Happy New Year!

Welcome 2015!!! I hope you have all had a restful and fun two weeks off! Here is a heads up of what to expect for the rest of the semester:

8th Grade: Students will finish the semester with an energy project in which students will investigate forms of energy used to power our world. Those forms of energy include Solar, Wind, Geothermal, Nuclear, Hydroelectric and more! This is part of our energy in Technology unit!

7th Grade: Students were asked to start bringing in recycled materials the first week back. As part of our transportation unit we will investigate how car manufacturers keep us safe in our vehicles. We will discover the differences between transportation 100 years ago and how that compares to today with the invention of seat belts, airbags and anit-lock brakes, which are used to protect us today. In small groups we will design and build vehicles which will hold a raw egg. We will attempt to keep our egg safe as it drives down a ramp to hit a wall simulating a front end collision. Can our egg crash vehicles, like our own cars, keep the egg safe in the case of a crash?  We shall see!!!

6th Grade: Students looked at various styles of homes to see what we like in a house’s exterior beginning in December.  Someday our students will be homeowners and, as part of this communication technology unit, it is important for kids to know what their tastes in architecture lie. We also learned about and tried  an online program called smallblueprinter.com.  This program allows students to create a floorplan (blueprint) or a home. We will continue working on this activity until the end of the semester.

All grade levels will have final notebook checks due the last week of the semester. Here are some dates to consider:

January 14th: late start

January 19th: no school, Martin Luther King Day

January 22nd: 1/2 day (last day of the first semester)

January 23rd: no school

January 26th: 1/2 day (beginning of the second semester)