Cluster 6 Newsletter (11/18)

We are just about halfway through our whole class novel, Warcross by Marie Lu. We just finished up our first project! Instead of showing our mastery of finding strong evidence from the book in essay form, we designed a birthday party for our main character. Students had a series of categories to plan such as, what gifts they would bring, who would be on the invite list, who would NOT be on the invite list, decorations, etc. Students took what they knew about the main character in order to make these choices and find evidence. These projects also allowed us to work on our presentation skills. Next, we will be diving deeper into finding the theme and refining our "CER" essay writing skills.

Please encourage your student to read each night starting back up next week! Remember, we have access to the audiobook, so anyone who claims to be "too busy to read" can hit play and just listen for about 20 mins :

This week we started our Reproduction and Genetics unit, which will be our focus for the entirety of Term 2 (see link below for an overview and learning objectives for this unit). Students refreshed their understanding of relevant biology topics from 6th and 7th grade, reviewing the characteristics that all living organisms share and the organelles of a cell. They then turned their attention to reproduction. Students have each been assigned a statement related to a type of reproduction that occurs in nature and have been asked to conduct research in order to create a poster about their statement. **Ask your student what statement they have been researching and if they’ve found it to be true or false!** Students will take a quiz on their topics and share their posters in class on Tuesday.

8th grade math students are now deep into our unit on linear relationships. We are learning about rates of change in tables, graphs, and equations, and will soon be solving one-variable equations. This unit has a much more "high school feel" to it, and the students are starting to realize the value of doing thorough work. As our district heads further towards grading less on effort and more on content mastery, it is absolutely vital that assignments are done and also very well understood. Please encourage your 8th grader to stay on top of assignments to fully understand all content, and to seek help as soon as issues arise.

Algebra students have also spent a bit of time on linear relationships, as this is one of the 8th grade math topics that they've missed. We will continue to learn more about rates of change, how relationships can be linear and also non-linear, and how non-linear relationships can be represented with visuals such as graphs and tables, and eventually equations. Like the 8th grade math students, Algebra students should continue to focus on fully understanding all material that's covered in class or assigned as homework. This class moves quickly, but if we are focused on getting the help we need in near-real time, we will do well with assessments!

We’ve just wrapped up our unit on the 2022 Election. We learned about the candidates and issues that votersWe’ll learn much more about local and state government later this year.

We’ve now returned to our unit on the Structure of Government, and are reviewing what we already learned about the legislative and executive branches of government. Students will also start to study about the judicial branch and our court system, which we’ll return to in our Justice in Action unit at the end of the year. Heads up: students will have a unit test on the three branches and three levels of government on Tuesday, November 22nd. There’s a lot to know, so we’ll be doing a choice board of review options to get ready! After the November break, we’ll start our next unit on the Origins of Democracy.

Current learning targets:

• I can understand the powers of the judicial branch.

• I can understand how the different branches of government check and balance each other.

• I can name the levels and branches of government, and identify people who work in them.