Mrs. Vrsek's Room

Just a friendly reminder that conferences are Thursday from 3:30-6:30!

Please feel free to come and stop by anytime during those hours!

It’s the last week of school before spring break! I know the students are getting excited and antsy to be off and playing for a week.  We still have a lot of work to cover though.  It is also our PBIS March reward this week! It is a Cones and Phones.  Students will get to use their phones for 1 hour and get an ice cream.  It will take place during 6th hour.

Reward Dates:

Wednesday- 8th grade

Thursday-7th grade

Friday- 6th grade

Friday is the end of the marking period, all work is due by Wednesday.

No School next week April 1st-5th

Conferences Thursday April 11th.

The end of the marking period is coming up! It seems so quick!! Next Friday (2 weeks) is the last day of the marking period.  Students will receive notes with missing work and have until next Monday (3/25) to turn it in.  Interactive Notebooks will be graded on 3/27 for the marking period.

This week we will be starting WIDA testing.  We will be testing on Wednesday and Thursday and doing any make ups after that.

We also will be continuing on with our lessons around testing.  In science we are moving forward with our weather and focusing on clouds and cloud types/formations.  In math we are continuing our focus on 3-dimensional shapes.  In Language Arts we are continuing with Authors Purpose but focusing on Informational Texts.

Upcoming News:

Wednesday, March 13th: Late Start

Friday, March 29th: End of Marking Period

Elementary Schools typically go all out celebrating Reading Month in March, but its important to remember we still need to celebrate reading in middle school too.  March has been recognized as reading month across school districts since I was a little kid and it has always pushed me to want to read more.  We need to remember this mentality across the other 11 months of the year as well.  Use this month to try and encourage the students to read an extra 15 minutes every night and try and push for it each and every month forward.

In class we will continue pushing forward with our core subjects.  We have 1 month left in the marking period.  In Science, we are still working on our vocabulary for weather and starting to look into clouds and their contribution to weather.  In math, we are beginning to dive deeper into shapes and comparing different attributes of shapes.  We will begin looking at 3-dimensional shapes too.  In Language Arts, we just finished writing a story in 3rd person narrative.  We are now switching into the Authors Purpose of reading and focusing on informational texts from there.

This week another month ends…hard to believe we have completed another month of school!  The students are still working hard in all of their classes and we are still going strong with our same content topics as last week.  We are still working on attributes of 2-D and 3-D shapes for math, 1st and 3rd person reading and writing in Language Arts.  This week we will be writing and typing a 3rd person narrative.  In Science we are continuing to learn about weather and different weather vocabulary and instruments used.

We have been working on our leadership roles and skills in and out of the classroom.  It is important for us to carry them to other parts of the school and to home as well.  We also have been focusing on friendship and peer qualities.  These are important as some students begin to transition to new environments (high school) and have a whole new group of peers to get to know.

I hope everyone had a nice long restful 4 day weekend.  It is great to be back and to see the sun shining bright.  The students seem eager and ready to begin the day!  After many snow days and days off I know it can be difficult to get back into the routines, but they are doing a great job of continuing to follow the rules.

This Friday we will have our February PBIS reward.  All students so far have earned the reward!! They are earning pride points like crazy!!

We are diving into our new Math unit and they have been doing a great job so far.  In Science we will start a new unit today.  We will be focusing on weather and temperature.  This is a great time to look at weather because it seems to go from -20 to 40 in just a day or two.

In Social Studies, we are still discussing Egypt and we are talking about Pharoahs and mummification.  The students find this quite a fascinating topic!

Upcoming events:

Mar. 13           Late start

Last week we were able to get back in the groove after many days off.  Even though we had a day off in the middle, we still stayed on track and kept on going through.  In math we wrapped up our Equivalent Expressions unit and everyone did amazing on their tests!  We will begin looking deeply into 2-dimensional and 3-dimensional shapes and looking at not only what shapes they are (as a review) but angles and lines of symmetry and comparing and contrasting different shapes.  We will also look at real world examples of all of these 2-D and 3-D shapes.  In Science we are reviewing today for a test tomorrow (Tuesday) on the water uses and water cycle.  We will begin our next unit on Wednesday with Weather and Climate.  We will start with weather instruments and vocabulary terms.  In Language Arts, we just wrote fantastic papers comparing and contrasting two animals.  This week we will turn our focus into reading more and look at authors  and if they wrote in 1st person, 2nd person, and 3rd person perspective.  This will also help students begin writing assignments in 1st person or 3rd person.

Upcoming Events:

Thursday, February 14th: 1/2 day AM only

Friday, February 15th: No School

Monday, February 18th: No School

January flew by just like this school year has been.  Although we missed many days our last week of January, we still ended our 1st semester strong.

We will be wrapping up a couple of units between math and Science this week and next week and starting new units following.  We have finished up NWEA and we have a few week break before WIDA testing begins in the classroom.  We will use that time to continue to focus on our goals and objectives academically and behaviorally.

Upcoming Dates:

Feb. 4-28         WIDA Testing

Feb. 6              Late start

Feb. 14            Half day

Feb. 15-18       No School: Mid-winter break

Today starts 2nd semester.  Students will be getting new schedules.  They will still have myself for core classes, but their electives will change.  Please be sure to ask them when they get home what their new electives are.

A friendly reminder that today and tomorrow are 1/2 days of school and then we return to full days on Thursday.  This week will fly by!

This is also the last week that we will be NWEA testing! They have been working so hard on their tests.  They truly have been doing amazing!