Looking for activities to celebrate St. Patrick's Day in your classroom? We've got a pot of gold for you, right here.

🍀 🍀 🍀

Taitneamh a bhaint as!

Congratulations to 8th grader Angela Dai for being an official published author in two Young Writers Anthologies! Also congratulations to 8th grader Emely Romero and 9th grader Ana Ko for successfully publishing creative short stories. We are so proud of our buccaneer authors!

To celebrate Valentine's Day in Spanish class, Ms. Garcia's students engaged in listening to and singing along with a love song to enhance their language skills and emotional expression. Afterwards, they reflected on what brings them joy by completing a heart-shaped activity, where they wrote, drew, and decorated sections with things that make them happy.

Viral Tik Toks as Quadratic Functions

To enhance understanding of quadratics and their key features, students are partaking in a project wherein they choose a viral Tik Tok trend of their choosing and analyze its quadratic properties.

Because viral Tik Tok’s rise, have a peak, and then begin to fall, their journeys often reflect quadratic functions. Students entered ten weeks of data and completed quadratic regression to generate equations, calculate the vertex, calculate the axis of symmetry, and identify x intercepts. Our project closed by identifying what these key features represented for a viral Tik Tok video and by discussing who may benefit from having this information. Here are some snapshots of our data collection and graphing

Ms. Adam and Ms. DeAngelis do a great job in math with our 8th graders. Students are preparing and working hard to get ready for the upcoming NJSLA. Good luck to our 8th graders and all our students in upcoming testing!🤩

Geometry is about more than just shapes - it’s about thinking logically and solving problems systematically. CLUE reinforces these problem-solving skills in a different context, reinforcing mathematical deduction - and plus, it's FUN! Students in 5th period Geometry spent the day analyzing CLUE data, making deductions, recording information, and utilizing their competitive critical thinking skills to crack the CLUE code.

Just when you thought they had seen it all, P7 Algebra II delved into the mathematical world of Imaginary numbers-but don't be fooled! They may not be "real", but they certainly exist!

Students did stations to practice their quadratic equations in Algebra. The more accurate they were, the fewer problems they had to solve so they made sure to work extra carefully!

"May your troubles be less, and your blessings be more, and nothing but happiness come through your door."

- Old Irish Blessing (Have students write their own! Click here)

The Bergen County Unsung Heroes are students who have made a lasting impact through their unique and outstanding contributions to their schools and communities. Their efforts, often overlooked by traditional student recognition programs, are vital to making our schools and communities thrive, and it's these unique and outstanding contributions that we aim to honor and celebrate.

Four of our seniors: Melanie Aybar, Lauren Huarhua, Saul Villamar, and Sofia Sanabria had the opportunity to have their artwork exhibited in the 'Art Start' show at William Paterson University. This event took place on Monday, February 10th, a well attended reception held at the Power Art Center building. Our students should feel very proud and accomplished to have their work shown amongst some of the best in Northern New Jersey! Mr. O'Boyle also showed one of his pieces as well, which was a great opportunity to share the wall with his dedicated buccaneer artists!

Students learned about creating a sense of implied form and dimension in a drawing using their shading skills. Through observation, each student created a drawing of a sphere or other object.

Intro to printmaking completed their final projects to wrap up the semester in which they created relief print self-portraits which were first carved out of linoleum and then printed. Great pieces of art!

During the month of February, we are creating paper flowers in our school's Makerspace. Students can create their own for a friend, teacher, or loved one. We also now have a BHS Library Instagram for students to follow and be up to date on the events taking place in the Media Center, as well as check out new books, stay up to date on new literature and media, and suggest library or makerspace related projects to feature on our account feed. We are also celebrating Black History month and featuring Blind Date with a Book. Students who check out a book and turn in their review cards after reading their book will receive a Valentine prize at the end of the month.

-Ms. Hochgesang

Along with our Women's History Month Selection for the month of March, we are also highlighting a display of Irish and Scottish Heritage books available for checkout in our Library / Media Center.

We are preparing for the Spring Musical and busy making and building sets / props, organizing and altering costumes, and rehearsing with our students. They have been putting forth awesome effort and care with their preparation for the show. We will be featured on the Morning Show, and performing in two weeks for the Middle School and 5th graders of Steen & Bixby who will be visiting BHS. We are so excited for their visit! In our Intro. to Theatre and Dance class, we have been creating scenes with lighting cues, and learning about the lighting design process. Currently, we are making props and set pieces for the musical.

Our 8th grade students in our Videography class traveled back in time with the use of a green screen to show various changes in our community. Students were tasked with researching the history of their site and providing historical context on its development throughout time.

Love is in the air as students create their own love songs using new skills with panning between different speakers and automating their volume changes!🎸🎹🧮

This month, students have been introduced to the basics of using Adobe Photoshop to create digital art with digital drawing tablets. To practice using the tablets, understand how to use Adobe Photoshop, and to learn the digital drawing process, students have been tasked with illustrating a character, animal, or object of their choosing to understand how to sketch, create line art, base colors, shade and render art digitally. Below are examples of students' work in progress thus far on the project, they are nearly done with it!

Students began learning a new graphic design software: Adobe Illustrator. To practice this industry standard graphic design software, students conducted a series of exercises to practice creating vector art. Additionally, as a first project to become familiar with the program, students created their very own hamburger with an additional side. To utilize and put their skills and design knowledge to the test, students have begun brainstorming to create their very own logo for a hypothetical brand/company of their choosing. To plan and go through the graphic design process for this, students researched successful logos, learned about what makes successful branding, and how to choose colors + typography that match their brand. They created a mood board and now will come up with sketches with their logo before bringing their sketch into Adobe Illustrator to finalize. Below are examples of practice exercises done in Illustrator along with students' moodboards & sketches. The next step is to bring their sketches into illustrator to begin converting them into a vectorized logo. It's alot of work but worth it for the finished product!

In this edition of our S'mores newsletter, we'd like to recognize Frailine Gliozzi, Class of 2013. Frailine was the Valedictorian of her class and received a full scholarship to Rutgers University in New Brunswick. She earned a double major in Political Science and Criminal Justice, graduating in the top 10% of her class. Afterward, she attended North Carolina Central University Law School, where she earned her Juris Doctorate. She recently passed the Bar Exam and completed a law clerkship for a judge in Essex County. She is now transitioning into real estate law. Congratulations Frailine on your successful journey! You are truly an amazing buccaneer, and we are very proud of you.