Monthly Class Updates

May/June 2021

 

Instrumental Music 6 (Introductory and Advanced): The 6th grade ensembles will begin the awesome process of developing our ensemble skills as we begin playing together in the coming weeks! Our focus will shift from individual musicianship and technique to working together to create a musical experience as a group. This will expand the students’ skills from self-awareness and experience to ensemble-awareness, and will require the students to listen and adjust to one another as they work to play their music accurately and expressively.

 

Acting 6: The 6th grade acting students have just finished up their “Pirate Fairy Tale” project. We are now moving onto building individual stories in the upcoming “Neighborhood Stories” project. The project starts with the question: “While walking through your Neighborhood what stories bubble up for you?” The stories could be based on actual experiences, or could be totally made-up, generated by visual prompts. We will end the year with a longer story generated by the students using all of the skills they have practiced throughout the semester.

 

Vocal Music 6: The 6th Grade choir students continue to explore vocal techniques and breath management as they embark on creating choral music together for the first time. Students are learning a Unison piece (“Galop”), a two-part piece (“Ol’ Dan Tucker”), and a three-part piece (“Kookaburra”).

 

Art 6: 6th grade artists are well into their comic project. This is a multi-lesson project that challenges the students to conceptualize form in space by designing a character that they have to render from multiple perspectives. We then learn about narrative sequencing and designing within a frame as they figure out how to visually represent a story in three to five frames. The final design is then inked in after we spend some time learning about the Japanese concept of Notan. It’s fantastic having the kids back in the art room. We have a clay project on the horizon. 

 

PE 6: It is great to have the students back on campus running around and working with each other during our classes at SPARC. Our first two units back will be Volleyball and Speedminton. The students will learn the rules and strategies while practicing the necessary skills needed to play both of these sports. The students are discovering that even the workouts are more enjoyable to do when they are with their classmates. 

 

Health and Wellness 6: We are launching into our work around race, racism and the power of words. We will start by introducing a vocabulary of equity and inclusion and then discuss the history, intent and impact of language that attacks the dignity of others. Following this unit, we will begin our unit on puberty, focusing on physical, social and emotional changes. Ms. Hicks will also share related lessons about gender identity and sexual orientation. Throughout these lessons, students will continue to develop practices of mindfulness and self-care. 

 

Science 6: In 6th grade science, students begin to work on their science research projects. Students have just finished up presenting their science research ideas and will form research groups in the next couple of weeks. After that, students will begin their research process by doing background research and writing an introduction to their project. Afterwards, students will collect their data or design and build their engineering projects starting in late April. This is a really fun process for students and a time for them to put into practice all of the research skills they have learned earlier this year. 

 

French 6: The next couple of months will bring loads of new vocabulary, grammar structures, and culture. We will begin working with the structures that show gender and plurality in French—an important component of all romance languages. They will also practice using negation in French. We continue to discuss cultural comparisons and contrasts, especially with francophone music and francophone Africa. Toward the end of April, we will begin working in Unit 3, our final unit this year. Students will learn different ways to talk about school supplies, shopping, and prices. We’ll delve into how to tell time and look at school schedules in francophone countries. They will take a deep dive into how articles work, and how to choose the right one as well. Students will widely expand their communication skills this month and next when they tackle two of the four major verbs in French: avoir and être. We play games during class that help repeat common expressions and structures so that students can begin to determine what ‘sounds right.’ It’s a way we can hone skills while having fun. 

 

Chinese 6: In Chinese 6 class, students will learn to exchange information on the days of the week and months; inquire about and describe the relative location of an item; as well as ask and answer questions regarding food and drink choices or preferences. For grammar, we are going to learn about using 在 to indicate relative location and degree adverbs 最 喜欢 and 了 to indicate change. Students will make a traditional Chinese sewing book online about themselves with the book creator app, which each will use to introduce their name, age, nationality, family members, school, and place they live etc. For the culture piece, students will learn about the difference between solar and lunar calendar; the four treasures of study; and the special symbolism in fruits and the role of food in Chinese society.

