Monthly Class Updates

September 2020

 

Instrumental Music 6 (Introductory and Advanced): The 6th grade ensembles will be launching into the semester by learning how to assemble/take apart their instruments, basic instrument care, and the ever-exciting first sound. The Advanced ensemble will be reviewing basic instrument care and will dive into producing good tone on their instruments. The students will be discovering good practice habits including a routine that is easy to follow and consistent, and will be documenting their own progress in practice vlogs that they will turn into me every week. The vlogs for September will focus on establishing routines and becoming comfortable with recording and listening to themselves and receiving feedback from me.

 

Acting 6: The 6th grade acting students will be focusing on learning the basic skills of collaboration and group storytelling. We will be exploring techniques that use our physical and vocal “instruments” to add emotional color and texture to our stories. Theater vocabulary, stage picture, introductory character creation, and constructive critique will all be incorporated over the course of the semester. In September we will introduce group storytelling skills as well as appropriate ways to share feedback.

 

Vocal Music 6: Welcome to 6th Grade Choir! This is indeed an interesting time to be singing! Nevertheless, we adapt and will thrive! We begin the semester with classroom procedures/responsibilities, posture and breathing, vocal techniques, introductory rhythmic and melodic sight reading, and learn to sing harmony with yourself. Students will also explore the use of new music technology and software. In our first Creative Project, students will document music that is important to themselves and conduct interviews in their homes to explore the musical interests of their family members. 

 

Art 6: Welcome to Middle School Visual Arts!! We are going to start the new school year getting to know each other as aspiring artists and collaborators. We will make sure we have a space at home to support our creative endeavors and we will spend some time familiarizing ourselves with the supplemental art kits that students will pick up during orientation. Students will be using Google Slides as a platform to document their work, to reflect on their creative process, and to share their creations with the classroom audience. Projects will generally start with ancient art as a historical point of departure as we explore a wide range of visual mediums from watercolor pencils to collage. The goal is to maximize the amount of time that students are creating with their hands off of the computer. 

 

PE 6: Welcome to 6th Grade PE. I am looking forward to meeting and getting to know all of the students. There are many goals that we will strive to accomplish in class this year including improving the student’s overall fitness level and their understanding of the different physical fitness concepts while also having a lot of FUN in class. We will start off the year getting to know each other while learning many different exercises and the benefits of doing them. The students will be performing a wide variety of exercises during class that will keep them moving and will help them get some much needed energy out. The students will have a daily fitness log to show what they completed for each day they have class. I am excited to get the school year going!

 

Health and Wellness 6: Welcome to health and wellness! We’ll launch into the semester with a unit designed to foster connection between students and to help them get to know each other...and themselves better! Students will reflect on their values through a photo project and will delve into an exploration of happiness, through the creation of a “happiness mandala.” We’ll also begin to introduce practices of mindfulness and self-care, which we will continue to develop throughout the semester. 

 

Science 6: Welcome to 6th grade science! I cannot wait to work with your budding scientists throughout this school year. We will be focusing on the foundational skills of science in conjunction with content based around biology, ecology, and “our local environment”. Students will start the year off with a science boot camp. This will give students the opportunity to learn about the prerequisite skills to allow students to engage in carrying out their own experiments and engineering & design challenges later this year. We will start with skills and ideas, such as: Observation vs. inference; qualitative and quantitative analysis; independent vs. dependent variables; and accuracy vs. precision. 

 

French 6: Bienvenue! Welcome to the first year of French! Each unit will be built around questions that help us connect French to our own language and cultures. How many different ways do we use to greet each other? Is there a formal way of speaking in English? This month, as we get to know each other and get used to working together in an online environment, we will start off with greetings and introductions in different contexts. We will also dive into some numbers and common expressions for working in the classroom together. Students will practice their speaking and listening skills using a variety of scenarios, and will learn about speaking formally and informally. We will explore cognates, listen to popular songs, and examine the pitfalls of online translators.

 

Chinese 6: Guanyin Huanyin Huanyin, I am so excited to welcome all of you entering OES Middle school and you are so brave to take the challenge to learn Chinese Language. This month, besides getting to know each other and getting used to the technology tools, we will be focused on learning Chinese character’s pronunciation based on the pinyin (initials finals) and four tones. Each group of students will have a chance to create a pinyin song by themselves. Meanwhile, we will learn greetings in Chinese manner, common classroom language and numbers. 

