7th Grade MP3 Campus

School Data is open on the 1st for parent reviews. These are due by the 5th. We hope the cut and paste grade level newsletter will be helpful to supplement your remote learning plan reviews. Thank you for submitting in a timely manner and if you need help please reach out to your SLPC.

Topics: Multiply and divide positive and negative fractions and mixed numbers, apply order of operation rules to solve problems with negative numbers, the distributive law, rewriting fractions as decimals, rewriting decimals as fractions.

Activities: Students continued their explorations into negative numbers, this month focusing attention on multiplication and division. Students learned to look at the total number of negative signs in a multiplication or division sequence. They then know that if the total number of negatives is even, then the result will be positive, and that if the total number of negatives is odd, then the final answer is negative. Students also completed a Khan activity where they gained proficiency with negatives numbers in multiplication and division by determining which expressions were equivalent.

Teacher Tip or Reflection Questions: Have your student log into their Khan Academy account and show you what they have been working on during class!

Teacher Info: Mr. Garlatz, tgarlatz@meridian.wednet.edu

Topics: Constructed responses, nonfiction, narrative writing, poetry.

Activities: This month, we have focused on providing constructed responses to writing prompts. Students have practiced reading nonfiction articles and answering questions using text evidence to justify their answers. We have stressed the importance of restating the question in an answer to a writing prompt. In addition, students presented their first book projects, completed their narrative writing projects and shared them in class, created "black out" poems, practiced editing, and completed daily journal writes. We have just started exploring our upcoming readers' theater project.

Teacher Tip: We'll have another book project presentation day in March. Instructions are up on Google Classroom.

Teacher info: Ms. Keegan, akeegan@meridian.wednet.edu

Topics: Armistice, Treaty of Versailles, the 14 Points and post-war Europe, presentations

Activities: Once again, students did some terrific work this month. We learned about the merciful end of WWI and how the Allied Nations, led by Great Britain, France and the US, attempted to lay the foundation for a more peaceful future. Woodrow Wilson presented his plan for global peace called the 14 Points. Students analyzed each of the points and recognized that Wilson addressed each of the various causes of the war. Creating the terms of the Treaty of Versailles was an enormous challenge and in the end, Germany was harshly punished. The Axis powers were forced to give up enormous amounts of land and the map of Europe was changed dramatically. Students did some map work to compare the differences between pre-war and post-war Europe. They were surprised to see that the Ottoman and Austro-Hungarian Empire were dissolved and new countries emerged, especially in Eastern Europe. Even the victorious Allies agreed to begin liberating their overseas colonies. Unfortunately, there were some fatal flaws in the Treaty of Versailles. Significantly, Russia was left out of the treaty talks and Germany was punished so harshly that it made WWII almost unavoidable. Students did a nice job predicting short term and long term outcomes from the war and the well-intentioned but flawed treaties. A huge celebration was seeing the student presentations on topics related to WWI. Each student created and confidently presented a powerpoint on a topic of their choosing and uncovered some fantastic information. Well done, class!

Teacher Tip: Ask your students to explain the 14 Points and what led to the failure of the League of Nations.

Teacher Info: Reach out if you have any questions.

Mr. Caraco, jcaraco@meridian.wednet.edu

Topics: Keyboarding, Google Sheets, Google Forms, Stop Motion Movies

Activities: This month's emphasis was on collecting and presenting data in Google Sheets. Each student created a survey in Google Forms that he/she emailed to staff. Next we looked at how to transfer responses into Google Sheets and manipulate the information to create charts, bar graphs, and pie graphs. Each student created a plan for a restaurant, based on the data, and learned how to insert their graphs into Google Docs as he/she submitted a formal proposal for the restaurant.

Our next activity, stop motion videos, will take us through December and will combine technology, language arts, and art! We began this unit by watching the first silent movie, A Journey To the Moon, created in 1902 and watching examples created by other students. Currently the students are creating plots and writing scripts in language arts and creating scenes in art. We hope to begin filming the last week of November and premiering the short films for the school on December 13th!

Reflection Questions: Ask your son or daughter to discuss his/her restaurant idea and his/her movie script!

Teacher Info: Mrs. Montgomery, rmontgomery@merdian.wednet.edu

This month Art could be added to your Social Studies review.

Topics: Elements of Art: Form, Color, Texture, and Shape; Principles of Design: Pattern, Balance; Movement, Unity, and Contrast; Techniques: abstract painting (drip, scrape, layer) and clay

Activities: Students completed their clay beetles this month and did a fabulous job showing additive and subtractive relief and symmetry on their pieces. I hope they are proud of their work! Next, in honor of Native American Heritage Month, we learned about contemporary Native American artist James Lavadour. He is an abstract landscape artist who uses unconventional painting techniques. We looked at several of his pieces and made our own abstract landscapes using scraping, dripping, and layering techniques. They are each so unique and amazing! In our current project, students are combining work in art and technology to make a stop-motion video. They are working in small groups to create characters with modeling clay, a background, and a storyline. These are a work in progress and we can’t wait to share the final products with you!

Reflection Questions: Ask your student about their stop-motion video plot and characters!

Teacher Info: Mrs. Warnock, swarnock@meridian.wednet.edu