Weekly Preview: 12/12-12/16, 2011

First of all, this week brings many performance & audience opportunities. Auditions for this year's school play, Number the Stars, take place on Monday and Wednesday from 3:40-5:00. The annual Drama Club Christmas party featuring Sing Along Sound of Music takes place on Tuesday after school. And, the always entertaining FMS Talent Show happens on Friday at 1:45. What a fun week!

Here are the happenings in room 101 this week:

6th GOAL: Students are beginning their first mock trial on Monday... the State vs. Hansel and Gretel Schmidt. Depending on when the first trial ends, I hope to fit in at least one more before the holiday break. All their work has led up to actually acting out the trial. Learning fun!

7th GOAL: Students are presenting their literature circle projects this week. We'll also be finishing up our read aloud book, The Cardturner. Before the holiday break next week, I hope to begin brainstorming about possible History Day topics as well as do some jigsawing of epidemics books to prepare the students for the upcoming 7th grade interdisciplinary unit.

8th GOAL: Students are finishing literature circle project presentations this week. We finished our read aloud book, To Kill a Mockingbird, so before the holiday break, we'll be watching the movie with the amazing Gregory Peck as Atticus Finch.

7th Language Arts: Final drafts of pen pal letters are due Tuesday. On Wednesday through Friday, we'll be talking about the sentence fluency trait of good writing. We'll do an in-class activity with sentence fluency involving the book Joyful Noise: Poems for Two Voices. Spelling list 15 is full of frequently misspelled words. It will be a challenging list. Pretest corrections and book page 94 are due on Wednesday. We'll take the posttest Friday.

Week 15 Spelling Words

breathe

usually

vacuum

picnicking

bouquet

annually

pursuit

bouillon

actual

league

mimicking

variety

coupon

maneuver

curiosity

peculiar

visually

courtesy

initial

pursue

Weekly Preview 12/5-12/9, 2011

We're having our first snow of the year today, and it's beautiful. Here's what else is going on in and around room 101 this week:

GOAL Parents: Don't forget Tuesday's Parent Meeting in the FMS Cafetorium at 7:00. Ann Hektoen and I will be giving overviews of our programs, plans for future parent meetings, information on characteristics of gifted learners, and resources for families of gifted learners. There will be other meetings throughout the year, and more information will be presented on our Fairfield TAG website, which is currently under construction.

6th GOAL: Students are preparing for their first mock trial. Parts have been assigned, and we hope to start the trial on Friday. This week will be spent preparing opening statements, questions for witnesses, witness testimony, and evidence.

7th GOAL: Students are working on their literature circle projects which will be presented on Friday. This project will compare and contrast the different culture clashes the students read about in their literature circle books.

8th GOAL: Students will be finishing their literature circle projects and will be presenting on Wednesday. These projects will show what they learned about the Holocaust during their literature circle unit.

7th Language Arts: Students will be working on pen pal letters this week. Typed, conferenced second drafts are due for teacher edit at the end of class on Thursday. Week 14 spelling words focus on the suffixes -able and -ible. Pretest corrections and book page 88 (1-20) are due Wednesday. The posttest will take place on Friday.

EXCITING ANNOUNCEMENT: The first meeting of the Fairfield Middle School Rabid Readers Book Club will be on Wednesday, December 7, 2011, after school in the band room. Any FMS student in grades 6-8 is welcome to attend. Refreshments will be provided, and we'll be choosing our first book of the year.