 

Spanish 6: Seeing most of the students in person has been great for learning and for fun!  We have started Unit 4: The Hotel. This unit focuses on hotel vocabulary and the verb Tener (to have). This verb has many idiomatic uses in Spanish and it is an irregular verb. This will be a bit tricky for some students but we will get it down. We also have some silly songs to help memorize the conjugations of Tener. Later, we will do some role-playing to reserve and arrive at a hotel room. 

 

Technology 6: The 6th grade Tech students have just finished their “Big Project,'' which was a project based on their own tech creation interests. The students worked in CoSpaces, Scratch, or MakeCode. Once we finish the critique and feedback phase we are going to begin a short 'interactive-storytelling' project and then finish up the semester working with Augmented Reality using the Merge Cube that is a part of the CoSpaces 3D content creation platform. Cospaces will allow the students to create animated and static 3D content that “lives “on the 3D cube. Ask your students to show you what they have been creating!

 

Pre-Algebra Prep 6: With fractions, decimals, properties and some algebraic foundations under their belts, these mathematicians are moving onto work with integers (positive and negative numbers) and absolute value. We will explore what integers are, how to compare them, work with all the operations and apply these concepts to fractions, decimals and more distributive property and order of operations. The beauty of math is how it all builds on what came before. As we approach the end of the year we will either do some ratio work or play with some statistical concepts.

 

Pre-Algebra 6: We are delving into all solving expressions using all operations with negative and positive integers, and absolute value. The trick is to remember all of the rules this involves. Following operations with, the students will add more rules to incorporate all operations involving rational numbers. With all of their knowledge from this year, the culmination will be solving linear functions.

 

Humanities 6: Being back in the classroom has afforded us the opportunity to dive into geography. Making maps of India, its neighbors, and its physical geography supports understanding of the partition of India, which is central to our current novel, The Night Diary. Students continue to track elements of literature, discuss character, plot, and writing style, and put themselves in the shoes of the story’s main characters during discussion activities in class. We look forward to finishing the book in mid-April, at which point we will explore Gandhi’s legacy. Meanwhile, Humanities students have also learned the basic tenets of Islam and have researched the scientific and cultural achievements and impact of the Abassid Dynasty. Research and notetaking, slide design, and presentation skills are the main areas of focus for the project. Ask your student about their topic and what they have learned!

May/June 2021

 

Instrumental Music 7: The 7th grade ensembles will begin the awesome process of developing our ensemble skills as we begin playing together in the coming weeks! Our focus will shift from individual musicianship and technique to working together to create a musical experience as a group. This will expand the students’ skills from self-awareness and experience to ensemble-awareness, and will require the students to listen and adjust to one another as they work to play their music accurately and expressively.

 

Acting 7: The seventh grade acting students have just finished their two-person scenes. We will wrap up that project by practicing the craft of sharing thoughtful feedback and critique. We will then clear our creative palettes a bit while using improvisational exercises to explore character objectives more deeply, as well as unpack the concept of “tactics” or “choices” in terms of achieving objectives. We will finish up the year with one more two- or three-person scenes to help solidify the skills we have been practicing this semester.

 

Vocal Music 7: The 7th Grade choir students continue to explore vocal techniques and breath management as they embark on creating choral music together for the first time. Students are learning several two-part pieces (“O Desayo” and “The Defining Moment”) as well as a three-part piece (“Shake the Papaya Down”). 

 

Art 7: After spending a couple of weeks exploring visual composition with various short projects, the 7th grade artists learned how to draw A Golden Rectangle and a Golden Spiral that they then used as a basis to create a collage. Now that we are back in the classroom, the students are having a grand time putting together a 3-D assemblage from found objects collected from home or from treasures they were able to unearth from the bottom of our junk bins. We have a ceramic project on the horizon after we settle into our new routine. 

