The Scarlet Pimpernel and BIRTHDAY BASH!

Today scholars began working with algebraic equations, took a spelling and vocabulary test, and filled out a Venn diagram comparing and contrasting the novel and the movie of The Scarlet Pimpernel. They will be using their Venn diagrams to write essays next week.

In 15 minutes we were able to celebrate a host of students, those who had birthdays in December and those who had birthdays in January. There will be plenty of sugar coming home today!

Happy Noah! lol

Singing to Logan

These two ladies share their day!

Singing to Hyrum

Stoic Satchel!

Happiest of Birthdays to all our winter scholars! :)

Out of This World!

The highlight of today's educational experience was certainly Comet Making Class. The scholars discussed what makes up a comet, and then participated in adding together the ingredients to build our own comet so we could take it outside and play catch. Enjoy the photos!

Let's COOPERATE!

The third quarter is up and running and scholars are working feverishly to master skills from the first half of the year and wrap their minds around new information on a daily basis. They are currently working in "cohorts" of three as we move into a team building/cooperating phase. These scholars will need to be able to work as teams and cooperate with others when they move into 7th grade, in less than 8 months. We will be preparing them this quarter with plenty of teamwork and opportunities to learn tolerance and patience.

During our character time we have allowed students to work together to show how they can communicate and cooperate in order to get the job done. We have spent time playing Kingdoms with historical figures and novel characters. We have also walked blindfolded students down the stairs, around the building, and back up the stairs with only giving verbal directions. Success was the word of the day as scholars lead their friends through the hallways!

Today scholars cooperated with each other in groups as they were required to figure out logic puzzles with Popsicle sticks (math in disguise). They worked together well, and are showing great improvement in their skills!

We took the mid year math test today and all scholars put forth effort to complete as much of the test as they could. I am sure they have renewed many of the skills that have been a bit rusty. We will continue to work on those as we move forward into our inequality unit in math.

We are moving right along in Astronomy. The night sky has been cooperating in a lovely way this past week. Students are drawing the moon phases each night and this morning's waning crescent was just fabulous! The winter sky is the best sky to view the stars. We learned about the life cycle of stars today and will be graphing some constellations this week. Tomorrow we will enjoy an exciting experiment building our own lifelike comet and playing with it outside!

The Scarlet Pimpernel is coming to a close and we will view some of the video on Friday as a treat for finishing the novel. Scholars will have a quiz on the novel tomorrow, and we will continue reading Tale of Two Cities. At the same time we have begun our study of Call of the Wild by Jack London. We will be reading this novel while participating in the Yukon Quest race that starts on Saturday. Your scholar can watch the race and track his or her musher by going to the website:

www.yukonquest.com

Enjoy watching the race!

Stop back tomorrow for photos of our comet experience!

Risky business needing to trust others!

cooperating together

Enjoying our quarterly field trip

Searching out answers

Already the End of Second Quarter!!!

Here we are at the end of the second quarter, half way through the year already. There are many things coming up and we want to be prepared so that students have the best experiences possible. We will be heading to the planetarium on Friday. Please remember to cancel lunch for your scholars, we will be back in time just to grab a bag lunch and go home!

We will be in full gear for the science fair over the next few weeks. Scholars will be handing in final details on their experiments today and will need your help to get their experiments accomplished over the next weeks. Please help them by being their personal photographer. All students need photos of THEMSELVES doing the experiment. Without that documentation they will be eliminated from the competition.
On that note, we are in need of judges for that evening. I have my emails going out today to past judges. Parents or relatives of students in the school MAY NOT JUDGE, but if you know of someone that would be interested, or is a scientist by trade, we would love to have them join us. Please have them email me and I can give them details. We will feed them that evening and be sure to thank them for their support of our program. The science fair is slated for February 27th at GFA with judges training at 6:00.

Parent University for Singapore Math his this Thursday the 16th. I will be asking students if they would like to participate today as part of the mental math section of the evening. If you would like your scholar to show off their mad skills please encourage him or her to participate! :)

Have a great week!

Revolution!..or is it Just a PHASE ?

