Week 11

November 13th - 17th

Math

Ms. Knippen

jknippen@foxbay.org

Math hours 1 and 8 – We are multiplying binomials and factoring quadratics (but only as a "puzzle" at this time). When we finish the last lesson in the second session there will be a quiz (Thursday perhaps). Mathcounts workout 3 will be collected Friday for a graded assignment.

Math hours 3 and 7 –Tessellation creations are due on Tuesday for a homework check grade. The tessellation was an application of our translation (slide) unit. We are working on two other transformations this week-rotations and reflections.

Science

Ms. Waller

twaller@foxbay.org

This week the students will complete an investigation of the planets where they will explore the difference between mass and weight, examine the structure of the terrestrial planets and create a model of the solar system. We will have a concept check-in and begin the reading for the last part of the unit. Towards the end of the week we'll start on our first engineering lab where students will design a shield to protect a satellite from damage due to meteoroids. By the end of the week look for a review sheet for the end of the unit test to be posted on Google Classroom.

English

Mr. Heimerl 

zheimerl@foxbay.org

This week, we will continue our exploration of the dystopia genre, specifically focussing on the short story “Red Card.” It will be our goal to not only understand the story at a factual level, but to understand it at an analytical level. We will slowly walk through the thinking process involved in understanding a story’s theme. Moving beyond topics like “love” or “suffering” or “authoritarianism,” we will ask ourselves what the author says about love or suffering or authoritarianism. We will look to the motifs, repeated images and ideas, that occur throughout the story to get a deeper, more analytical level. This process will culminate in analytical writing that will be due after Thanksgiving break when we return for second trimester.

For grammar, we will continue to practice with and review the relative clause and the appositive phrase. There will be a quiz on Friday, 11/17.

Reading

Ms. Brinnington, Ms. Traska, Ms. Hiir, Ms. Allen

dbrinnington@foxbay.org, straska@foxbay.org, ghiir@foxbay.org, jallen@foxbay.org

The Silenced comes to a close this week. After several weeks analyzing the text and discussion irony and foreshadowing throughout, the students are prepared for their final assessment. The unit test will take place in class on Wednesday, November 15 and Thursday, November 16. It will be in the form of a double-journal entry.

As noted before, it is very important that your child find balance with his/her independent reading and the class novel. All students should be well into their second book for the trimester by now. Journaling continues in class each Friday.

There is no Greek/Latin vocabulary this week!

Social Studies

Mr. Blahnik

bblahnik@foxbay.org

This week in Social Studies we finished examining the Foreign Policies of the President's Washington through Monroe.  Students are currently presenting their Presidential biographies in class.  We also started Chapter 14 which is about President Andrew Jackson and the Growth of America.  This essential question for this chapter is How well did Andrew Jackson Promote Democracy?  We will then examine the different policies of President Jackson throughout this chapter and examine their impact.  Students will have a unit test on Tuesday, November 21st.  

Week 10

November 6th - 10th

Our fundraiser for the DC scholarship fund is November 10. Students have signed up in teams to participate in a dodgeball tournament. A very exciting event!! We are in need of baked goods for the bake sale that same afternoon. Please help us by making and packaging goods to be sold. Your items can be dropped off at school any time on Friday. Thank you!

Math

Ms. Knippen

jknippen@foxbay.org

Hours 3 and 7-We are studying transformations. We started with slides and an art project that uses slides. We will look at flips and turns as they relate to the coordinate plane.

Science

Ms. Waller

twaller@foxbay.org

After studying the Earth-moon-sun system last week, the students will now read about the other planets in solar system. While reading they will be practicing the reading strategies of selective highlighting and magnet summaries. Ms. James is coming in on Wednesday to do a guidance lesson. In the last part of the week, the students will do a lab investigation where they will see that the mass of different planets affects the gravitational pull and therefore the weight of objects. They will also compare the surface features of the terrestrial planets and create a graph illustrating the comparative structure of the internal layers of those planets. I will be out for the week first presenting at a conference in Boston and then attending the National Science Teachers conference here in Milwaukee. I look forward to returning to the classroom the following week.

English

Mr. Heimerl 

zheimerl@foxbay.org

This week, we will begin discussing dystopia, in preparation for our next major unit – literary analysis. To do so, we will look at many examples, both in writing and in video, and discuss what makes dystopia the genre it is. Moreover, we will begin to explore CER, an acronym that stands for Claim, Evidence, Reasoning – the three major skills we will develop as we analyze the literature we read. To start, we will focus on evidence, exploring how to choose good evidence and how to sufficiently contextualize it for our readers.

Beyond lit analysis, we will continue our study of the relative clause. There will be a grammar quiz on the relative clause and the absolute phrase next week, Friday, 11/27.

Reading

Ms. Brinnington, Ms. Traska, Ms. Hiir, Ms. Allen

dbrinnington@foxbay.org, straska@foxbay.org, ghiir@foxbay.org, jallen@foxbay.org

This week, we will discuss chapters 44-56 in the novel, The Silenced. The students continue analyzing this novel at a deeper level through the literary elements irony and foreshadowing. Many outstanding conversations have been had as the suspense continues to develop! This class text will come a close soon; the final assessment is scheduled for Wednesday, November 15 and Thursday, November 16.

As noted before, it is very important that your child find balance with his/her independent reading and the class novel. Students should be reading their third and final book by now while having written their seventh journal entry last week. All journal entries are to be written in the double-journal entry format.

This week’s vocabulary root word is -fer...meaning “to carry”, “to bear”, “to bring together”. Contextually rich sentences, with proper grammar and mechanics, are due Wednesday; the quiz follows on Friday.

Social Studies

Mr. Blahnik

bblahnik@foxbay.org

We are finishing up the Chapter on Foreign Affairs of our Young Nation.  We have learned about the Foreign Affair policies, dilemmas, and responses to Foreign Affairs events of President Washington and President Adams.  Next week, we will be studying the Foreign Affairs events of President Jefferson, President Madison, and President Monroe.  The Students are also finishing up their project where they selected a Foreign Policy Affair and event that a President experienced at this time period.  The students are providing a summary of the event and then creating a question that they have about the event that they want to further explore.  From this research, they are developing a claim that is supported by Evidence and Reasoning.  They are presenting on Tuesday.  The next Chapter we will study is on A Growing Sense of Nationhood that is developing in the United States at this time period.