 

History 7: Now that we are back on campus more regularly, students are finally able to give their Black History Month presentations that we began before conferences. After those wrap up, we will launch our next unit where the main question we are considering is, “How do societies transform over time?” We will begin by examining events in post-Renaissance Europe such as the Protestant Reformation and the beginning of the Church of England. We will discuss the various ‘push’ and ‘pull’ forces that influenced people to consider leaving their lives and starting new in America. We will also read and analyze primary sources and continue practicing research and note taking. The unit will culminate in a deep dive into the Salem Witch Trials, in which students will study the people, causes, and conditions that led to this fascinating, albeit dark chapter in American history.

 

PE 7: It is good to have the kids back on campus for PE class. We already started units on speedminton and volleyball. Each day will start with a dynamic warm-up that is led by students. After the warm-up, we will go over bumping, setting and serving for volleyball. We also will play games. For speedminton, students are being introduced to game strategy as well as the fundamentals of the game. It is certainly nice getting to know the kids at this point. Please help remind your student to wear athletic attire on PE days. 

 

Health and Wellness 7: Students are beginning our unit on human reproduction. They will review anatomy and learning about pregnancy. Following this unit, students will explore the role of media in their lives, particularly the impact of social media. Students will do an inventory and reflection of their media habits and will create a “true-selfie” to help them explore identity and the impact of media on their self-image. They also will explore allyship and advocacy. Ms. Hicks will also work with students around the theme of mental health and body image. Throughout these weeks, students will continue our class practices of mindfulness and self-care. 

 

Science 7: We are embarking on an exciting time in science class; we are starting science research! Students have been ideating science research questions or engineering design challenges. They will determine their final idea soon and then present their proposals to the class. Next, projects and research teams will be chosen based on student’s interests, preferences, and the feasibility of the proposals. The research teams will then develop a research plan and complete background research papers to build a solid knowledge foundation of their chosen areas. 

 

French 7:  This month, we tackle vocabulary related to professions, the irregular verb, venir, and several francophone countries of Africa. As usual, we continue to build skills in reading, writing, listening, and speaking. Later this month, students will show their skills on a Unit 5 exam, then we dive into our final unit—Unit 6. How is shopping different in other countries? Students will learn different ways to talk about clothing, stores, how to make purchases, and how to choose items. We will also build vocabulary skills for grocery shopping and food preferences. We continue to learn nuanced grammar structures such as saying these versus a/the/some. French 7 students will also expand their communication skills with new verbs conjugations for acheter, vouloir, and regular -re verbs. The culture sections in the book are now in French, which will help build reading skills. In May, we’ll watch the French classic film, Jean de Florette, which is full of intrigue, villainous treachery, and many opportunities to explore the question, “What does it mean to be the ‘other’?” 

 

Chinese 7: In April and May, we will continue learning Unit 6: Preferences and Abilities. Students will learn to name commonly played sports; exercise preferences; express quantities; distinguish pronouns for animals and objects; associate various sports with appropriate verbs, and also construct names of spoken and written languages using country names. We might also start a new unit and learn about activities. For grammar pieces, students will learn how to say 更 meaning “even more,” 因为--所以 meaning “because…, therefore," 如果 meaning “if," and 会 meaning “can” and  “will.” For cultural immersion, students will learn about popular sports and pets in China, as well as languages and local dialects in shopping and bargaining in China. 

 

Spanish 7: We just finished up our unit on the irregular “yo” form verbs. This signifies the last of the conjugations to learn for the present tense, which is a HUGE accomplishment! Our new unit working with direct object pronouns (DOPs) signifies the definitive end of being able to translate directly from one language to the other and allows the opportunity to become more fluid with the Spanish language. We will be using DOPs in a variety of writings and readings, as well as playing a lot of games! We will follow this up with informal commands and the pretérito perfecto (or present perfect) culminating in a final cooking show! It is really important that students check in with me if there are any lingering doubts or questions about the grammar we have covered this year. As with everything involved in learning a language, it’s all about scaffolding—learning one piece to be able to move to the second piece like the rungs of a ladder. Next year’s grammar is built entirely upon what has been learned this year, so it is extremely important to have a solid grasp of the material now!