Role play is one of the more creative ways to allow students to experience the history that they are studying. Today the scholars practiced some expeditionary learning as they practiced the "luck of the draw" and were placed in categories based on their social class prior to the French Revolution. First estate clergy was only 10% of the class. 20% of the class fell into the second estate, or nobility and aristocrats and the rest fell into the bourgeoisie. They were required to pay taxes, many lost their homes and had to double and triple up to live with others. The aristocracy tried to help some of the peasants by offering to let them serve them and be their footrests. Other bourgeoisie that had income less than their tax burden were hired by clergy to fan them and keep them cool.

Eventually when the majority of the bourgeoisie had enough of the taxing and living paycheck to paycheck, they decided to come up with a plan that if the clergy and aristocracy did not accept, they would follow through and drag them to Madam de la Guillotine. Their offer to hold off the violence was that the first two estates would have to give back half the taxes they took, and they would pass a flat tax as a country where everyone would have to pay a percentage of their income to support the country, no matter how much they made.

Of course the clergy would not accept that because they did not work, but lived off of the tax funds from the third estate.
Chaos ensued and the bourgeoisie succeeded in taking power.

Later in the day we reviewed the phases of the moon with Mr.Lee's Moon Phases rap and took turns displaying the phases. Your scholar can tell you each phase from the photo. 

Paying Taxes

The Clergy - First Estate

Having to double up in their homes

Suffering homeless

Taxation out of control

Revolution ensues

cleaning up the mess of a revolution

These are the phases of the moon!

January's Calendar and Such!

Scholars hit the ground running yesterday as we made up for some lost time in December. Our most marked work was in the realm of the French Revolution that are just embarking upon. Your scholar will be reading the famous Scarlet Pimpernel, as well as hearing A Tale of Two Cities during our read-a-loud time. We will be studying the revolution in detail in our history unit. This unit tends to be one of the favorites for scholars as there are so many deep activities involved. We are out to have some serious enjoyment while we learn.

We are also getting into the nitty gritty of astronomy this month. We have a field trip to Clark Planetarium on the 17 and currently we only have one driver who can transport three students. We need drivers or I will have to cancel, and I hate to do that. If there is any way you can help us, please let us know!

Scholars have chosen and are reading their books for their book report at the end of the month. This month is a written report and they have been given the outline form to attach to the written report. It is mandatory that those two pieces are handed in together on the 28th.

Scholars are also back to full essay writing as of this week. They are writing a persuasive essay regarding the topic of the bill they are drafting for student congress. I expect these essays will be powerful.

Thank you again for your patience as I catch up with all the grading and gaps from my time of absence in December.



Calendar for the month!
8 - Science Project Idea submitted in writing
10 - Assembly/spelling test/vocab test/essay due/  Geo Bee at 1:45
14 - Science Test, Earth, Moon, Sun
15 - Latin Test/ Calling Cards Due
17 - Planetarium Trip/Seasons/moon phases
20 - No School for students
21 - Math Test Unit 7
24 - Essay due
28 - Written Book Report Due
30 - History Test - French Revolution
31 - Spelling test/vocab test/essay due/ BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION for Dec and Jan birthdays

If there are changes I will alert you by email and change the blog!

Happy Day to you all! :) 

Davis County Students and Parents Please Plan for This!

Thank Yous, Happy Holidays, and onto 2014!

Thank you parents and students for the kind notes, thoughts, and prayers after the passing of my mother-in-love. She was an amazing lady, and our loss is heaven's gain. We miss her terribly and will be heading to NY in the spring to lay her in her final resting place. We were blessed by your heartfelt sympathy.

We will have some work to make up when we return on Monday. Certain pieces that are essential to the Core Knowledge sixth grade curriculum will be covered over the first week back. We will then jump headfirst into our new units. I will post the calendar early in the week.

In review... right before I left the 6th grade hosted the monthly assembly. Service was our theme and we were blessed to have raised over one thousand dollars for the PTO to share with needy families in our school.

Then, while I was gone the scholars had a trip to Mountain Ridge Assisted Living in Ogden. They played checkers with the residents and made some new friends!

Then when I returned we headed to The Christmas Carol at the Terrace Plaza Playhouse. We enjoyed the play and the next day had a great time watching the movie. We had time to celebrate the holidays and share company with each other. Enjoy the photos!

Mountain Ridge

Making Friends

Enjoying the movie

Green and Purple Pillows! :)

Dreidel