Middle School
Weekly Update
Week of September 22nd
01
Friday is a BDay
Calendar
Thursday, 9/26, 5pm: Chicken Dinner & Ice Cream Social
(VOLUNTEERS NEEDED: See below)
Thursday, 9/26, 6pm: Open House
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Office Updates
From Mrs. Lomax
Our Open House will be held on this Thursday, September 26th. This is a fantastic opportunity to meet your child's teachers and learn about their curriculum for the year. Before the Open House, treat your family to a mouth-watering Chicken BBQ dinner starting at 5:00 PM. Don't forget to order your meal by Monday morning through the Google Form HERE. We're looking forward to seeing all of our wonderful families at these events. It's going to be a great evening of food, community, and learning! If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to reach out.
5th Grade
5th Grade Daily Planner Please check your students’ take home folders and planners with them daily.
Hello Parents: PTO could use your help scooping ice cream before Open House this Thursday. THANK YOU! https://signup.com/go/stLvctp
ELA: In ELA this week, we got in the routine of reading every day. We also worked on writing complete sentences and identifying fragments. Lastly, we read about growth mindset, while underlining evidence of character traits such as grit, perseverance, dedication, and overcoming adversity. This week, we are very excited to begin our first class novel- Front Desk, by Kelly Yang. At first, we will be doing a lot of the reading in class. By the beginning of October, students will be expected to do some reading for homework.
Social Studies: This week we examined 3 of the Earliest Native American Migration Theories (Land Bridge Migration, Coastal Migration, Solutrean Migration).
Band: 5th grade instrument lessons start this week. Hopefully your student got a personalized paper that says their lesson group, lesson day and period. If they did not, you can find it on the lesson schedule HERE. Students do not need anything for this first lesson. They will get a mouthpiece, folder and primer at their lesson. :)
Chorus: It’s been another great week in Chorus! This week, try asking your Chorus 5 student to show you our “hiss like a tire” breathing exercise. Some of them can get beyond 24 counts on a single breath. Also, you should have received an email from me last week with our Chorus 5 course overview and our concert dates. Please mark those on your calendar right away!
PE: 5th Graders enjoyed cooperative games and learning safety rules for class. Please make sure students have sneakers. We will also post information on Google Classroom this year! We are starting our soccer unit as well.
6th Grade
Here is a link to the planner-please bookmark this page. Our iReady Diagnostics finishes up this week with Math on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Hello Parents: PTO could use your help scooping ice cream before Open House this Thursday. THANK YOU! https://signup.com/go/stLvctp
ELA: It was another great week in ELA! We’ve started The Lightning Thief, and we’ve practiced the annotation process. Next week we will take our first assessment about Percy’s challenges and responses, using evidence from the text. We will also begin planning our six word memoir essay. I am looking forward to meeting many of you at open house!
Math: We ended last week with a quiz. The kids did a great job with their first Review Sheet to help them prepare for the assessment. We will start to wrap up this current unit this week. We will also start our weekly assignment on Tuesday. Can’t wait to you at Open House on Thursday!
Science: This week our focus was on figuring out how the air at lower altitudes compares to the air at higher altitudes. We discovered that the air higher up is always colder than the air closer to the ground and has less thermal energy. Next week we will focus on figuring out why that is. I am looking forward to meeting you at the Open House on Thursday.
Social Studies: Students have been working on finishing up their autobiography island. We will be moving into Ancient Greece next week. Carol Hockett from Johnson Art museum will be visiting next week to show us art with mythology interpretations.
Band: Thank you all for getting a binder for your student! Students are saying they really like having a binder for band. We have added Scale Preps to the warm-up section and 2 new pieces to the Band music section. Everyone should have an assignment to practice marked with a red flag. Mrs. Posegate’s Lesson Schedule
Chorus: Chorus lessons have begun! 6th graders have been great about communicating with me and their classroom teachers, and scheduling makeup lessons when needed. Students have been working on marking their music with breaths, cutoffs, and consonants! Chorus Lesson Schedule/Groups Week of 9/23
PE: 6th Graders enjoyed cooperative games and learning safety rules for class. Please make sure students have sneakers. We will also post information on Google Classroom this year! We are starting our soccer unit as well.
7th Grade
Please have students bring a water bottle to school everyday. This is the 7th grade weekly planner. Please bookmark it.
We are planning to go on a field trip Friday, Oct. 4. Please fill out the field trip permission slip that was sent by email earlier this week.