 

Pre Algebra 7: The class has officially begun Algebra 1. They will continue with Algebra 1 through 8th grade. They are reviewing solving simple equations and multi-step equations. Following they will explore solving equations with variables on both sides. Their final unit covers graphing linear functions using a variety of methods. They will discover slope and work with graphing linear equations utilizing Slope-Intercept, Standard Form, and Point-Slope Form. The class will get to use these methods to Real-Life situations.

 

Algebra 7:  We continue with non-linear algebra topics this spring. In April, we will wrap up our unit on simplifying radicals, applying exponent properties, and exploring exponential growth and decay examples in real-world situations. We will then look at how to add, subtract, and multiply polynomial expressions. In May, we will switch gears—we will graph quadratic functions and explore characteristics of these new graphs. We end the month learning various methods of solving quadratic equations. 

 

English 7: In April and May, seventh grade English classes will begin reading Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass. This moving and challenging autobiography is not only an important first person account of the horrific realities of slavery in America, but also an inspirational true story of the power of education and overcoming adversity. Douglass is a central figure in nineteenth-century American history, and also one of the great voices in American literature and political thought. This text will also provide the class with a rich treasury of powerful vocabulary words for students to learn. We will also return to some grammar concepts with a focus on sentence structure and parts of speech and apply them to writing assignments.

 

Technology 7: As Tech rotation classes wrap up the third quarter, we will reflect on our work so far, discuss what excited us about our projects, what challenged us, and how we approached these challenges. Fourth quarter will see a new set of 7th graders being introduced to a variety of tech tools, who will dive into the planning and developing stages of their projects for the quarter. Whether it is creating virtual reality scenes, coding side-scrolling puzzle games, or animating an interactive story, students will have plenty of opportunities to immerse themselves in a technology tool of their choosing.

Religion 7: Welcome to Religion 7! This class offers students the opportunity to explore how and why sacred stories play such an important role in many faith traditions. We’ll start the quarter off in April by learning about creation myths from various faith traditions and examining the similarities and differences among them.  Our dive into creation stories will culminate with students creating their own unique myth describing how the world came to be. At the end of April and into May, we’ll focus on important characters and plot lines that appear in early stories within the Jewish, Islamic, and Christian faiths and examine the parallels among these ancient stories and those found in pop culture. We will also begin exploring key figures within religious stories that are commonly forgotten because of their gender, class, or ethnicity. In particular, students will read and hear stories about Miriam and Judith, two important women in Jewish and Christian traditions and explore what their stories may teach us about our own lives.

  

May/June 2021

Eighth Grade Inquiry:  The 8th graders are now in the process of translating the research they have done up to this point (along with their expert interview) and trying to determine a way to translate that into an artifact of understanding. Their artifact is essentially answering (or approaching) the questions: (1) What about your question feels important to you; (2) What do you need people to know about your question and your learning; and (3) How do you learn and also How do you express your ideas and thinking? It can be just about anything: poetry, programming, an art piece, etc. They will then work to find ways to share their artifact with the wider community. 

 

Instrumental Music 8: The 8th grade ensembles will begin the awesome process of developing our ensemble skills as we begin playing together in the coming weeks! Our focus will shift from individual musicianship and technique to working together to create a musical experience as a group. This will expand the students’ skills from self-awareness and experience to ensemble-awareness, and will require the students to listen and adjust to one another as they work to play their music accurately and expressively.
 

