7th and 8th Grade Physics of Light Open House
- Tuesday, December 18th:
- 1:15- 1:45 on Voyager House. All are welcome!
Voyager Dance Night - Chaperones and Donations Needed!!!
- Voyager will be sponsoring a Dance Night on Friday, January 4th from 6:30 - 8:30 pm. This is a fun night for 6th - 8th graders to socialize and is an important fundraiser for the Voyager Team. We can’t pull it off without adult chaperones, food concession help, and donated goodies and drinks for our concession. If you would like to help us out, please add your name to our volunteer list.
- Many thanks in advance for your support!
Wanted for Science Project
- We want your cleaned-out, small tuna fish cans or cat food cans (Fancy Feast are the right size!).
Voyager Survival Unit - Volunteers Needed!
- Voyager is preparing for our Survival Unit in January. We are looking for parents who have outdoor survival skills expertise to teach afternoon workshops the week of January 7th. Volunteer instructors would only need to teach once in the afternoon that week. Please contact your core teacher if you are interested.
Marko the Magician Coming to WCS!
- Please join us for a fun-filled family evening of Magic and Hypnosis with Marko the Magician on Friday night, January 11, 2019 at 6:30pm - sponsored by Swift House. Entertainment for all ages! Concession! Click here for the Ticket Form.
REMINDER - 8th Grade Field Trip to Ridin-Hy
- Registration Deadline is Friday, 12/21/18:
- If you haven’t done so already, please review the documents below with your 8th grader about the exciting 8th Grade Celebration Trip to Ridin-Hy Ranch next spring.
- Registration and permission slips are due on or before December 21st, 2018.
Ridin Hy Information
Ridin Hy Behavior Expectations
Ridin Hy Medical Form
Ridin Hy Parent Consent Form
Ridin Hy Release Form
8th Grade Student DC trip Opportunity
Dear 8th Grade Parents,
Your student has an opportunity to join the Swift House sponsored trip to Washington D.C. this June. If you choose, your 8th grader may attend both the end of year trip to Ridin-Hy and this educational trip to Washington. You should have already received information about the Ridin-Hy trip. If you have not received anything please ask your student about it or your house TA. If your student is interested in attending the Washington D.C. trip please read the information attached and return the required forms to your house TA by the deadlines given. Please note that there are academic expectations for the Washington trip. If you have questions about the Washington trip please contact the Swift House TA, Lisa Barland, at lbarland@cvsdvt.org.
Behavior Contract
Permission Form
Morning Drop-Off & Supervision
- A clear and calm morning routines helps students to enter their school day successfully. We are encountering more and more students coming to school between 7:30-7:55 am and we are not equipped to handle the numbers. Please do not drop your child off prior to 7:55 am unless it is absolutely essential. If you have to drop your child off early, please reinforce that the expectation is that students sitting in the front lobby until 7:55 am and engaging in a quiet activities. Ex. listening to music, reading or finishing homework. Thanks for your help with this. - Jackie Parks
Voyager Web Site
- Please bookmark our web site to keep in touch with what’s happening in Voyager this year.
Absent Student? Appointment? Change in Bus ride home?
- Please email tmilks@cvsdvt.org and your core teacher if your student will be absent, needs to be picked up during the day for an appointment, or will ride a different bus home. Core teacher emails are:
cobrien@cvsdvt.org
amerrill@cvsdvt.org
jroof@cvsdvt.org
mquatt@cvsdvt.org
After School Homework Club:
Voyager House offers an after-school program to all 5-8 grade Voyager students who would like a smaller, quieter setting for work completion. We accept any student who is motivated to be there and willing to work independently and who is open to support. We may also recommend this opportunity to students who are in need of work completion or who consistently fail to complete assigned work. It has been a great program for students and we are happy to have the staffing and funding to offer it again this year. Ms. Kim and Ms. Allison, our two house paras, will be the contact adults for this group.
- Every Tuesday (2:00-3:00) and Thursday (3:00-4:40) right after dismissal.
- Occasionally cancelled due to staffing. We will let you know as far in advance as we know!
- A late bus is available for transportation home.
- Membership is through interest and motivation as well as strong recommendations from teachers.
Please do not bring in food to share.
- We have many food restrictions on house. Thanks!
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IMPORTANT LINKS
- Student Assistant Professional (SAP) - https://spark.adobe.com/page/ssMYvqB70CDFQ/
- WCS Athletics - Click this link to the website to view all information regarding the WCS Athletics program.
Voyager House Learning Tools for teachers, students, and parents:
- Google Site - an important site for regular communication coming from Voyager. This site will be modified weekly and should be bookmarked on your desktop or laptop. This site contains a link to weekly academic summaries as well as important upcoming events. https://sites.google.com/cvsdvt.org/voyagerhouse/home
- Google Classroom - an online planner platform where students can check on daily assignments. This is in lieu of a paper planner. Just ask your child to log in using his/her email. It is important to know that this is not an assessment database. We do not check completion of the assignment on this platform. However, we do ask that YOUR CHILD press the button MARK AS DONE when an assignment is completed. This will make it easy for you and your child to discuss completion of work.
- Google Mail - an email system used by Williston Central School. All students have an email account and students use it regularly to communicate with peers around collaborative work and project-based learning. This is a great way for teachers to communicate with students and a great way for students to get reminders about assignments from Google Classroom.
