces negative numbers and discusses absolute value.  I have found the introduction of absolute value to be an essential one in helping students understand the negative side of the number line.

PLEASE DO MOBY MAX OVER BREAK!

Science ⅚:  This week students began an important discussion about matter and gravity. We finalized ideas about matter, since gravity acts on all matter, so that we had a working definition of it.  We also began an inquiry task where students dropped objects to determine which object would hit the ground first.  Day One was an open inquiry to choose objects and drop them, while Day Two was a more focused inquiry on determining whether mass affects which object will hit the ground first.  Students are all dropping spherical objects and the time lapse option on ipads in order to ensure accurate data collection.  As part of this inquiry opportunity, students are using triple beam balances to find the masses of objects.  This will bring us to some important claims about gravity as a force on Earth.

STUDENTS WILL BE RECEIVING A FEW HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENTS THIS NEXT UNIT, INCLUDING A MOON JOURNAL.  HELP THEM BY OBSERVING THE MOON AT ALL TIMES OF THE DAY!

The Week in Ms. Wesnak’s Room (⅞ Humanities):

This week in Humanities we have been working hard on our argument papers and starting our studies on early 20th Century history with the big immigration boom!

During our morning time together students worked on bringing our Trimester 1 unit to a close, by creating a new American flag and defining themselves as Americans. The new American flags were a great way for students to illustrate their reflections on the unit, and put to paper symbols, colors, and pictures that (to them) represent who we are as a country. The definitions were also a really great way for students to reflect on what they’ve learned, but to now take their gained knowledge and connect it back to themselves. Another creative element that students participated in was having their American Portraits taken. These portraits will be printed and showcased in an exhibit titled, “The Faces of America” in our upcoming American History Museum! More to come on the museum later! As the week continued on 7th and 8th graders had their rough drafts edited for their 5-paragraph argument essays on youth immigration. As the week came to a close students watched a documentary introducing them to the experiences of immigration in the early 20th Century, Ellis Island, and the Ellis Island Museum.

Our afternoon time together was spent simulating our way through defining terms for our next mini unit of study: early 20th Century immigration. Students were asked to look at 3 words and define them: refugee, immigrant, and emigrant. Students were told that all 3 words have similarities, but they are different from each other. Our focus for this week was  to understand the differences, and make connections to find the similarities, between a refugee and an immigrant. We had a lot of fun with these simulations and the 7/8 community was really respectful, inclusive, and creative when dealing with the challenges they faced! These simulations were a great way for students to really see the similarities and differences between a refugee and an immigrant, and they were also a great stepping stone into our studies that will start after the break. Simulations are also a great way to do some hands-on learning in and out of the classroom!

Thank you for a great 1st Trimester! It has been filled with creative thought, critical thinking, and thoughtful reflection. I hope everyone has a healthy and happy Thanksgiving!

The Week from Ms. Q’s Room (⅞ Math & Science):

CMP8

This week we looked more closely at that the meaning of square roots and cubed roots,  better known as radicals.  We began a new unit called “Looking for Pythagoras” which had us creating squares on a diagonal and finding the side lengths based on the area of the square.  Students learned the derivation of the square root and cube root by creating models.  We became more adept at estimating where a square root  of a number would lie on a number line, by using the perfect square numbers that we know such as 4,9,16 which are 2, 3 and 4. When we come back from Thanksgiving Break, we will learn how the Pythagorean Theorem was derived.

On a special note, all CMP 8 students have an algebra placement credit intent letter that must be read, signed and returned when we get back.  Thank you for your attention to this detail.

CMP7

What makes geometric figures similar?  We began our “Stretching and Shrinking” unit with finding the similarities and differences of figures that are scaled down or blown up.  Students practiced their graphing skill as we created the “Mug Wump” characters, their fanny packs and hats! Students also created simple characters and coordinate pair instructions for their classmates. These skills link to translating figures using a rule and will be seen in the future when we stretch, shrink and move non-linear functions.

Science 7th/8th

Gravity! This week we continued our exploration of this force to pin down a better understanding of what it is and how it relates to the mass of an object. We viewed a video called the “Lords of Gravity”  which had amazing footage of planets, rings, and evidence of gravitation force in space.  There was a lot of enthusiasm for space exploration so we spent an afternoon looking into NASA and other space agencies to see what probes are out there, what their mission is, and what they have found out. Students also began to brainstorm possible project ideas with the solar system and space in mind.  These projects will begin after break.

Week of November 10th - 14th

TA’s Notes:

Snack time is a “working snack” meaning students have a small snack in the morning during class time.  They are given time to retrieve their snacks and are expected to eat and work during class time.  Any food that needs to be microwaved must be held back until lunch time.

Message from CVU Student:

Winter Coat Drive

This year CVU's sophomore class partnered with Vermont Refugee Resettlement Program in helping those in need of winter coats stay warm this winter. We are hoping that the community of Williston will aid us in our mission by bringing in your gently used winter wear and leaving it in the box in the WCS lobby. Our drive will be ending the day before Thanksgiving break, with possible extension. Thank you for all your help in support!

                                                        -Eva Rocheleau Sophomore Co-President

After school with Ms. Sherman:

Homework Club - Mr. Merrill is available (most days) at Homework Club (until 4pm) for individual or small group support. Please let him know ahead of time if you would like to schedule individual support for your student.

If your student is staying for Homework Club, please pack an extra snack for your child, some of the students are mentioning that they are hungry at the end of the day. Thank you.

The Week in Mr. Merrill’s Room (⅚ Humanities):

The focus for our Reading Cafe this week was to think about how the book you are reading makes you feel or to identify the feelings of the characters in your book. Students wrote a response to this in their Reading Response Notebooks. For current events, the kids completed a scavenger hunt, learning how to navigate online news sources and newspapers to find articles on specific topics. They had a lot of fun working with their “clock partners” on this activity.