Acting 8: The eighth grade acting students have just finished their two-person scenes. We will wrap up their scene work by practicing the craft of sharing thoughtful feedback and critique. We will then clear our creative palettes a bit while using improvisational exercises to explore character objectives more deeply, as well as unpack the concept of “tactics” or “choices” in terms of achieving objectives. We will finish up the year with one more set of two- or three-person scenes to help solidify the skills we have been practicing this semester.

 

Vocal Music 8: The 8th Grade choir students are continuing to explore vocal techniques and breath management as they embark on creating choral music together for the first time. Students are learning several three-part pieces (“Festival Sanctus,” “I See Colors,” and “The Rhythm of Life.”) 

 

Art 8: The 8th grade artists have been working hard on a Cubist painting, which is the culmination of multiple smaller lessons in which we explored the history of Cubism and learned various methods to create cubist abstractions. The students are working from a drawing that is a synthesis (or mash-up) of three drawings, which they did in preparation for this project. It’s been fantastic having the kids back in the art room. After we settle in, we will begin an independent project with the opportunity to work with ceramics. 

 

History 8: The 8th graders are finishing up the unit on World War I. We’ll do a final writing assignment in order to learn how to use footnotes to identify sources. Next we’ll start right into the years before World War II and the war itself with a focus on the human cost of the conflict. We’ll tie in current events regarding refugees for this particular unit. Students will continue to work on writing and researching skills. We’ll also start to work on more presentation skills as we spend more time together on campus. 

 

PE 8: Welcome back to “normal” PE class. We will begin with a Speedminton unit. This will include game rules and strategies as well as tournament play. Students will also prepare for the end of the year fitness assessments, which will include the mile run at the track.

 

Health and Wellness 8: Diving deeper into identity and self-awareness, we’ll explore the workings of the human mind/nervous system with regard to the nature of bias—as both a function of our categorical minds and a product of socialization. Elements of our studies will include stereotypes, stereotype threat, profiling, implicit bias, racism, anti-racism and more. We’ll also investigate how the prefrontal lobe offers us the chance to recognize our own processes as they occur and how such present awareness can move individuals and communities beyond the confines of limited conceptual frameworks.

 

Science 8: We're coming back from spring break, and our 8th grade scientists will become astronauts. In the astronomy unit, our students will first get to know some of the basics of space as well as some of our deeper and more complex understandings of cosmic events and objects, as well as introducing some of the unknowns of space. We'll also either build a DIY parachute or launch film canisters to explore how Newton's Laws affect everything around us.

 

French 8: The 8th graders have been working hard to understand and express ideas in the past tense. Through April, students will practice vocabulary for the city and for describing past events. As part of our studies on Paris, place, and identity, students will do mini-presentations on African-Americans who emigrated from the United States to Paris. Students will also learn how to use metro maps to navigate Paris. Now that we’re back in the classroom, we’re finally watching Manon des Sources, the sequel to last year’s film! In May, we dive into Unit 9 when students approach the questions: What’s the French perspective on health and sickness? How do French kids deal with being sick? What are French tendencies for eating and wellness? Students will learn vocabulary for the body, health, sickness and wellness. We will build communication skills using the impératif mode for verbs, which is how to give orders and tell people what to do. Lastly, we will build language skills for talking about the environment and current global challenges. As always, we’re working on balancing communication skills with keeping an eye out for what we call PFGs —petites fautes de grammaire —those little grammar mistakes we learn to correct or avoid.

Chinese 8: In the month of April &and May, students will move on to the next unit: Unit 13 Media & Technology. It is a very interesting unit with a lot of cool and updated topics. Students will learn to inquire for more information about an event and how to get tickets; describe different types of price discounts and coupons, and also engage in a conversation about online activities. For our grammar piece, we will focus on using 都 to anticipate multiple responses; expressing past experiences with 过 正好 meaning “as it happens;” “happen to,“ and using 才 to indicate a small number or amount. For cultural immersion, students will learn about four ancient inventions from China and traditional markets in China bargain. We will also make a name stamp using a traditional Chinese printing skill of wood carving.                                                    