 

Spanish 6: ¡BIENVENIDO (welcome)! I am excited to meet you! We are all arriving at OES Middle School with zero or some experience in Spanish. After we get to learn a bit about each other and how to use technology, the first chapter is the basics and brand new for some people and a great review for others! We will be starting with the alphabet and pronunciation supported by some goofy songs. Learning greetings and goodbyes are a natural place to start with some role-playing activities. Also, we will be working on numbers to 100 with games. A basic small-talk area in every language is asking and telling the date and we will practice this often. See you soon!

 

Technology 6: This year the 6th grade students will take a semester of technology. We will explore computer science through an inquiry and project-based lens with the goal of understanding computational thinking practices and perspectives such as: experimenting and iterating, testing and debugging and viewing technology as a medium of creation. Some of the technologies that may be used in this course are the CoSpaces environment, 3D printing, Unity, VR and AR technologies, and the Scratch programming environment. 

 

Pre-Algebra Prep 6: Welcome to Middle School! I am so looking forward to doing math with you this year. We’ll be starting off the year getting organized, doing some quick review on past topics, getting comfortable with the e-textbook before embarking on powers and exponents, order of operations, divisibility tests, some non-traditional problems and introducing the “24 challenge." As you readjust to being back and school and doing math, I encourage you to ask questions in our face to face classes, via email or setting up a time to see me. I am excited for our year together.

 

Pre-Algebra 6: Welcome to 6th grade Pre-Algebra! The year begins with a quick review of past topics and problems solving skills, as well as getting organized for the year ahead. You will be introduced to your e-textbook before embarking on powers and exponents, order of operations, prime factorization, and divisibility tests. We then will apply these skills to find greatest common factors and least common denominators. I look forward to seeing you Face to Face (online) during our morning classes. 

 

Humanities 6: Welcome to Humanities! This year, we will be exploring the big question “What does it mean to be human?” through the lens of literature, history, current events, and ourselves. We will begin our school year with the essential work of building a community in each class as well as creating routines for reading, writing, and community discussions. Students will explore the multidimensional concepts of both culture and identity, which will guide our work the rest of the year as we consider perspectives beyond our own. In September, students will write their “Academic Autobiography” as well as share their “Timeball” of important events in their lives. By the end of the month, we will start to read the novel Peak and learn how to do close reading by annotating our books.

September 2020

 

Instrumental Music 7: The 7th grade ensemble will launch into the semester by reviewing some basics of instrument care, re-establishing good practice routines, and producing good tone on their instruments. This month will be all about settling into the rhythm of Continuous Learning as an instrumentalist and focusing on the individual sound of each student. The students will be re-discover good practice habits including a routine that is easy to follow and consistent, and will be documenting their own progress in practice vlogs that they will turn into me every week. The vlogs for September will focus on establishing routines and becoming comfortable with recording and listening to themselves and receiving feedback from me.

 

Acting 7: In this class we will be leveraging the techniques of improvisation to explore character and relationship as they relate to theatrical production. We will be focusing on the skills used by the individual actor to support and move the story collaboratively, building towards performance of short scenes, monologues, and one acts. We will be covering theatrical terms and vocabulary, connections between improvisational theater and text work, as well as constructive critique and elements of directing. This month I will be introducing the curriculum for the year, sharing some specific terminology, and then we will jump right into physical character construction.

 

Vocal Music 7: Welcome to 7th Grade Choir! We begin the year with a review of basic rhythmic and melodic patterns and continue to develop literacy through progressive sight-reading. We will redefine what it means to sing in a time when we aren’t together in person as an ensemble. We begin with concepts such as proper body alignment, new vocal techniques, singing harmony with oneself, and learn to operate new music technology and software. In our first Creative Project, students will document music that is important to themselves and conduct interviews in their homes to explore the musical interests of their family members.

 

Art 7: Welcome to 7th grade Visual Arts. Once we reacquaint ourselves and share our hopes, desires, and inspirations for the coming school year we will launch into a project based curriculum that uses Renaissance art through the 19 century as a launching point for lessons that explore a wide range of visual mediums. Students will be using Google Slides as a platform to document their work, to reflect on their creative process, and to share their creations with the classroom audience. We will spend some time the first week going through the supplemental art kits that students can pick up during orientation. The goal for the year is to spend as much time as possible off of the computer creating with our hands. 

 

History 7: Welcome to 7th grade! We begin the year by posing this question: when studying the past, how do we know what we know? We explore the importance of using evidence to inform our understanding about history. We also discuss other important vocabulary that helps the students think and behave like historians. We then begin studying when and how the first humans arrived in the Americas, exploring different theories of migration, and looking for the evidence that supports those theories. We also review the steps involved in good historical research and citing and evaluating one’s sources effectively. The first days of the year will be focused on getting to know each other and building a class community, as we navigate Continuous Learning together.