Following our visit to the book fair, students continued working on taking Cornell Notes. This time, they were responsible for taking their notes independently using the Cornell format.  At the end of the unit, students will have taken Cornell Notes on all three branches of government.

Finally, in conjunction with our study of the branches of government, students prepared for a mock trial using the Pro Se Court format. Each student is preparing for their role (judge, attorney for the city of Chicago, or attorney for Jesus Morales), and will participate in the court hearing next week. The case is based on a real Supreme Court ruling.

Finally, a big THANK YOU for all of the book donations. These books will become a part of our own house library, students can sign them out throughout the school year. We will do a book review of all the new additions after the Thanksgiving break. We have had over 75 books signed out since the beginning of the school year.

The Week in Ms. O’s Room (⅚ Math & Science):

Math 5:Our goal this week is to build the idea of equivalent fractions into our understanding of operations with fractions.  We spent a few days viewing number lines and trying to relate, say a number line divided into fifths with one divided into tenths.  We even looked at sixths and eighths to begin to understand how this could be true.  Generalizations came about...the first is:  whenever lines match up on a number line in which the wholes are the same, then you have a pair of equivalent fractions.  The other generalization was related to multiplying by 1 or another name for one, like 2/2.  So a fraction like 4/6 and ⅔ can be proven equivalent which the lines on their respective number lines match up.  We can also prove equivalence by saying that ⅔ x 2/2 equals 4/6. Any number multiplied by 1 is itself. Continental math folks have been working really hard and took their first challenge this week. Thanks to Sandy Connolly for all she is doing to help students work through these interesting problems.

Math 6:  Our goal this week is to move from fractions and ratios to decimals and to see these representations as offering a deeper understanding of numbers that represent parts of wholes.  We had several interesting problems to work through and students worked hard on them.  The first was to go back to some basic skills like renaming improper and mixed numbers and then comparing them to each other.  We also look at groups of fractions to decide using generalizations which are greater.  The generalizations were:  comparing to ½ to see if the number is bigger or smaller than ½; viewing fractions whose denominators were different but numerators were the same; viewing and comparing fractions whose denominators are the same, but whose numerators are different; and viewing fractions which are one unit away from the whole.  Students were really challenging by this last one, but used what they know about unit fractions to work their way to the generalization.  We are moving to decimal representations next week and a last quiz on Investigations 1-3 in Comparing Bits.

Science ⅚:  

• creating and launching rockets the week before the holiday break.  Check it out and come see!
• photo or sketch journal of the moon’s phases.
• trout eggs are arriving in January!

Students are completing a word map to reinforce relationships amongst words in science.  The focus of the map is on Natural Selection.  Students have done a really nice job trying to figure out how traits and genes are related to each other and how Darwin and Natural Selection or Origin of Species are related.  Students worked in partner groups.  I will be giving a pie chart to students on Monday to ask them to reflect on the partnership and how balanced it was in terms of the work completed.  Please remind your child that they are responsible for their part, not the part their partner has chosen to do or not do!  Final assessment was today.  Students really persevered through a lot of vocab identification and essay type questions.  Good for them!

The Week in Ms. Wesnak’s Room (⅞ Humanities):

This week in Humanities has been loaded with debates, essay construction, and bringing our citizenship project to a close!

During our morning time together students started the week with our usual Independent Reading Mondays. Students were asked to analyze the title of their book and find evidence to support why the book was given its title, or find evidence to support a new title of their own making. As the week moved on spent two of our classes debating birthright citizenship. Both classes were able to hold strong and respectful debates. Students were really able to draw evidence from sources and use them to support their opinions. All students participated and at the end, despite their differences in opinion, shook hands and congratulated each other on a job well done! The rest of the week was spent working on our 5-paragraph argument essay. Students will be writing about youth immigration in the U.S. and have been provided a whole packet filled with information such as the essay outline, a writing checklist, and the rubric.

Our afternoons started off with current events on Monday, and we also started to prep for the Geography Bee. We are using the Daily Quiz on National Geographic’s “Study Corner” site to start our preparation. The rest of the week was dedicated to bringing our citizenship project to a close. Students worked really hard on this project, and had a great time seeing how adults did on their tests! I’m excited to see the graphs and final data to see what kind of conclusions we can come to. A HUGE THANK YOU to all parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, neighbors, siblings, friends, and staff who took our tests! Without you, students would not have found the success they did in this project!!

The Week from Ms. Q’s Room (⅞ Math & Science):

CMP8

We completed our “Growing, Growing, Growing” Unit with a review of scientific notation, exponent rules and practice problems using both growth/decay rates and factors.  Students have learned to create equations, tables and graphs that reflect these mathematical systems. Unit tests and will be returned sometime next week. On Friday, we began our new investigation called “Looking for Pythagoras”.  We began to look at the origin of squares and square roots by creating different size squares both horizontally/vertically oriented and tilted.

CMP7

The 7th graders completed their Accentuate the Negative Unit with practicing Order of Operation and the Distributive Property.  We played an exciting game of jeopardy and completed a class record of our new “rules” when utilizing positive and negative integers.  We began our new unit called “Stretching and Shrinking” which looks at similar figures.  We used some rubber band stretchers to see if we could create a larger similar image from smaller ones.

Science 7th/8th

This week our focus was on Newton’s Third Law; for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.  We built and tested straw rockets to see firsthand how air going in one direction could launch a rocket in the opposite direction.  Students reviewed their motion and forces vocabulary for a brief “pop quiz” and then worked to find the definition of gravity and its relation to mass. Members of the class presented cartoons, raps, songs, demonstrations, posters and poems to explain this elemental force.