Allied Arts Department
Sixth graders have recently completed metal bird ornaments that are displayed in the central foyer, IMC, and art room. They are now working on a still life, learning how to show the illusion of three dimensions on a flat surface. Soon they will start a lesson on perspective and projects integrated with ancient cultures and social studies.
Seventh grade students have been working with a wide variety of media. Weaving with papers created by sprinkling watercolor paper with salt crystals, resulted in constructions with a magical look. Reduction prints were created by carving into a soft printing plate and reducing the surface area each time a new color was added. One point perspective was explored by drawing various sizes of 3-D boxes floating, as if in space. Expressive words were illustrated with acrylic paint on cardboard. Students have also been sketching a still life showing proportion and values (lights and darks).
Eighth graders have been busy painting their large-scale, "posterized" self-portraits that will be on display for Achievement Day in June. They have also simultaneously, been working on perspective drawings and illuminated letters.
Technology Education - Computer Applications - Seventh grade students are working in teams of two creating multi-media presentations. The goal of the presentation is to instruct or inform an audience on an educational topic that students have learned about during their seventh grade experience. One topic used in the past focused on three famous women of the Revolutionary War. Projects like this help students integrate what they learn in other disciplines by using today's technological advances as another tool to formally communicate information.
Eighth grade students are currently in the process of exploring and learning about how designers and engineers create two- and three-dimensional drawings. Using a Computer Aided Design (CAD) program, students are creating drawings to communicate their ideas for manufacturing and construction. This unit demonstrates how important mathematics is in many careers.
Technology Education - Industrial Modular Units - Seventh and eighth grade students continue to work in their chosen units. This one-quarter class allows students to choose three from the twelve units of study available in the classroom: Video Production, Laser & Fiber Optics, CNC Milling, Woodworking Tools & Machines, Research & Development, Aerodynamics, Electronics, Plastics, Environmental Tech., Automotive, Engineering Design, and Graphic Communication. Each unit teaches students about the basic categories of technology -- manufacturing, communications, power and energy, transportation, biotechnology, and engineering. Activities in each unit promote teamwork and problem solving while incorporating historical aspects, industrial language, applied mathematics, and scientific concepts. In addition, as student’s progress through each unit, workplace skills are emphasized and career choices are introduced.
English and World Language Department News
Cluster A English: Second Quarter was spent working on a five-paragraph essay format, focus statements, topic sentences, descriptive details, and four star sentences. Third quarter we will be embarking on a research unit focusing on biographies with students coming in dressed up as "their character”.
Cluster B - English projects for January include a classmate interview project, a narrative piece and an emphasis on adjectives and verbs. They composed a 2-3-paragraph essay about their partner who they interviewed. In Reading we are studying nonfiction and creating nonfiction children's books on a student selected topic.
The 7th and 8th grade Reading classes are winding up a review of reading skills and strategies that started in September. Students will be applying these skills and strategies as they read a novel in the second half of the year.
Cluster D language arts will continue with another reading contract, will read the novel “The Ransom of Mercy Carter”, and will attack the Wordmaster’s II vocabulary.
Cluster E Language Arts classes have focused their efforts on pronouns, and have begun the Historical Fiction novel " The Ransom of Mercy Carter". Recently, students have conducted an interactive web journey.
Cluster F students finished working on a descriptive essay and are transitioning into short stories. This past month, students participated in the Spelling Bee and worked on the parts of speech.
Cluster G students are reading and discussing the novel “Lyddie” - comparing their lives to the lives of those living in the nineteenth century. The author's style, use of symbolism, and characterization will be the focus of writing pieces. Our students are also diligently studying the new Word Masters.
Cluster H has finished Lyddie, and are completing the final project for the novel, which is an Alphabet Book that illustrates various characters, plot points, and themes from the book. Students are working on building their "Writer's Toolbox" and exploring the various creative choices in types of figurative language and sonic devices.
Cluster I students have completed a month-long study of Greek mythology. The students enjoyed reading The Adventures of Ulysses by Bernard Evslin as well as writing persuasive essays and creating models of different characters from the book. Next, classes will delve into a rigorous study of short stories. Students will read selections by Jack London, Edgar Allan Poe, Saki, and others. As always, students will continue to work at mastering grammar and writing mechanics.
World language news – Grade 6 students were celebrating National French week; students did internet research on a famous French-speaking person or character. Currently Both French and Spanish students are learning and reviewing family members with descriptive adjectives. Students will soon begin a self-portrait project.
Grade 7 students are continuing to hone their language skills by telling more about themselves and their family. They are learning about the great variety of holidays and celebrations. They will be showing what they learned in their research through creating and presenting one month of this year’s calendar.
Grade 8 students have jumped into telling about different verbs of movement. They will be learning shopping skills and focusing on describing the clothing needed in different situations.