 

PE 7: Welcome to a new school year of physical activities and fun for all students. Similar to last spring when school went remote, the students will have choices of different activities or work-outs on a weekly basis. This year, I will attempt to incorporate more group activities and competition. The goal is to have students connect during class while competing or completing a specific task. The goal remains the same, having students be active and given a chance to reset or release some energy. They will be required to document their activities through the weekly log or a recorded video. A small reflection either recorded or written will also be a required weekly. I look forward to getting to know your child, either remotely or at school as the year evolves. 

 

Health and Wellness 7: Welcome to health and wellness! We’ll launch into the semester by striking “warrior pose.” Students will reflect on what grounds them and what they are anticipating as they step forward into their 7th grade year. We’ll also delve into an exploration of “Flow State,” a concept faculty member Tyler Green will help illustrate by sharing his exciting and challenging experiences as a long distance runner. In addition, we’ll begin to introduce practices of yoga, mindfulness and self-care, which we will continue to develop throughout the semester. 

 

Science 7: We are excited to welcome you back and begin exploring the fascinating planet on which we live! Science 7 is all about the interconnectedness of Earth’s Systems and you will deepen your understanding of this through scientific investigations and engineering design challenges. This month we will dive into an overview of Earth’s systems and demonstrate our understanding by identifying interactions among the Earth’s spheres as observed in our own backyards. We will also take time to build our class community and get to know each other as we go on this journey of learning about our planet and our place within it.  

 

French 7: Bienvenue! Welcome to 7th grade French! Each unit will be built around questions that help us connect French to our own language and cultures. Is soccer as popular in France as it is in the PNW? How do we suggest ideas to people around us? This month, we will use games and conversation to reconnect with key concepts from last year and then begin Unit 4. This unit will help students build communication skills for making suggestions, discussing plans in the near future, and asking questions. Students will learn about sports, especially soccer, in France and francophone countries. We will also revisit their favorite French songs, build skills with dialogue videos, and reexamine the pitfalls of online translators.

 

Chinese 7: Huanyin huixia 欢迎回校! For the first two weeks, besides getting used to the technology tools and new schedule, we will spend some time reviewing Pinyin, tones, radicals, stroke orders and the characters in 11 units that we have already learned. We will have lots of games for students to reflect on what they have learnt, look for any patterns, and make conclusions. After that, we will start our new unit Chinese food. Students will learn to list a few typical Chinese dishes; exchange opinions (likes and dislikes) about food or restaurants; and talk about an action that has occurred in the past.

 

Spanish 7: ¡Bienvenidos back to school! We will spend our first few weeks reviewing last year's material and then head right into our first unit – the differences between ser and estar (both which mean “to be”), comparing and contrasting, and using quantifiers to flesh out sentences. Though in our respective homes, we'll still be doing lots of fun games and activities to practice when to use these verbs! The expectation for Spanish 7 is for Spanish to be spoken at all times by students and teacher. It is certainly an adjustment, especially doing so over Google Meet, so the more encouragement to speak Spanish the better!

 

Pre-Algebra 7: Welcome to advanced pre-algebra (APA)! Following a quick review of past skills we will launch into the completion of chapter 5 in Big Ideas, Unit Conversion. During this unit you will gain skills to convert units from US Customary to Metrics. We then will jump to chapter 7 where we will delve into the skills to solve algebraic equations and inequalities. I look forward to an exciting year ahead with you!

 

Algebra 7: Welcome back! We will start off solving simple and multi-step algebraic equations, including absolute value equations. We will also rewrite equations and formulas as we get more comfortable manipulating variable expressions. We will tackle our first Problem of the Week, a challenge problem that we will do periodically throughout the year. We wrap up the month by learning some problem-solving strategies and applying them to word problems.

 

English 7: After an initial discussion of major themes for the year and an accompanying writing assignment based either on the summer reading book or some other book selected by the student, we will begin the first reading selection for seventh grade English: Jamie Ford’s Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet. This historical novel tells the stories of two families living in Seattle’s International District during World War II and the incarceration of Japanese Americans during the war years. The novel illuminates many themes: American identity, immigration, family relationships, race and ethnicity, bullying, justice, and the idea of “outsiders” in society. Students will practice active reading skills and comprehension, and we will look at literary terms and examine the use of figurative language. There will be short writing assignments based on the novel, and students will also learn vocabulary words pulled from the book.

