Ms. Khzouz

One month of school down!  Can you believe it?

This week was a little thrown off with all of the NWEA testing. Testing took a lot longer than anticipated, resulting in students being pulled from class to get caught up.  Thankfully, this week is a regular school week.  I am eager to get everyone back on track.  Our focus this week is to complete our summative assessment for the Thinking like an Engineer unit, and to kick off our new unit, Water; A Mighty Molecule.

Instead of giving students a traditional written assessment, we will be completing a lab in groups next week. Students will work together to create a flashlight. This task builds on the lab students already completed, where they created a circuit. I am excited to see students collaborating together and applying their knowledge to complete this task. I know the students are excited to be back in the lab after a long week of testing.

Homework: 4A/B in the interactive notebook is due Monday October 1st.  Frayer Models for the article were due Friday but I will accept them Monday for students who were out of class due to NWEA testing.

Things to take note of, we will have our second bellwork quiz this Friday, October 5. Students can prepare for this by taking notes during bellwork in class and reviewing their notes at home. I have decided that from now on bellwork quizzes will not be open note. There was too much confusion and dependence on the notes during the quiz. It is my hope that this will motivate students to pay close attention during bellwork review in class.

Keep a look out for progress reports. They should be coming in the mail within the next week or so. If you have any questions for me regarding grades, please reach out. I am noticing a trend in students not turning in assignments. I am going to start requiring that students write down homework and important dates in their planners.

Please feel free to contact me with any questions or concerns you may have!

This was a fun and interactive week for the students!  We started off on Monday doing an interactive activity about peer collaboration and why it is important to work with other students.  They had a task to memorize a series if letters first independently,  then students paired up with a partner and did the same activity.  After the memorizing activity we compared our results.  A lot of students realized it was easier to memorize the letters with a partner than doing it by themselves.  On Tuesday we spent the day using a self evaluating rubric to reflect on how we effectively collaborated with people and why it makes a job easier as engineers to collaborate.

Wednesday-Friday we did our interactive circuit lab where students in groups of 4-5 had to build a circuit with wires, batteries, light bulb, and other materials.  Students were given the materials and had to come up with a way to get their light bulb to light up.  Throughout the lab we encountered problems or “constraints” that students had to problem solve through together.  Once students got their light bulb to light they felt the achievement that engineers feel when they get their final prototype/model to work.  Students recorded their observations/revisions on their lab sheet and then completed the self evaluating rubric on the next page.  These pages are 3a and 3b in their interactive science notebook (ISN).  If students do not have an ISN yet they need to get one ASAP and set it up. Next week we are starting on page 4a and 4b of their notebook.  It is not good to fall behind and be unorganized especially this early in the year.  I have extra notebooks in my room if students would like one for $1.00.

Friday was the first bellwork quiz of this unit consisting of 10 multiple choice questions.  I have the grades in.  If students are not happy with their grade, I strongly suggest coming to class on time and participate in bellwork.  Students also need to be studying for the bellwork quizzes as we talked about it in class.

 

Engineer Bellwork Quiz 1

 

During the third week of school (second week of Sept.) we started our first unit called “Thinking like an Engineer”.  We spent time learning the difference between an Observation and an Inference and how to apply it in science activities.  We used a Claim, Evidence, Reasoning (CER) guided notes to write down observations, and use our observation as evidence to back up a scientific claim.  This was used in our cube activity that we did in class where students had to guess what was missing on the blank side of a cube.  After modeling level zero for the students we then moved on to level one which was a slightly harder cube.  We observed patterns and gathered evidence to explain why our claim is true.  Next week we will be working with groups learning how collaboration helps engineers build a circuit using a D-battery, copper wires, and a light bulb.  During this activity students will be writing down any observations they have and make any changes to their design.  Knowing how to make proper observations and inferences will help students with this next activity.

We also spend a day setting up our ISN (interactive science notebook) with a table of contents, titles, and page numbers.  It is very important our students are well organized because these notebooks will serve as an important tool in keeping all of our work, notes, and used as a study tool.  If your child does not have a notebook for this class yet, please help them get one as we already started using them this week and will next week.

 

Students: Here is a copy of my reasoning section for the CER on cube Level 1.  Please make sure your reasoning sounds smilier to mine.  You need to include the location of the number, letter, or roman numeral (top right, bottom left, middle, etc.) as well as the color too.  Make sure you refer back to the patterns we observed and why they support the claim.  It helps to talk about one pattern or one number/letter at a time just as we did in class.

My evidence supports my claim because we observed many different patterns.  Based on the order of a cube, the middle number is a red 6 because of the numbers 1 ,2, 3, 4,and 5 being visible.  We also noticed that odd middle numbers were a blue color and the even middle numbers were a red color which is why 6 should be red.  Another pattern we observed were that the black roman numerals that were located on the bottom left corner, all seemed to match the middle number.  Therefore if the middle number is a 6 then the roman numeral should be a black VI.  On all the faces of the cube at the top right were orange letters that were in alphabetical order starting at B, C, D, E, and F.  According to the alphabetical pattern, the letter A seems to be missing.  The letter A should be placed at the top right and it should be orange according to the rest of the cube/pattern.  On the top left of the cube, all the faces have a black number that is divisible by 2.  It starts with 2, 4, 8, 16, and 32.  That pattern shows that 2×2=4, 2×4=8, 2×8=16, 2×16=32, therefore 2×32=64.  A black colored 64 should be at the top left of the cube because it fits in with the pattern that we observed.  Lastly, we have a missing green number at the bottom right of the cube based on the pattern on all the other faces.  One of the patterns supports that the missing green number should be a 58.  The pattern observed states that the top left number (64) – the middle number (6) = the bottom right (58).

During the second week of school we reviewed classroom norms and expectations with the students.  A syllabus was sent home with students to be reviewed and signed by a parents/legal guardian.  The signed syllabus is due Friday September 14th.  Please take a few minutes to review the syllabus with your child to make sure they come to class prepared, and are aware of the types of activities we will be working on throughout the year.

During the rest of the week (Tuesday-Friday) we learned about Growth mindset versus Fixed mindset.  This activity included an interactive reading from an article while students took notes during class discussion.  On Friday students watched 3 short videos about growth mindset and answered questions.  No homework was given this week.

Reminders:

• Gather the necessary materials for this class (can be found on the syllabus).  Sign syllabus and turn in by 9/14/2018
• NWEA testing for Science is September 20th.  Have students prepare by making sure they get a good night sleep, a healthy and filling breakfast (brain food), brain warm ups such as reading for 10 minuets in the morning.  Bring water to class to stay hydrated in this warm weather!

Syllabus Page 1

Syllabus Page 2 

Copy of Graphic MINDSET

Hello everyone!

My name is Ms. Khzouz and I am the 7th grade science teacher here at Woodworth Middle School.  Today was the first day back for our students.  We did bell work for the first few minutes of class.  Bell work today covered what students are excited/nervous about for the new school year, and what rules they would like to see implemented in the classroom.  We briefly talked about expectations and procedures which will be covered more this week.

For any parents/guardians who need to contact me my email is khzouza@dearbornschools.org.  Feel free to email with any questions or concerns regarding your child.

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