Hello Parents: PTO could use your help scooping ice cream before Open House this Thursday. THANK YOU! https://signup.com/go/stLvctp
Science: This week, we examined specimens to determine if they were living or nonliving. We looked at both one-celled and multicellular specimens under the microscope, providing our students with a hands-on learning experience.
ELA 7: We dove into the waters of critical thinking this week. We have been swimming in the waters of morphology with our first list of prefixes, suffixes, and root words. We have just begun our journey into the sea of critical thinking as we work to make inferences. This next week we will scuba dive into the short story “The Veldt” by Ray Bradbury. Pink reading bookmarks are due Monday, and we will examine our reading goals to see how well we’re meeting them.
Rattenborg’s Small Class ELA 7: We are starting the short story, “The Veldt,” by Ray Bradbury and exploring our relationship with technology.
Math 7 & Pre-Algebra: This week we started our curricular work with Building Thinking Classrooms and worked through stations as we learned to add integers and rational numbers. We concluded our week with a short review statistics quiz and learned how to read Box Plots. View our photos from the week. Next week for our Friday statistics we’ll learn to make our own plots with our jumping jacks numbers and examine plots of home prices to understand how they can be useful for comparison. We’ll practice more with adding rational numbers this week and learn to subtract rational numbers. View our Week 4 Agenda. Pre-Algebra students are getting comfortable with finding, completing, and submitting their work online. This week we added a Pre-Algebra station in class to practice our skills, and I am excited to share that a couple of Pre-Algebra students signed up for Math Lab to have extra time in school to complete work with support from me. Any student who has space in their schedule for period 4A or 8B is encouraged to sign up.
Chorus: Chorus lessons have started! At each lesson students do a combination of vocal technique work, music literacy and ear-training work, and repertoire practice. Chorus Lesson Schedule/Groups Week of 9/23
Music: We have started learning about musical genres! Students chose an artist to research and shared songs with each other to guess genre. This week, we will continue learning how to identify different genres of music based on characteristics we hear.
7/8 Band: Lessons have started! Please make sure to ask your student if they have located Making Music Matter Book 1, and if your student was given one last year, Making Music Matter Book 2. All students have been given 1 copy of each (if your student hasn’t gotten to book 2 yet, they will be given one when they get to that point). All students need both lesson books in school this year! If your student has lost their book, please visit the Hickeys website or call to replace it. They will deliver to school!
If your student uses a school owned instrument, a Borrower's Agreement needs to be filled out each year. This was also e-mailed to families if their student uses a school instrument.
7/8 Band Lesson Schedule/Groups week of 9/23
7/8 Band Course Outline/Concert Dates
PE: 7th Graders enjoyed cooperative games and learning safety rules for class. Please make sure students have sneakers. We will also post information on Google Classroom this year! We are starting our soccer unit as well.
8th Grade
Science 8: Students have been chemists the past 2 weeks trying to solve what was in the mystery mixture. They used observation skills, testing of substances, and research on substances to determine their results. This coming week, we will be looking at chemicals in our foods and beauty products. Students have been asked to bring in product packaging for our research.
Regents Earth Science: We have been working on contour lines and calculating gradient. Students will take these skills and apply them to topographic map reading this next week.
Kotler’s ELA 8: This week, students will complete the first of three iReady diagnostics for the year. While students continue to read Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde (ch. 2-5), I will conference with students over iReady results and ELA goals for the year.
Rattenborg’s Small Class ELA 8: We are starting the short story, “The Veldt, by Ray Bradbury and exploring our relationship with technology.
Social Studies: Coming up this week we will practice making a claim and supporting it with evidence & reasoning; we will talk about the topic of misinformation & the tools we can use to combat that online; lastly, we will be starting our first content unit: The Civil Rights Movement.
Health: Ask your child about the 6 essential nutrients, what they provide us and examples of each (They might even share it in song!). Students watched, wrote and discussed their views related to the impact food has on our mental health. And, working on building our community, students both shared homemade healthy snack/meal recipes with the class AND played “Would you Rather…?” Jenga – see pictures here. Next week our unit on Nutrition and Physical Activity continues. Students will learn about and analyze a couple nutrition tools/guidelines, consider what influences our food choices and how to make healthier selections when eating fast food. A choice-based mini-research will follow.
PE: 8th Graders enjoyed cooperative games and learning safety rules for class. Please make sure students have sneakers. We will also post information on Google Classroom this year! We are starting our soccer unit as well.
