8/29-8/31/18 Great Start!

We have had a fantastic start of the school year with our new grade 6 students!

6/18/18 Summer Reading Notice

Happy Summer!

Each student should be bringing home a copy of their summer reading book,

Flying Lessons and Other Stories. All middle school students are reading this book,

and will be expected to complete activities in September based on their favorite

of the 10 short stories.

If your student was not able to get the book, copies are available in the

grades 6-8 office.

It has been a pleasure teaching our grade 6 team this school year, and we thank

you for your support throughout!

We wish our students an adventurous and fun filled summer!

Team Independence

Final Team Independence News Letter

Hello, Families!

Now that we have entered the home stretch, the excitement is palpable!

This Friday, June 15, we are hoping to have an activity day consisting of movies,

outdoor games such as the egg toss, and wiffle ball.  We will purchase snacks using the

money won by students in the Box Top competition.  To participate in the activities, we

are asking students to do their best not earn ODR’s or multiple TAB outs this week.  

In Social Studies, students are engaged an a skills recall competition, with multiple

ways to win and in Language Arts they will continue reading The Schwa Was Here,

as well as demonstrate skills by playing Quizlet and other review games.  In Literacy,

students will finish the movie,

A Wrinkle in Time.

We would like to thank families for supporting our Industrial Revolution Project Night.

We are so very proud of our students! Presentations as you know, are not easy,

however 99% of our students stood to present their Industrial Revolution Projects

and/ or written pieces in class, and after school during our project presentation night.

What a great way to end the academic year!

As you may recall, this 2017-2018 school year was our first attempt at an

independent 6th grade team. Although we struggled with our schedule configuration

and needed to work out a few other kinks, students and parent were patient and flexible.  

We believe we have had a great finish with your amazing children! We thank you for

your support throughout this 6th grade year!

Sincerely,

Team Independence

Weekly News 6/4/18

6/4/18

Happy Monday to our Families!

Wednesday Event True Confessions: Stacey failed to inform our principals of a

time change for our Wednesday event which is now scheduled for 5:00- 6:30.

This being said, I plan on being here to from 5:00- 7:30 to accommodate any

previously made plans since the first memo was sent.  My hope is to see as many

students arrive with their parents as we can.

Language Arts Requirement:

Students will present their Social studies projects for their last Language Arts

public speaking grade, either in front of their peers (whole class) or at the open

house to an adult.  We are looking forward to seeing students demonstrate their

knowledge and hard work.

Math students will be completing their slideshows in class and in Science

students are looking at potential and kinetic energy through an in-class activity.  

Announcements 5/15/18

Hello, families! 5/15/18

Announcements

MATH-  STAR test for Math on Wednesday, May 23.  There are also many resources

on the Team Independence blog: https://grade6teamindependence.blogspot.com/

Literacy- STAR reading test this Thursday, May 17.  STAR will be on Friday for chorus kids.

In Language Arts, Literacy and Social Studies students are studying the industrial

revolution of the 1800’s.  As part of the unit, there will be a grade 6 learner celebration/

Open House on Wednesday, June 6 from 6:00 to 7:30.  Parents can come anytime and

enjoy a stroll through the many projects based on inventions, inventors and reformers of

the time.  

In social studies students have a Quiz tomorrow (Wednesday 5/16).  

In Language Arts, students are writing argument essays this week based on topics

of their choice brainstormed in class.  This is the first of two opportunities to write an argument

to be reflected on the trimester 3 report card.

Math Classwork Division - Videos to Watch

5/14/18

1. Divisibility Rules Refresher
fun video!

2. Long division with whole number and decimals. We have 3 different videos by
music preference!

Whole Number division single digit divisor

Indy style song sung to the Lumineers - about 2mins

     Country style  

Colorful and fun - 2 mins 49 sec

Rap

      Cool beat - 2 mins 48 sec

3. Long division with decimals

Dividing with Decimals

8 mins 14 sec - engaging

2 examples: decimal divisor and decimal divisor and dividend

Dividing with Decimals Rap - adding zero

3 mins 19 sec

Use this video as a resource for your classwork today!

4/30 Weekly update

Hello, Families!

We hope our students had a restful break!

• On Wednesday, May 2, Students will be attending Machine de Cirque at the

Flynn Theater, please make sure permission forms and money has been
handed in prior to the show.

• Students/ parents need to turn in input forms for next year’s student placement

F108F - Student Parent Input Form.pdf

• Conferences are being held this Thursday, May 3.  Slots are filling up quickly!

If you have not been able to schedule and would like to please let us know.

Language Arts- This week students students will start with making corrections

to their westward expansion narratives.  This can be done in class and, if need be,

worked on at home. We will then begin an in-class reading of the novel,

The Schwa Was Here, which we will modify into a child’s picture book or an adult

informational handbook. We will alternate days between the book and Industrial

Revolution topics.