Spanish 8: After the prep for the placement exam, we will move into our penultimate unit of the year —reflexive verbs which, once again, lack an English equivalent. However, what’s really nice about this unit is that it’s not a new tense! Reflexives are simply a different type of verb, so we get the opportunity to practice all the tenses while using them. We will use a lot of children’s books for reading and listening comprehension, as well as great vocabulary and grammar practice including Froggy Se Viste (Froggy gets dressed) and watch the Mexican version of Sesame Street’s “Rubber Ducky” song that Ernie sings! We’ll also compare and contrast daily routines in various countries, noting the start/end time of school and the practice of siesta. Next we move to the future tense (i.e., "I WILL get good grades this year"). Students really enjoy this grammar piece as the conjugations are intuitive and easy compared to what we've already learned this year in other tenses. It's also very concrete in terms of usage. We have a chance to do some fun activities and projects based around what we will or won’t do. We will read the If You Give a Mouse a Cookie book series in Spanish, taking turns reading aloud one of the books and answering questions. After, they will begin writing their own “If You Give a...”-style short story with an animal of their choosing. I will be sure to share them as this group is always so creative!

 

Geometry 8: We are in the midst of our study of right triangles where there are lots of proportions based on similarity. Then we will explore 45-45-90 and 30-60-90 triangles before moving onto the basic trigonometric ratios which let us find distances and angle measures that are hard to measure in real life. You may even remember sine, cosine and tangent. After right triangles we’ll move onto circles and it is amazing how similarity also comes into play here. Before the end of May these mathematicians will dip their toes into the realm of quadrilaterals. In mid-April all geometry students, regardless of their high school choice, will take an Upper School math skills assessment that focuses on math thinking, which will be one of the tools we use when placing students in math courses for next year. More to come in an email on that.

 

Algebra 8: We continue with non-linear algebra topics this spring. In April, we will wrap up our unit on simplifying radicals, applying exponent properties, and exploring exponential growth and decay examples in real-world situations. We will then look at how to add, subtract, and multiply polynomial expressions. In May, we will switch gears —we will graph quadratic functions and explore characteristics of these new graphs. We end the month learning various methods of solving quadratic equations. 

 

English 8: English students will start reading MAUS and exploring comics as a means of storytelling. They also will choose a separate book from a list we provide that is connected to the same historical era. This unit will include selections from Scott McCloud’s Understanding Comics, which raises many nuanced and fascinating elements of visual storytelling. The parallels to more traditional texts and core reading skills will be highlighted as we move through this material. The unit will conclude with a portfolio project that helps students explore comics as a medium of storytelling, tying it to their reading and study of World War II in history. Our final unit will center on William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, which is a great chance to bring together all the various reading and writing skills that have been a focus of our year together. 

 

Technology 8: April includes both the conclusion of the third quarter Tech rotation and the beginning of the fourth quarter Tech rotation. We'll finish our third quarter Tech rotation by reflecting on our work so far, predicting future plans for our projects, and then sharing our work with each other. For the fourth quarter Tech rotation, we'll introduce ourselves to the tools available and then start creating. The directions in which we go will depend on what each student is most interested in. From programming to stagecraft, game creation to video editing, the options to use technology are all in front of us.

 

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 by also designing and leading our virtual weekly Middle Schools Chapels. Starting in April and continuing through May, students in Religion 8 will design and lead our weekly chapel, taking on more complex roles and responsibilities as they gain experience and confidence with holding virtual chapels. April and May are rich with various religious and cultural holidays, which offers students the opportunity to explore their meanings and traditions both in class and in chapel. Specifically, students will explore the meanings and traditions of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, the Christian seasons of Easter and Pentecost, as well as diving into the power of poetry and music. Lastly, as students gain experience and confidence in leading our weekly chapels, we will reflect on how the first half of the quarter has gone and how to continue to improve our chapel services.