 

Technology 7: Welcome to your 7th grade year, and technology class. Throughout this course, we will broaden and deepen our knowledge and understanding of the technology tools you and your peers have previously explored, or new technologies you are interested in. You will be asked to develop a project which demonstrates your ability with these technologies, explain how it supports you and your learning objectives, as well as documenting the process of how you gained these skills. Some examples of technologies students may select from are 3D printing, VR and AR, Scratch and Swift programming environments, and Micro: bits.

 

Religion 7: Welcome to Religion 7! I’m looking forward to exploring with students how and why sacred stories play such an important role in many faith traditions. We’ll start the school year this September by learning about creation myths from various faith traditions and examine the similarities and differences among them.  Our dive into creation stories will culminate with students creating their own unique myth of how the world came to be. Lastly, we’ll start to focus on important characters and plot lines that appear in early stories within the Jewish, Islamic, and Christian faiths.

  

September 2020

 

Eighth Grade Inquiry: Welcome to Inquiry 8!  We are excited to support students as they discover and then explore a big question that excites them. By diving deeply into a question that interests them, Inquiry 8 offers students the chance to explore who they are and their place in the world. This is accomplished through focused and creative work to support students in developing not only their critical thinking and research skills, but also their curiosity, perseverance, and wonder. Students start the year exploring their identities as both individuals and as a class. Through a range of activities meant to build community and learn about ourselves and each other, students will discover how identity shapes the way we see and experience the world. By building a deeper and richer understanding of their identity, students are creating a foundation to identify their passions and then craft a guiding question that will direct their research and exploration later this fall and winter.

 

Instrumental Music 8: The 8th grade ensemble will launch into the semester by reviewing some basics of instrument care, re-establishing good practice routines, and producing good tone on their instruments. This month will be all about settling into the rhythm of Continuous Learning as an instrumentalist and focusing on the individual sound of each student. The students will be re-discover good practice habits including a routine that is easy to follow and consistent, and will be documenting their own progress in practice vlogs that they will turn into me every week. The vlogs for September will focus on establishing routines and becoming comfortable with recording and listening to themselves and receiving feedback from me.

 

Acting 8: In this class we will be looking at acting from a production perspective. We will be working with scripts, breaking down text, constructing characters, blocking movement, and memorizing lines as we move towards performance. We will cover the concepts of production norms and design for theater as it relates to costumes, sets, sound, and lights. We will also be introducing basic directorial concepts and techniques. In September we will introduce new vocabulary, begin vocal character work, and introduce text deconstruction as it relates to story and character development.

 

Vocal Music 8: Welcome to 8th Grade Choir! We begin the year with a review of basic/intermediate rhythmic and melodic patterns and continue to develop literacy through progressive sight-reading. We will redefine what it means to sing in a time when we aren’t together in person as an ensemble. We begin with concepts such as proper body alignment, new vocal techniques, singing harmony with oneself, and learn to operate new music technology and software. In our first Creative Project, students will document music that is important to themselves and conduct interviews in their homes to explore the musical interests of their family members.

 

Art 8: Welcome to 8th grade Visual Arts. This year is a dynamic and challenging year where students begin to discover their creative voice as they exercise more autonomy in the direction of their creative interests. Students will be using Google Sites as a platform to document their work, to reflect on their creative process, and to share their creations with the classroom audience. We will learn how to constructively talk about our work and the work of our classmates in small group critique. Projects will generally be inspired by Contemporary Art as a historical period but students will be encouraged to follow paths that truly inspire them. The goal for the year is to spend as much time as possible off of the computer creating with our hands. 

 

History 8: Welcome to History 8! This class is about Modern World History. We’re going to start off with some community building so we get to know each other and start to feel comfortable talking about the big ideas that make the study of history so important. History 8 takes a look at how our past connects to our present. For each unit or theme the class will study what it looked like in the past and how we see it today. We’ll start off with exploration of different systems and various forms of data so we can practice our observation and inquiry skills. Our first focus is on seeing change over time. 

 

PE 8: Welcome to 20-21 PE class!! I look forward to incorporating the tools and skills from what we learned during our week-long workshop that the MS faculty attended this past summer (GOA). Students will be researching topics and sharing videos with me and their peers throughout the different units this year. The first unit we will be learning about the different fitness components and yoga movements. Students will create and develop a short lesson to present (video) to their peers. I look forward to working with your children and helping them to lead a healthy and fun school year. Please feel free to tag along during our classes.

 

Health and Wellness 8: In Health and Wellness, we will begin the year by finding our anchors of mindfulness- through breath, sound, touch, and sight. Students will have the opportunity to share moments of “awe” that they experienced over the summer and through art and words, share why those moments matter. We will also take a deep dive into “presence” and practice being present with a cherished animal or natural item. Beyond the experiential learning, students will personally inquire how these different mindsets affect them, building on their understanding of the mystery and science of our nervous systems. 

