UPCOMING EVENTS, NEWS, and REMINDERS
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 e-mails are:
Spiral International Trip to China
- 7th and 8th grade students are parents are invited to attend an informational meeting about the educational trip to China from April 15-27th with Spiral International. Students and teachers that attend spend 5 days in Chinese schools interacting with students and attending classes and 5 days learning about the Chinese culture. The informational meeting will be held on Monday, October 29th from 6:30-7:30 pm in the WCS Community Room. Mrs. Parks serves a trip facilitator through Spiral International.
CRAFT SHOW - NOVEMBER 3
- Join us to "shop local" on Saturday, November 3rd as Williston Central School hosts the 27th annual Craft Show sponsored by FAP.
- Find over 100 crafters/vendors showcasing their handicrafts and specialty foods.
- When: Saturday, November 3
- Hours: 9AM - 4PM
- Where: Williston Central School
- Delicious breakfast and lunch selections available in the cafeteria during the show. Start your holiday shopping or treat yourself! More information on our website www.WillistonCraftShow.org or find us on Facebook @Williston CraftShowVT
- WE NEED VOLUNTEERS! - The Craft Show is one of FAP's largest fundraisers. Proceeds from crafter booth rentals help fund the many programs that FAP supports within the Williston Schools. Please help us make this a successful show by signing up to help us set up on Friday, November 2nd or for a 2 hour shift on the day of the show, November 3rd. Here is a link to the sign-up page and to descriptions of the shifts. http://signup.com/go/rUkLHGt - Contact Karen and Paula at wsdcraftshow@cvsdvt.org if you have any questions. Thank you for helping with this important school fundraiser!
After School 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 and Wednesday 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.
Williston School Safety Team Open House / Meet and Greet
- Would you like to know more about School Safety in Williston?
- The Williston Safety Committee invites you to attend a Meet and Greet on Friday, November 2nd, 7:30 - 8:30 in the ABS Cafeteria
- Come and meet members of the safety committee, including representatives from The Williston Police, Williston Fire Department, VT State Police, School Staff, and Town Personnel.
- This is a chance to learn more about their work and ongoing efforts to enhance school safety
- Coffee / Tea and refreshments will be available
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/
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
Moby Max - a math program used by ⅚ 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 ⅚ humanities students to build typing skills.
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ACADEMIC UPDATES
Ms.Q
CMP8
CMP8
This week in class we have been fine-tuning our understanding of linear and non-linear models. We began with the Mammoth Game, a biological model using die. Students started with a small herd of mammoths and with each roll of the dice, calves were born, mammoths died naturally, were killed by a predator, or lived another year. We graphed our results and noticed a non-linear trend. We played another round, and this time we introduced paleo-indian hunters. We saw in our graphs that there was an even sharper decrease of the herd. We found out that the model showed exponential decay. As the years increased the herd decreased.
CMP7
This week was all about polygons and their properties. We explored how polygons are named and the difference between regular and irregular polygons. We investigated the internal sum of the angles of many different regular polygons and came up with a rule that could be used to find the sum of the internal angles.
We then went from regular polygons, 
to irregular polygons 
to see if the same rules applied.
to see if the same rules applied.
We were able to find that the rule of the (s-2) 180 still applied.
Science
The physics behind mousetraps was completed and students began building their cars. We are using lots of tools, duct tape, skewers, dowels, and lots of imagination. The cars need to complete a 4 meter track in the fastest speed to win this contest. Students are experimenting with lever length, wheel size and location, string length and many other variables. Each group will do a series of tests, record their data and then redesign to make their cars quicker. The final competition will take place next week.
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Mr. Roof
This week, we focused on figurative language, especially similies, metaphors, alliteration, hyperbole, onomatopoeia, and idioms. These are some of the tools that authors intentionally use with words to connect their readers to the writing in deeper, vivid ways. We played some games and did group work to practice our understanding of these strategies. Students then had to demonstrate their understanding independently on Reading log 5. We also worked on a book recommendation in which students wrote recommendations on a book they read since this summer, and created an original "new" cover for the book. In addition, we read and completed comprehension activities based on an article about lowering the voting age to 16.
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Ms. O’Brien Classes
Math 5: This week students worked on building place value understanding of decimals. Students built decimal models with base ten pieces to visualize the value of a numeral in a number and also consider whether a trade was necessary in a set of base ten pieces. For example, if we have 12 hundredths, we can trade ten hundredths for one tenth. Students physically traded these pieces helping to strengthen place value understanding (remember carrying??? This is what students call trading now!). We also represented numbers in expanded notation. This instructional move is meant to get students to understand that lining up the decimal when you add or subtract a decimal is essential place value understanding. You cannot add ones to tenths and get anything but a mess! Working toward proficiency when adding and subtracting decimals.
Math 6: Students spent the week working on renaming fractions as decimals using long division. Seeing each fraction as a division problem is a really important interpretation of fractions and helps set in motion the long division algorithm for finding decimal names (especially when the fraction is something like 5/11). We played a little bucket ball today putting targets at certain distances from zero and then shooting to look at our fraction, decimal, percent and ratio success.
Science 5/6 : This week we completed a final assessment on plants. I’m seeing some deep learning in the responses and am excited about all they have learned. We began our next unit on food chains and food webs by playing a food chain tag game outside! It was cold and snowing, but we had fun! Friday we had a split class day. Blue classes worked on seed projects and Gold classes worked with Colby Norton, a CVU senior, who led us in a marketing workshop for the greenhouse.
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Mystery and Spook: Students should finish reading their mystery and spook book by this
weekend. On Monday we will begin exploring and finding evidence of how the setting of
the book enhanced the plot and mood of the book, answering the question, what makes
scary, “scary”?
weekend. On Monday we will begin exploring and finding evidence of how the setting of
the book enhanced the plot and mood of the book, answering the question, what makes
scary, “scary”?
State Government: Our preparation for the field trip to the state house included a
scavenger hunt of the history students will find in the VT History Museum, a preview of
a mock trial to understand the roles to play, and a study of the three branches of
government at the state level. Students brainstormed an idea for a bill to bring to
Montpelier that was to be used as the starting point for their tour of the legislative process
in the state house.
Vermont State House, Supreme Court, and History Museum Field Trip:
We had a great day in Montpelier. Students participated in a mock trial in the Supreme
Court. A law clerk for our chief justice facilitated a mock trial that used a real case. We had
5 student justices preside over the case as presented by student attorneys. The state
house provided the perfect setting to learn about the legislative process as students toured
the senate, house, and governor's office. The Vermont History Museum provided the students
their first glimpse of some of the history we will be studying this spring. It was a chronological
walking tour of the great history of our state. We will be comparing state and federal
government and exploring the important relationship that exists between our three branches
of government next week.
State House Pictures
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