- Jumprope - an online platform for assessment of the targets. Students can view weekly or biweekly his/her achievement on the targets by logging in using his/her email and a password. This password was emailed to each student in a letter last week. *Habits of Learning, like homework completion and collaborative learning skills will be posted on a biweekly schedule. This is where you CAN SEE whether your child is in good standing on daily assignments. https://nyc.jumpro.pe/login/
- Protean - an online Personalized Learning Plan (PLP) platform used primarily at this point by 7th and 8th graders. ⅚ students may post executive function skills reflections, personal interest projects, and other measures of growth and reflection after 1st trimester. https://app.protean.me/index.html
- IXL - a program that supports students on math and language arts skills. https://www.ixl.com/signin
- Moby Max - a math program used by 5/6 math students to build computational fluency and fill gaps in understanding on major concepts. Students have a username and password for this program.
- Typing Club - a program used by the 5/6 humanities students to build typing skills.
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ACADEMIC UPDATES
Ms.Q
CMP8
The week the 8th graders began their unit called “Growing, Growing, Growing”. We worked on “step” books with important exponent rules. We practiced a variety of rules and explored some very specific rules that can be tricky. For example: -32 = -9 whereas (-32) = 9. Mr. Sironi led the class in an activity that looks at exponential growth of pennies over time. The question was whether you would choose a million dollars or a succession of pennies that double each day for 30 days. We began looking at tables, graphs and equations that show exponential growth.
CMP7
Students completed their Shapes and Designs unit assessment at the beginning of the week. We then looked into properties of circles and experimented with different circular objects to see the relationship between the diameter of the circle and the circumference. We found that through our investigation that the diameter of a circle can fit around the perimeter of a circle a little over 3 times. Students found pi or 3.14... for this relationship between diameter and circumference. We then moved onto finding the area of circles and ended the week with finding the area of a variety of figures without using formula. It challenged students to use a variety of strategies.
Science
This week students have been researching their light phenomena, finding demonstrations and creating accessible scientific explanations. Next week on Tuesday, December 18th from 1:15-1:45 we will have a brief Physics of Light Open House for several lower houses and the school community.
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Mr. Roof
7&8 Humanities:
Students delved into WWI propaganda this week through analysis of posters. We learned that authors of propaganda use seven primary "tricks" to increase the impact of their messages. Students viewed reproductions of original posters in pairs or individually, and analyzed them, identifying and explaining which of the tricks were used. We then discussed and debated our answers as a full group. Then, as a current tie-in, students selected advertisements to share with the class, and applied the tricks of propaganda.
Next, students participated in a WWI technology "lab." This lab focused on the numerous advancements in technology and weapons before and during WWI, and students used 9 stations with posters and QR codes in the classroom to find more information about the various technologies after making predictions. They recorded this information on charts. As an introduction to the lab, students listened to On Patrol in No Man's Land, by Jim Europe, a song from 1919, and analyzed the lyrics. We are focused on the claim and evidence targets in both current events using CNN 10, and the weekly reading log. Students are tying their claims to a big idea, and using multiple pieces of credible evidence to meet the learning targets.
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Mr. Merrill
Harry Potter Unit - Students did an amazing job reading picture books to the 3/4 students Tuesday afternoon. This was a kindness challenge and booster cells were presented to all of the students that participated. On Friday, we had our second wand ceremony and house challenge.
Students are really doing a great job reading the Harry Potter books. I am seeing excellent participation during the book talks and literature circles. Many students have read several books in the series at this point.
Ode Poetry - Students continued to work on their ode poem, using a variety of writing techniques during the drafting process. We hope to be prepared to share the poetry next week.
Ms. O'Brien's Classes
Ms. O'Brien's Classes
Math 5: We had a great week of learning this week. I have seen so much growth in student’s habits that we were able to have great discussions and advance individual thinking all at once. Well done! This week was filled with problem solving using factors and multiples. Although some students continue to need practice on finding the factors and multiples of a number, we have made great strides in using strategies to find them. Please continue to push your child to know their multiplication facts. There are some great links on Hooda math, but never underestimate the flashcards! I will be sending individual notices home for those who could use some practice over the vacation next week! Specifically we used common factors and common multiples to solve “sharing equally with no leftovers” and “at the same time” problems. Our focus next week will be to decide on the strategy when given a problem. Is this an at the same time problem? How do I know? Is this a sharing equally problem with no leftovers? How do I know? When I’m in this unit, I’m reminded of just how much there is to learn in math and so many ways to learn it!
We did have a studio this week, where many teachers came to my class, while I was teaching, and analyzed my teacher moves and how students responded to what I asked them to do. The fifth grade students tried really hard and were their best math selves. Other teachers were pretty impressed with the evidence of learning that students produced. Thanks again to each one of them, for helping me become a better teacher.
Math 6: We arrived at some great strategies for dividing fractions this week! Kady, Jacob and Molly all invented strategies that help us solve fraction division problems and they presented them and others practiced them over and over. It was pretty great to have students come up with these strategies when given problems that do not have common denominators. Jasper introduced us to the standard algorithm for division, which after using other methods, really made sense. We often wait on the algorithms in math, so that they make sense to us in the end. And we had another perfect segway in this unit. Division is sharing equally, so when you model, and consider common denominators, you are thinking about fair share. The algorithm of multiply by the reciprocal only makes sense if you understand fair share. We talked for some time about which strategy to use when. Sometimes the most efficient is to divide across and so students are encouraged to see this. See examples below.
⅚ Science: Our Muggle Magic Matter Demonstration project was introduced this week and students have made a great first effort in fulfilling the project goals. I have attached the handout to the Google Science Classroom, so please take a look if you need more information. Please be sure that you check in with your Voyager this weekend. They will need materials for their demonstration starting Monday. Students have chosen some pretty cool projects and so they may need a little help getting materials. Otherwise, we are using school time to make this project a reality.
Important Invitation Note: You are welcome to come to the Potions Lab on Wednesday from 10-11. Students will demonstrate their understanding of matter by showing how matter can change! Could be fun and messy!