Food Prep News
Students work in small groups to prepare a variety of healthy foods. This involves reading a recipe, following a set of instructions; correct measuring and a good clean up at the end. Each Friday a different breakfast is prepared and eaten. Some of the favorite recipes this quarter are pizza, breakfast cookies, pretzels, pumpkin pancakes and crazy bread. They will also be learning how to make stir-fry. Perhaps you can get your son or daughter to cook for you sometime soon.
Health Education News
Grade 6 Health classes have been busy exploring the topic of nutrition. They have discussed the importance of nutrients; the role vitamins play in the body, different types of fats and how caffeine affects the body. The class analyzed different food labels and had to distinguish which foods were the healthiest.
Goal setting is considered a protective factor that promotes resiliency and health literacy. Young people who have goals are more likely to evaluate the consequences of their actions and think about how it may affect or influence their ability to achieve their goals. In addition to our regular class work, each grade 7 & 8 health student has a short-term health goal and a plan to achieve it. The students reflect on the progress they are making toward their goal by weekly journal writing. Check in with your child and find out what their goal is. Think about taking advantage of teaching/sharing opportunities that come up in the home as they relate to your child’s goal, perhaps there are ways that you can encourage or help your child to achieve their goal. For example, if your son or daughter’s goal is to get more physical activity, volunteer to walk with them.
Math Department News
Grade 6: After an exciting pilot of the Mathscapes series for their graphing unit, Mrs. McRae’s Cluster A classes are continuing to sample lessons from Mathscapes and the Connected Math series to investigate probability, factors and multiples. They are also having lots of fun with fractions!!! Mrs. Snowling’s Cluster B classes also finished the Mathscapes pilot and will move on to dividing by whole numbers and decimals and rounding decimal quotients. They are using their decimal skills to solve equations as well. Geometry connections include finding the perimeter and area of figures as well as finding circumference.
Grade 7: Students in Ms. VanDeusen’s, Cluster D math classes had an exciting time with the Mathscapes pilot. It provided them an opportunity to challenge their problem solving skills and come up with their own algorithms for solving problems. All classes are now embarking on a fraction journey. The culmination of the unit will be a “Restaurant Expo”. Students will create their own restaurant and work with fractions to customize recipes to meet the needs of their restaurant.
Mrs. Fairbanks’ Cluster E students recently completed their outstanding Stock Market Portfolios and many students presented their findings to Fidelity Investment representatives, who made a return visit to the cluster. During the month of February, students will continue to work with the world of money by exploring foreign currency and exchange rates as part of a Foreign Menu project. Through this activity, students will be reviewing basic fraction computational skills as they work with recipes from foreign lands and then prepare these recipes for classmates during a food festival! Mrs. Harrington’s Cluster F students completed a comprehensive unit on fractions. Next, students will learn how to operate and solve equations with integers. Block D students have wrapped up their study of Number Theory, and will move on to exploring rational numbers. In addition, all classes will be working together to create class quilts, which will tie in with the current social studies unit on Colonial America.
Grade 8: Students in Mrs. Fisk’s Cluster G classes have entered the world of Integers. Through the use of manipulatives, they are developing a deeper understanding of adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing positive and negative numbers. This will help pave the way for solving equations. Algebra students have completed a challenging unit on a variety of real life word problems. Next up will be polynomials. Mrs. Greenwald’s Cluster H students are also learning how to operate with Integers using a variety of approaches. This unit will lead to solving one and two-step linear equations. Algebra students have finished a long, challenging unit on a variety of word problems. Included were wage, uniform motion, mixture, and cost problems. They soon will be learning about polynomials and factoring. Students in Mrs. Depalo’s Cluster I classes are finishing a unit on Geometry that included work with basic concepts, area, perimeter and circumference, surface area, and volume. This work will subsequently be used in science when they study density. Future units include equation solving and Discovering Pythagoras. Algebra students have completed an intensive unit solving word problems of all kinds. Currently, students are working with ratio, proportion, trigonometry, and percents.
All grades will be piloting a unit from the Connected Mathematics 2 series in the next two months.
Music Department News
We are wrapping up another great year in the music department! There are just a few more performances left to close out the school year, and we hope you will join us. Details about the various performances are listed below. In addition to these performances, some of our band students will be going on tour to the local elementary schools to encourage participation in the KMS band and jazz band programs. Several 7th and 8th grade students will be joining us for these tours on Tuesday, May 2nd, Tuesday May 16th, and Thursday, June 8th.
The showchoir will perform for Westmoreland and Harrisville Schools on April 11. They will also participate in the Choral Showcase at Keene High School that night. Spring choral concerts: Grade 8 chorus and Showchoir - Mon. May 22. Grade 6 and 7 choruses on Thursday, May 25. All groups school assembly on Wed. May 24.
In General Music, we have been doing a wide variety of activities, including Instrument Bingo, listening to world instruments, playing on Boomwhackers and keyboards, and practicing notation using both staff paper and dry-erase music boards. We also learned about Taiko drumming in preparation for Burlington Taiko’s performance for the school on April 14th.