 

Science 8: Eighth grade science at OES is about how our world and our modern society interact. We'll start off September by re-engineering your working space, followed by using science to analyze your own daily life in this time of changes and new normals. We'll approach how science is different from other ways of trying to understand and interact with our world, and what science both lets us do and prevents us from doing. We'll dive into examples of predictions, data, and testing things out. We'll also confront conspiracy theories and dishonest graphs, because in order to rely on science for what it can do, it's also good to know how science can be misused. You interact with science every day, and you'll be better off if you know how and when and why that happens. How do you want to use science to make things better?

 

French 8: Bienvenue! Welcome to 8th grade French! Each unit will be built around questions that help connect French to our own language and cultures. How are French homes different from homes in the U.S.? What might someone from another culture be surprised to find in your home? In the first exhilarating month of the school year, we will reconnect with key concepts from last year, revisit some favorite French songs, and then dive into Unit 7. Real estate listings and dialogue videos will help provide context for the theme of the home. Students will develop vocabulary skills to describe a home in detail. We will explore different types of residences in francophone countries, like those in northern Africa. Students will make cultural comparisons between the francophone world and their own experiences.

 

Chinese 8: Huanyin huixia 欢迎回校! This month, besides catching up with students and getting used to the technology tools and new schedule, we will be focused on quickly reviewing the characters in the last 32 units that we have already learned. After that, we will start our new unit which is about communities. We will start the unit by naming different facilities found in a community; describing the relative locations of buildings in a community; and also describe daily activities around the community.

 

Spanish 8: ¡Bienvenidos back to school! We will do minimal review of last year's material and dive right in with IOPs (Indirect Object Pronouns). We will be playing some fun games, learning technology and telephone conversation vocabulary, and adding IOPs to all prior grammatical concepts. The expectation is that students are speaking Spanish at all times during class, including small group Meets where I may not be immediately present. It is completely normal for some students who may likely feel as if they’ve hit a brick wall, forgotten “everything,” and/or feel self-conscious about speaking Spanish. I encourage all of my students to check in with me when they’re feeling this way for a bit of encouragement, laughter, and some one-on-one time with the material if needed. It’s going to be a great year!
 

Geometry 8: Welcome to your 8th grade year! We’ll start building the discipline of Geometry beginning with the three undefined terms of point, line and plane. We’ll then add in good definitions, some postulates and some theorems. From there we will build up to ray, bisectors, congruence, angle pair relationships, the Pythagorean Theorem and introduce the platform provided by Geogebra, a program that lets students explore geometric relationships in a more dynamic manner.

 

Algebra 8: Welcome back! We will start by reviewing pre-algebra topics, including greatest common factor and operations with negatives, fractions, and decimals. We will also be reviewing simple and multi-step algebraic equations, including those with the variable on both sides of the equal sign. We will then review linear equations and graphs, and explore an online graphing tool called Desmos.

 

English 8: English 8 students will be sharing song lyrics that have meaning to them as a beginning to our look at how language ties to identity. We initiate this work by looking at children’s books in order to practice the kind of literary analysis and writing we will engage in throughout the year. We will then build from this idea as we start our first novel of the year, Warren St. John’s Outcasts United, and move towards our first creative and analytical writing pieces connected to that source. 

 

Technology 8: Welcome back to the beginning of your eighth grade year, and especially to your technology class. This course is an open-ended course that will help you develop a novel technology project by the end of the quarter. Each student will choose a topic of their choice and then set up and test out their own project that relates to something they're currently doing in another course here at OES. Code an infinite runner game on Scratch. Design and print a 3D replica of a Japanese temple on Tinker CAD. Program a Micro: bit to play your favorite tune. Or maybe you'll find something you are more interested in, and each of us will hone our skills along the way. What awesomeness awaits you?

 

Religion 8: Welcome to Religion 8! This class offers students the opportunity to learn about and appreciate different faith traditions by exploring the ways in which various traditions worship and gather. We accomplish this by both examining the how and why behind worship practices and also by designing and leading our virtual weekly Middle Schools Chapels. Starting in September, students start this process by reflecting on what their experience of chapel has been and what they hope to see chapel become. Students will also explore how best to incorporate music, story, and student voice into our weekly chapels, with a particular focus on creating an inclusive and welcoming online space. After setting some initial goals for our virtual services, we’ll examine how different faith traditions gather and what different worship styles may teach us about our own chapel gathering.