Social Studies:  This week will will begin our final unit of the year!  The unit is on the

Industrial Revolution. We will start with an introduction and then move into the early

inventions that influenced the way we live today.  A reminder to any student who

was not around for the Westward Expansion test on the Friday before break.  

These students will need to be prepared to take the test on Tuesday.

Literacy: Students need to make sure all discussion questions for

A Wrinkle in Time are completed and turned in.  This week they will also be

starting their book project.

Math: Students will spend the week working on LCM- Least common multiple.

Science: Students will be finishing chemical reactions. We will soon begin our unit

on energy.

Weekly Updates & Homework

Happy week before school vacation!

This week students in Language Arts class will be working on a

writing assessment.  This requires students to write an historical fiction

narrative (story) or complete journal entries using facts from our study

of westward expansion topics.  This means your student has homework

all week! Tonight students need to complete their fact sheet and

planning guide, and the rest of the week requires them to write. Stories

will need to be completed by Friday.

Social Studies: This week we will wrap up a very successful Oregon Trail

simulation game.  The students are having fun with this. We will wrap up with

processing the challenges and difficulties faced by the pioneers.  At the end of

the week, we will have our final assessment on the Westward Expansion unit.  

Students should begin reviewing 15 minutes per night starting Tuesday

(vocabulary words, Timeline notes and "you teach" questions/notes).

Math: Students have been working on finding the GCF of two numbers using
several different methods. They should all have a minimum of 7 problems done
by now and are looking to complete the page by Friday.Many students have not
yet handed in the volume and surface area of rectangular prisms worksheet
(first page only). They should have completed it by now, as it was assigned over
two weeks ago, and all students had a minimum of three days of class to work on the problems.Today we worked on data vocabulary and will be working on learning to
build, and interpret box and whisker plots.

4/9/18 Weekly Update

Good morning, Families!

Eligibility forms for sports have begun!  Every Thursday, school-sport athletes

must have their forms signed by all teachers.  Please note: This option is

available to all parents that would like feedback on your student on a weekly

basis!

Grade 6 parent/ student conferences will be held on Thursday, April 19 and

on Thursday, May 3.  Sign up sheets will arrive home with your child very soon.  

Language Arts students will receive a review sheet today to prepare for a test on

Friday, April 13.  Many students also still need to pass in their Sign of the Beaver

book summaries.  These summaries were the first writing grade of the new trimester.

Social Studies:  We just finished our Westward Expansion timeline last week.

 This week we are embarking on one specific aspect of Westward Expansion.......

the Oregon Trail.  Students will participate in a simulation/game activity that will

hopefully touch upon the realistic hardships of what these pioneers experienced.  

We will wrap this up with student choice topics to research based on the

hardships and realities of the journey.  Please ask your son/daughter questions

throughout the week to help reinforce their learning.

Literacy- Reading a minimum of 20 minutes a night makes a huge difference

in writing and preparedness for future schooling.  We can make some great book

suggestions if your child can’t seem to find anything!

Math students will be working in groups and teaching their peers about Greatest

Common Factor and Least Common Multiple.

In Science, students are finishing their work with testing chemicals and writing

conclusions about their findings.  There should be an assessment next week.

Weekly Update 4/2/18

Good Morning Families! 4/2/18

A quick reminder: today is a half day! Also, Check your mailbox for

report cards!

This week students will have 3 days of Math SBAC testing for a little

over an hour on each of the three days, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.  

Our SBAC testers and Science Fair finalists will be honored with a brief

assembly (15 minutes) on Friday morning, April 6 from 7:30- 7:45.

For Literacy class, students should be reading a minimum of 20 minutes

per night.

Math practice worksheets and answer keys can be found at mathdrills.com

Fraction work would be most helpful.

Social Studies:  This week students will wrap up their timelines on the

Westward Expansion events that we have been learning about.  All timelines

should be finished by Wednesday.  If you would like to see your son/daughter's

timeline, they are online in their google drives.  We will then move onto

"The Oregon Trail". This will focus on some of the hardships some of the early

pioneers experienced.  We will learn about this through a video and a simulation game.

Language Arts students will continue learning about the Lewis and Clark expedition

in preparation for their own Journal or story writing.  Sign of the Beaver book

summaries are very past due!  Please ask your student about handing in

their summary.

REPORT CARD INFO:

We would like to thank you for your continuous support and patience with the

report card delay.  Our tech specialists have been trying to solve the mystery

of the disappearing report card comments and other glitches in the program.

Below you will find the directions for viewing all teacher comments through

Power school that the should have been visible on the report card.  Also,

PBGRs written in all capital letters in PowerSchool are the grades that show

up on the report card. For example, PBGR.MMS.ELA.R READING is a report

card grade.

1. Sign into PowerSchool

2. Click on the STANDARDS GRADES tab

3. Click on the teacher/ course

4. Scroll down to the PBGR grades

5. Click on the comment icon in the T2 column.  

6. To view the next teacher's comment, continue to scroll down, and repeat steps 3-5.

Thank you,

Team Independence