Physical Education News
The Fitness Room is open to all students 4 days a week from 2:30-2:55. Students can check the weekly schedule posted on the door. January through April, the PE classes will go through 8 small unit class rotations. These units include spending time in the fitness room, KMS gym, and room 110 for Dance Dance Revolution. Ask your child about it.
Science News
Cluster A - In February and March, Cluster A science students will complete their in-depth study of the moon and its patterns. From there, we will move on to study the earth, exploring large scale, relatively fast changes such as earthquakes and volcanoes; and also slow changes such as weathering and erosion. These units will be taught all or in part by Rachel Lake, student teacher from Antioch New England Graduate School.
Cluster B - We will be studying weathering, erosion, rocks, minerals and the layers of the Earth through readings, demonstrations, centers and other exciting activities!
Cluster D - Cluster D will be concluding our Nutrient Investigation and will become very involved in Scientific Methodologies! Liz Mroczka from Keene State College will be working with Ms. Menck this spring.
Cluster E - Cluster E science will include skills practice in the use of the triple beam balance and a variety of calibrated glassware. Measurements of mass and volume will help students realize the unique properties of water and begin to understand the concept of density.
Cluster F - We are currently in the middle of our unit where we explore the digestive system. We will investigate the nutritional value of various foods by conducting a chemical food-testing lab that will last several weeks. At the conclusion of that unit, we will start a unit on weather. Christie Wallace will either teach these units in part or entirely. She is a student teacher from Keene State College. We are very fortunate to have her.
Cluster G - In Feb/Mar, Cluster G science students will be studying the Atom and the Periodic Table of Elements. We will be applying what we’ve learned so far this year in regards to physical and chemical properties and how all the “matter” in our world is classified. We will briefly introduce chemical equations and then move on into Energy (potential and kinetic) and the many different forms of energy.
Cluster H - In February we will be finishing up chemistry- studying the physical and chemical properties of the elements of the periodic table; conducting experiments on chemical reactions and lastly, studying common household acids and bases. We will also be examining the topic of atmospheric pressure and world climatic weather during our study of properties of gases. In March we will head into the physics part of our curriculum starting with a study of energy - heat, electrical and light in preparation for the building of our solar cars in April and May.
Cluster I - We will be concluding our large unit on chemistry with several exciting lessons on density. Our last density investigation will involve finding the density of a human! After that, we'll move right into physics with inquiries into the seven different kinds of energy. Once we understand a little more about energy, we will have a great foundation for the project kids have been looking forward to all year - Solar Cars! We'll begin our solar cars at the end of March and will continue working on those for several weeks. What an exciting few months we have ahead of us!
Social Studies News
Cluster A - 6th grade social studies have been immersed in Ancient Mesopotamia. We will be studying the development of cities, government, writing, religions, and economic systems, as well as what the lives of the ancient peoples were like.
Cluster B – 6th grade social studies is currently working on an interactive simulation where students become part of a Mesopotamian clan and strive to become an empire.
Cluster D - 7th grade social studies has just wrapped up their unit on life in the 13 colonies. They are now moving on to the wars for North America. They will be looking at the struggle between France and Great Britain for control of the New World and how this would affect the colonists and Native Americans.
Cluster E – 7th grade social studies students have completed projects on the earliest settlements in North America, including Jamestown, Plymouth, St. Augustine, Santa Fe, Quebec, and The Fort at No.4. Some of the projects have been on display outside of the IMC during the month of January. Everyday life in the English colonies has been the focus for our current unit. After reflecting on the text of Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech, we are now beginning a study of slavery in Colonial America to set the historical context for later events in U.S. history.
Cluster F - Mrs. Hebert's social studies classes are wrapping up their study of European exploration and settmement of the "New World". They have examined various motives for and effects of exploration and settlement.
Cluster G – Miss McMurphy’s social studies classes just finished Expanding the Frontier with a layered curriculum. We are now looking at the reform movements of the 1800's. Students are working in groups to look at a current problem and come up with a plan to deal with it. We also had a mock primary in class. The results were Obama and a three-way tie among Republicans.
Cluster H - Mrs. Tuttle's Social Studies classes are moving west! We have been studying Manifest Destiny and now we are looking at the groups of people who settled the west. We will be studying the impact these groups had on that land.
Cluster I - During the Second quarter, students have been engaged in the study of America in the early 1800’s. This began with our study of the Industrial Revolution, New England's textiles mills, and their impact on women. As a part of this unit, the cluster visited the Mills at the Lowell National Historic Park and the Tsongas Industrial History Center in Lowell, MA. To wrap up the study of this topic students examined numerous historical documents related to life and work in the textile factories. Students used these accounts to assess the positive and negative impact on the American women. Over the second half of the quarter we have also engaged in the study of the several topics covering the period from 1820’s-1850’s; we have held a reenactment of the first Women's Rights convention of 1848 and the resulting debates. The students have examined the presidency of Andrew Jackson, and assessed his performance on several key issues that arose during his time in the White House. Most recently, Cluster I students have concluded a study of Manifest Destiny and Pre-Civil War Westward Expansion.