Middle School Chatterbox

6th grade started a new unit with a theme of overcoming fear. The pieces centered on how the brain triggers and responds to fear and embarrassment, and how they can learn to manage those feelings in a healthy way. 6th grade has also been reviewing for state testing that coming up in just a few short weeks.

7th grade is reading pieces that deal with the topic of space exploration. They are also learning about correct usage of the English language its many conventions in order to strengthen their writing.

8th grade is reading pieces that look at the question what defines the places we call home. The readings dive into the stories of immigrants and different cultures. 8th grade is additionally review proper punctuation usage ranging from periods at the end of sentences to colons and semicolons to separate clauses in sentences. 8th grade also finished up their ELA portion of state testing last week; they just have the math portion to go!

They learned about geologic time period and put together timelines along with a prehistoric safari tour.

They learned about ecosystems and will be putting together a project for the MS Showcase.

They learned about energy and focused on potential and kinetic energy and created catapults.

6th Grade students have finished up a chapter about Ancient China and created name bookmarks using ancient calligraphy.

Geography class wrapped up the geography of the Americas with a fun Minecraft simulation of surviving in either the Andes mountains or the Amazon rainforest (which turned into an inadvertent lesson about lightning starting forest fires). We are now starting the geography of Europe.

8th Grade students are starting research projects about the History of Gettysburg and are starting to discuss the events leading up to the Civil War.

6th Math - This group has been busy working on a variety of skills. We have learned about measures of central tendency (mean, media, mode, and range). Then we used what they learned about median to create box plots. We have also started talking about 3D shapes (prisms, pyramids, cylinders, and cones) and are finding the volume and surface area of some of these shapes. It will be a busy few weeks as we are preparing for state testing.

7th Math - We have been working on solving equations. It was a rough start, but once they caught on, they have been rocking it! They can solve multi step equations with variables on both sides and also using the distributive property. We will continue to work on word problems using equations as well as cover some volume and surface area of 3D shapes before state testing in a couple of weeks.

8th Math - They just finished working with slope and are moving on to exponent rules, negative exponents, and scientific notation. We will be covering some Geometry topics (angles, lines, Pythagorean Theorem, and volume) before we start state testing in a few weeks.

We have been preparing for state archery that is coming at the end of March.

8th grade is looking at how internal and external conflicts affect characters in S.E. Hinton's The Outsiders.

The first week of March wrapped up the 8th graders time with Mrs. Langer as it ended the 3rd Quarter. The start of the 4th Quarter brought in the 6th graders. So far, they are covering personal hygiene to prepare for being in the kitchen which led to a project to create a Hygiene Super Hero. Now they are discovering what career fields they may be interested in in South Dakota.

We celebrated pi day on March 14th!

State testing time is upon us. We started last week and will continue through April.

Please remind your child to get plenty of rest and eat a good breakfast during state testing. We want them to be able to perform their very best!

We like to reward students for completing work on time. If students had no late assignments, they got to participate in our life size hungry hungry hippos game. It was a blast!

April 4th - MS Dance 7:00-9:00

April 11th - K-12 Spring Concert 7:00

April 18th, 21st - NO SCHOOL - Happy Easter

April 27-30 - State FCCLA

May 5 - MS/HS Academic Awards Night - 7:30

May 7 - MS Showcase 8:30-10:30

May 16 - Last Day of School - 12:50 dismissal