January 3, 2012

UPCOMING EVENTS: (Please see the MITCH calendar for additional school-wide events and notices)

  • Jan 16  Monday                MLK, Jr. Day, NO SCHOOL
  • Jan 20  Friday                  All school winter concert
  • Jan 26  Thursday              Heritage Fair
  • Feb  1  Wednesday           Spelling Bee


Field Trip:

Friday, January 20, 10:00 - 11:30 REAL.LIFE Exhibitat Medical Teams International.  Please plan to meet AT Medical Teams International at 9:45.  (14150 SW Milton Court Tigard, OR 97224)  For additional information: http://www.medicalteams.org/sf/real_life_exhibit.aspx

GRADUATION COMMITTEE!!!! Lori Ayers has volunteered to lead the parent committe for graduation.  THANK YOU!  She is working on securing a location and gathering information for the anual 8th grade All-Night party.  Please contact Lori if you are willing/able to help! 

Classroom Wish List: Thank you for the 3 frames!  I would still LOVE to have 4 more LARGE (old) frames for our "History Wall of Frames" that we will be working on throughout the entire school year.  Each frame will be decorated/designed in the theme of a certain decade...and needs to be about 2x3 feet in size.

 

HERITAGE FAIR: Callling all scrap-booking parents!  The 8th grade Heritage Fair project is a scrapbook!  This will be a HUGE project in a very short time frame!  We will be meeting FRIDAY, JANUARY 13 to begin assembly - I need parent volunteers this day!  Please have your child begin to collect photos, etc., and scrapbooking materials (scrapbook is provided) ASAP!  Thank you!

 

FOCUS ON LITERACY AND READING:

Book Reports:  as a reminder... The next book report will be due the last school day of JANUARY.  

OBOB: Oregon Battle of The Books is under way!  Our class has assembled a team and they are busy reading and preparing!  Mrs. Grady (7th grade) is guiding the OBOB teams.  

THIS WEEK....
Writing: Due the the short week this week, we are taking a break from our IEW writing program.  Students are writing a creative and thoughtful creative essay discussing the phrase, "Sound of Silence."  Next week will begin our research paper writing unit that will culminate in a rather hefty research paper on the Civil Right's Movement, later in February.  
We will be walking to the Tualatin Library at least once a week (beginning next week) to conduct our research and utilize in-house reference materials.  PLEASE MAKE SURE YOUR STUDENT HAS A CURRENT AND VALID LIBRARY CARD so that they may check out books and materials.  Additionally, I will need an extra parent or two to accompany on our library trips.  Please contact me ASAP if you are able.  Thank you! 

History:  Our focus this and next week will be: Marshall Plan, Fear of communist expansion, and the Truman Doctrine. We will begin to discuss our first of the "Wall of Frames" which will represent up to 1950! 


Reading:
Please make sure your child has their own copy of Animal Farm.   We will begin reading this short but deep novel at the end of this week.  In addition, we will continue our study of Twelfth Night and will assign parts for the Core Knowledge Even production of Twelfth Night, later this spring!  It's never too early to begin!

Science: we have been busy preparing student-led lessons on Sound and Light. Today, they wrote official "lesson plans" and will be presenting the entire lesson AND assessing students!