For the Week of March 23- March 27

ALL WORK FOR THIRD QUARTER IS DUE ON FRIDAY, 3/27!

This week in Social Studies:

Monday - Students began work on a map South East Asia. Current event #5 was also assigned on this day.

Tuesday – Students worked on a packet of questions on Chapter 29 of their text book.

Wednesday - Today we will be watching a video about Indonesia and taking notes.

Thursday and Friday - We will be creating Wayang (shadow) Puppets from SE Asia.

Due Dates:
Wed. 3/25 - Chapter 29 Packet
Thurs. 3/26 - South East Asia Map
Fri. 3/27 - Current Event #5

This week in Language Arts:

Monday - Students took a third quarter district reading assessment.

Tuesday and Wednesday - The class will be scoring real WASL responses as we revisit expository writing. The goal is for students gain a better understanding of what good writing looks like, and what is expected of them on the WASL this year.

Thursday and Friday - Students will be working on concrete poems about South East Asia.

Third quarter AR points are due by the end of the day on Monday, March 30.

This week also marks the last few days of Ms. Komar's full time student teaching. She will be in and around our classroom next week finishing up grades and we will have a small celebration for her next Friday (April 3). She's done an outstanding job and we all wish her the best as she starts looking for a full time job...(finally getting paid!)

Congratulations, Ms. Komar!

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For the week of March 16 - March 20

Social Studies

This week we will be continuing our unit on South Asia:

On Monday the class was divided into six groups and they created a summary of an assigned country. Tuesday the groups will present their summaries and the rest of the class will take notes.

Wednesday we will learn about Nepal, its culture and history, and Mt. Everest. Thursday we will be watching a video about the mountain and its legend.

Friday will be a QUIZ from the notes the students took on Tuesday and a brief lesson on Gandhi.


Language Arts

Monday we finished the book Homeless Bird then took a trip to the library so that students could earn their A.R. points for the book. Remember...everyone needs 15 A.R. points by March 30th.

Tuesday we will be working on creating quilt squares as a final project for Homeless Bird. Each student will create a quilt on a provided piece of paper depicting six scenes from their own life. They will be required to color and decorate their quilts as neatly as possible. Finished projects are due Friday.

Wednesday and Thursday we will be working on scoring persuasive essays in order to prepare for the WASL coming up in April!

Friday we will be sharing and grading the quilt squares.


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Language Arts Extra Credit Opportunity

You’re family is invited to a fun, free evening at Nelsen!

Nelsen Middle School’s
Family Literacy Night
Friday, March 13, 2009
6:00 - 8:30pm

Stations will include:
* REI presents Leave No Trace
*Cultural Center
* Bingo
* Math Literacy
* Notebook Making with Knowledge Points
* Mystery Guest Reader

Each student will have their name put into a raffle for a chance to win one of many prizes!

~Refreshments provided by Starbucks~

BONUS: My language arts students can earn 10 extra credit points for attending.

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For the week of March 9 - March 13

Language Arts

This week in language arts we will continue reading the novel Homeless Bird. This novel is about a girl named Koly who, at the age of thirteen, is getting married. However, after her new husband dies, Koly’s life takes many different twists and turns, through which she continues to show great strength and courage. This book ties in nicely with the unit we are beginning on South Asia in social studies.

On Monday we created a biography poem about Koly together as a class. The students then used the same format to write a poem about themselves. The rough draft is due on Wednesday and we will be working on the final during class on Thursday. There will also be an assignment coming home asking the students to write a poem about a family member. This poem will be using the same format and will require some time to interview the family member, so be on the look out!

Social Studies

In social studies we began a new Unit on South Asia. We have been working on our maps in class and they are due on Thursday. This week we will be learning about the physical geography of the region and studying India’s history and culture. On Friday there will be a short lesson on Bollywood and then the students will have the chance to watch some clips of movies and music videos from India’s Bollywood.

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For the week of March 2-6

Social Studies

Big test this week! Students will be able to use the notes they've been taking on the five major world religions for a test on Thursday and Friday. Even though this is an open note test, I've encouraged students to study by reading over some of their notes each night, even highlighting major terms/ideas. This will help them find things more easily.

Next week we will start South Asia.

Language Arts

We are finishing up going over strategies for success on the reading WASL today and tomorrow. The major things to remember include: underlining the answer when you find it in the text, crossing out answers that are wrong on the multiple choice section to narrow things down, and answering EVERY part of the extended response questions.

Students received a vocabulary packet to go along with a new novel we're starting on Wednesday: Homeless Bird. The vocabulary is due next Monday (3/9).

Homeless Bird is set in modern day India and ties in nicely with our overview of Hinduism and upcoming study of South Asia in social studies. (I just love it when we can mix the curriculum!) One of my major goals for this novel is, honestly, just for students to just enjoy reading it. It's a wonderful, fast-paced story and students are always hooked right away. We will do a couple extension assignments with the novel, but no major quizzes or projects...I'll keep you posted as those come up. This week our focus will be reading and discussing the story in class.

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