8th Grade
Chorus: 8th grade students who have indicated interest in participating in the Area All-State festival must return commitment forms with parent signatures by Wednesday, September 25th. These went home with students on Friday, 9/20. Please see my Friday email for more information! Chorus Lesson Schedule/Groups Week of 9/23
7/8 Band: Lessons have started! Please make sure to ask your student if they have located Making Music Matter Book 1, and if your student was given one last year, Making Music Matter Book 2. All students have been given 1 copy of each (if your student hasn’t gotten to book 2 yet, they will be given one when they get to that point). All students need both lesson books in school this year! If your student has lost their book, please visit the Hickeys website or call to replace it. They will deliver to school!
If your student uses a school owned instrument, a Borrower's Agreement needs to be filled out each year. This was also e-mailed to families if their student uses a school instrument.
PTO
Volunteers Needed
Upcoming MS PTO Events:
- Ice Cream @ Open House, Thursday, Sept 26, 5-6pm, FREE
- Glow Golf and Game Night, Friday, Oct 4, 7-9pm
- Middle schoolers can be dropped off, or they can bring their family to do some Glow in the Dark golf in the MS gym, and play some board games and/or BINGO in the nearby MS spaces.
- $5 per person
- Concessions available as well
Hello Parents: We would love to see some new members at our meetings. The next one is Wed, Oct 16 @ 6pm in the ES STEAM room.
Ways you can help without going to a meeting:
- Help us scoop some ice cream before Open House this Thursday. https://signup.com/go/stLvctp
- Volunteer at the upcoming MS Glow Golf and Game Night event on Friday, Oct 4 from 7pm-9pm (sign-up link to come soon)
Clubs & Activities
Student Council
We are looking for students in grades 5-8 to be involved with this year’s Student Council. We will be asking each homeroom to elect two people to attend our meetings which typically occur twice a month after school. Student Council is active in helping to make the Middle School an even better place to be. So if your child has ideas and wants to get involved we would love to have them. Our first meeting will be Thursday, September 26th from 3-3:30 in room 306. We will be planning the upcoming Spirit Week, first dance of the year, and other projects we want to work on during this year. Hope to see you there!
Late bus riders will need to sign up for the late bus by 12pm - please see a teacher for help with this.
Drama Club
Be sure to check out the Drama Club table at Open House on Thursday, Sept. 26!
Ski Club
Washington, D.C. Trip
Chicken BBQ. Chicken BBQ. Chicken BBQ.
Last call for chicken BBQ orders!! Dinners will be served from 5-6 before the Open House, and can be picked up to go. All orders must be placed by Monday morning. Don’t delay - if you haven’t ordered your dinners yet please do so now with the link below. All proceeds benefit the 8th graders trip to DC this year. We could really use your support.
https://forms.gle/98mS2buJn5wSS5D46
We are looking for a few more volunteers to help set-up, serve, and take down the BBQ. It is pretty easy work - but we need a number of people to make it go smoothly. If you are available, please contact Bill Begeal at wbegeal@tburg.k12.ny.us
There will be a short presentation during Open House during the 8th grade meeting about the DC trip and how to be eligible to attend. More information will be coming home soon.
We will be in touch soon about registration for the program.
Community
Girls Who Code
Are you a middle school or high school student? Want to change the world with your fingertips? Come join us and bring your ideas to life with the power of coding!
We are excited to announce that registration for our Fall 2024 Girls Who Code program is now open! Students will be able to attend free weekly classes where they can learn the basics of computer science by using software and hardware to create their own projects and tackle real-world problems. The class is open to all genders. No experience necessary!
Come to our first class on Sunday, September 15th and learn more about the exciting projects you will make and skills you will gain from joining the program. If you're interested, please fill out this form: bit.ly/WICC-GWC-Spring2024
Details:
Beginner: Sundays starting September 15th from 1pm-2:30pm
Intermediate: Sundays starting September 15th from 3:30pm-5:00pm
Location: Cornell University, Mann Library B30A
If you have any questions, comments, or concerns, please contact us at girlswhocode@cornell.edu.
More information can also be found on our website https://wicc.cornell.edu/#/outreach.
Feel free to follow our Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/wiccgwc/.
Building Contacts
Main Office: 607-387-2825
Attendance: Lauren Conners, 607-387-7551, x1425
Nurse's Office: 607-387-2827
Student Services Team: 607-387-7551 ext. 1449
Bryce DeSantis, School Psychologist
Lisa Magee, Administrative Assistant
Brian Cobb, LCSW, Social Worker
Claire Valletta, Guidance Counselor
IT Help: help@tburgschools.on.spiceworks.com or 607-288-2821 (Monday - Friday 8 am to 4pm)
Newsletter items/help/unsubscribe: Gail Brisson, gbrisson@tburg.k12.ny.us