Here we are in the middle - the middle week of our 3 between breaks - To Kill a Mockingbird is humming (no pun intended) along :) We are doing a mix of in-class reading/listening and at home reading. We have answered the questions in the packet for ch. 2 - 4 (5 - 7 are due tomorrow) and we will continue along these lines up until Winter break. We took a small quiz yesterday on ch. 6 WSH covering Chief Joseph of the Nez Perce - and we may look at chapter 7 next week as well. Block 1 finished up our look at Lewis and Clark and we will be working with some related short stories in the literature book and will move forward with another WSH ch. as well. In addition this week - we are working on the National Geographic Geography Bee - all students participate in 7 rounds in class and our top performing students will advance to another all school round at a later date. Block one finished all 7 rounds today, and blocks 2 and 3 will finish up tomorrow. Enjoy the rest of your week --- look for that TKM book to be read at home!!!

Welcome to the 3 weeks between breaks....lots to do, lots of energy, and waning desire to "do school"...please help your student keep up with this hectic season by gently reminding them to stay organized (use their agenda!), get enough sleep and avoid procrastination etc.... In English this week we will be starting To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee -we will watch a video on the Scottsboro Boys (the case on which the book is based) and then you should be seeing the book and a packet with questions on a regular basis. This book will likely take us into January so there will be a few chapters assigned for Winter Break just to keep connected with the book. In History we are forging ahead into the Western Frontier and statehood. Ch. 6 questions are due on Thursday. Today we started a fun activity on Chinook Jargon - the kids like this - ask them to share a bit with you just for fun :) Final "blurbs" are due tomorrow. Hope the weather cooperates this week, but the beautiful clear sky and calm air at bus duty screamed of, "calm before the storm"! INTERIMS are turned in on WEDNESDAY...please help your student check their grade before then - if it's later on Tuesday - a quick email with any questions would be helpful :)

In class this week we will be continuing our look at Native Americans in the Pacific Northwest (and a few others in other locations) ---Today we discussed the history of government schools and reservations and moved on to more recent efforts to improve education and cultural pride. I show a few videos to address these issues - and we will culminate with Smoke Signals on Wed. and Th. --- in addition - to piggy back on the theme of passing on family tradition and culture - we will be writing a short essay on this idea. Students need to brainstorm 5 ideas for a paper that address a tradition, a ceremony, or a routine that started with a previous generation of their family. Some students will choose religious or cultural events while others may choose to focus on something their family does routinely or annually - like a trip to a family cabin etc.... We will work on the outline in class - and the rough draft - but the final should be typed up at home and turned in on Friday.

Cause and effect paragraphs on significant events in Native American history and the 10 event timeline will be finished in class on Friday --- I hope many students also took the time on Thursday to look at some of the Veteran's Day topics on www.va.gov/opa/vetsday --- our assembly on Wednesday was so moving and I'm sure many students would love to have conversations about their family history with the military - please engage them in those converstaions if you have the opportunity to do so. We will start To Kill a Mockingbird on Monday - this is a challenging and rewarding book for most of the students - more details on this to follow! Enjoy your weekend! kw

This week has flown by! We had a good time with Poe last week - I collected their Raven worksheet on Tuesday -- they should all be very ready for further in-depth at the high school next year :) On Monday of this week, Jerry Harms covered the balance of power in the House and the Senate - discussed some of the close races - etc... they also had time in class to finish up their WSH ch. 4 questions --- On Tuesday - we reviewed the answers to the questions - added details --- the students keep their questions until the quiz on Friday so they can study! We have done a bit more coverage on Lewis and Clark (and York, Sacajawea, and others too!) and today we started a group activity where they are mapping, giving instructions, describing, and then summarizing. Each student has individual as well as group responsibilities - this activity should wrap up tomorrow and they will need to finish a bit of drawing and/or writing over the weekend.

Conference week! :) If you are not scheduled for a group conference I truly hope to see you during one of the arena sessions! Most students are doing quite well with Washington State History (we had a quiz on Friday) - and the Literature Circle on the novel Shakespeare's Secret --- this book combined nicely with our speaker Dr. Delahoyd from WSU - and has been very well received! Hopefully your student has shared some bits of the book with you and the DeVere conspiracy theory -- fun stuff! ---- Most students have been able to finish up their required reading and work on their lit. packet during class - a few have been checking out a book and doing some work at home --- this is our last week with the book for blocks 2 and 3 and block 1 should finish up next week. Our big focus for this week is POE --- otherwise known as "Poe Fest" --- The Tell Tale Heart is in our Lit. book - so we read that in it's entirety and then we do an overview of a variety of other works such as The Raven, The Pit and the Pendulum, Annabell Lee --- etc.... Should be a good time! Hope to see you this week!

Sorry it's been awhile without a post - filter issues with my district computer :( OK- to get you up to date....in the last couple of weeks we have finished our group maps and the scoring of these will wrap up tomorrow (would have been today, but the ch. 3 kids were gone to Q6). We also completed our PNW map test. There were quite a few perfect scores, and quite a few not so perfect scores. For those that struggled - lack of preparation was probably the issue - but good news, the group map project carries enough points to offset moderately poor test scores. We also watched a couple of short videos - Sculpted by Floods and Mud Slide - both dealing with the geology and climate of Washington. If you have an Mt. St. Helens memories, consider sharing them with your student :)

Today we started a new novel - Shakespeare's Secret - it is an intriguing mystery that also delves into bullying and other issues of "fitting in" -- I decided to go with this novel at this stage of the year largely because we will have a guest speaker, Dr. Michael Delahoyd of WSU's English department on Thursday - and he will be talking about some conspiracy theories related to Shakespeare - this same mystery is followed in our novel --- should be fun!!!

Also....in a quick apology - I hope to get the Music and Me papers returned by Monday and the book projects by late next week. This is an unusually slow turn around time for me. The death of my father near the end of the summer - followed by another family death - had me a bit off my game at the beginning of the school year in regards to energy for grading. I'm getting back up to speed, so please accept my apology and look for faster turn arounds in the future :)

Thank you to everyone who helped your student with supplies for the map projects - they really do produce some creative (and accurate) replicas of our state :) Hope you're all enjoying this lingering lovely weather!!!