Health and Wellness: Justin McNulty
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6th Grade: 6th grade has just started their Social and Emotional Unit, “Second Step: Stepping Up”. Students discuss the differences between elementary and middle school and their responsibilities as a 6th grader. Students practice and explore the benefits of working in groups, empathy, making new friends and trying new activities.
7th Grade: Students have begun their bullying and conflict unit, “Let’s Get Real”. Students will be able to identify ways and types of bullying, how to be an ally and the importance of their role in a safe school environment.
8th Grade: Students have been exploring Media Literacy and Digital Citizenship. At the end of the unit 8th graders will be able to analyze their media consumption, identify gender stereotypes, and explain how to use social media responsibly and safely.
Physical Education: Michael O’Connell
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Grade 6: Students are nearing the end of their Invasion Games Unit. This unit is designed for students to develop and demonstrate competency in a variety of movement patterns as well as apply knowledge of concepts, principles, tactics, and strategies common to invasion games and invasion sports.
Grade 7: Students are nearing the end of their Invasion Games Unit. This unit is designed for students to develop and demonstrate competency in a variety of movement patterns as well as apply knowledge of concepts, principles, tactics, and strategies related to the sport of ultimate and the games of flicker and speedball.
Grade 8: Students are nearing the end through their Invasion Games Unit. This unit is designed for students to: 1) demonstrate competency in a variety of movement patterns; 2) apply knowledge of tactics related to the sport of ultimate; and, 3) apply knowledge of rules and etiquette by acting as an official during ultimate game-play.
Spanish: Mr. Paras
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6th grade. We will be starting a weather unit. Students will talk about weather that happens all over the world. They will also be able to talk about the weather in various seasons. Students will end this unit by creating a 7 day weather forecast for a specific city or area of the world.
7th grade. Students will be learning classroom vocabulary. We will be describing classrooms verbally. Also, in class, students will pretend they are the teacher and setting up their classroom. What will you need as the teacher? Concurrently, we will be learning common classroom commands.
8th grade. This week we will begin a new unit on the bedroom. Students will be working on describing bedrooms using correct forms of verbs. We will review colors so we can accurately describe what is in our rooms. Lastly, we will introduce and work on the conjugations of stem-changing verbs.
Spanish & French: Sarah Bilodeau
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6th Grade French:
Bienvenue en français! We are off to a great start this year! This month 6th grade students are working on projects that include making a storyboard about two famous people meeting and greeting for the first time, seasons and meteorology in French and acting out dialogues where they meet new friends and invite them to do a favorite pastime. Please be sure to ask your student to share the google classroom page as well as to check Aspen on a weekly basis. Let me know if you or they have questions.
7th Grade Spanish: This month, we begin work on out “back to school” unit. Students will work on describing their average school day to a Spanish speaking pen pal. They will use common vocabulary for school materials, classes and places as well as the verbs “tener”(to have) and “gustar”(to like). They will write and act out dialogues giving a tour of RAUC to a new student. Please be sure to ask your student to share the google classroom page as well as to check Aspen on a weekly basis. Let me know if you or they have questions.
7th Grade French:
Allez, allez! This month we begin a unit all about “le football”! Students will learn to make plans, setting the time and place to do something, talk about soccer in France and a famous West African & French soccer players and talk about future plans using aller + infinitive and to form questions using inversion and the expression “n’est-ce pas?”. Projects include making a poster with biographical info about their favorite sports star and writing a mini biography about themselves using the future tense to tell what they plan to become in their lives. Please be sure to ask your student to share the google classroom page as well as to check Aspen on a weekly basis. Let me know if you or they have questions.
8th Grade French: This month students will wrap up their French fashion unit by doing a final project choosing between becoming a fashion consultant, writing their own fashion magazine, reporting on Paris fashion week or creating a unique learning game for unit vocab or grammar. We will then begin our next unit about shopping in traditional French speciality shops and outdoor markets. In this unit, students will learn vocabulary pertaining to running errands in a French speaking city and to telling the sequence of activities. Students will be able to shop for food, clothing and supplies as well as talk about French stores, music, cheese and shop for food using metric values. Students will use regular -re verbs and expressions of quantity. The final project will be to create and perform a dialogue about shopping and to design their own artisanal store and create a flyer to advertise their goods to classmates. Please be sure to ask your student to share the google classroom page as well as to check Aspen on a weekly basis. Let me know if you or they have questions.
Theater Arts: Summar Elguindy
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6th Grade: Students will be exploring storytelling through their body language and facial expressions. They just started the unit with practicing showing different emotions and communicating using neutral scenes. Once we master facial expression we will journey into body language using tableau and pantomime. Students will culminate this unit with a playlet project that will bring all these concepts together to present to their peers.
Band: Patrick Wroge: Director of Bands
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6th Grade Band: We are up and running and have begun working towards our first concert in February. We have started working on “We Are On A Mission To Rock” and the famous Beatles tune “Hey Jude”. Through these pieces and others we will continue the focus on music literacy, proper playing position, breath support, ensemble playing, proper embouchure formation, and the use of dynamics and how they play a major role in the outcome of a piece of music. One of my goals with the 6th grade is to have them join the older kids on a couple of pieces. Please remind your child to check the lesson schedule weekly.
7th and 8th Grade Band: We are up and running and have begun working towards our first concert in February. We have started working on “The Incredibles”, which showcases the main theme from the major motion picture ‘The Incredibles”. We are also working on the popular rock band Metallica’s song “Enter Sandman”. We continue to practice our set up routine. Skills we always practice in Band are proper playing position, breath support, proper embouchure formation, ensemble playing, dynamics, literacy, and being a team player. Please remind your child to check the lesson schedule weekly.
String Orchestra: Brittany Phillips
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The 6th grade orchestra is working hard to understand how to read notes off of the musical staff. Our primary key signature focus for the first portion of the semester will be D major, specifically, reading notes on the D string. We are integrating challenging exercises from the Essential Elements Method Book in order to support our note reading. Students are making great progress on “Tumbleweed Blues”! This is a challenging piece with tricky rhythms and a fun melody.
The 7th grade orchestra is making great progress with the thematic piece, “Dragon Slayer.” We continue to focus on music theory skills such as identifying the key signature, and investigating whether a piece is in major or minor mode. Additionally, students are focusing on strengthening their note reading skills and we are pulling away from writing in notes below or above the musical staff. Students are learning to demonstrate hooked and slurred bow strokes, and we are encountering these tricky techniques in our study of a new arrangement of Pachelbel's “Canon in D”.
The 8th grade orchestra is studying the history behind social justice songs as they reflect on the words of “This Land is Your Land” by Woodie Guthrie. Students will be writing their own stanzas as we prepare for the Veteran’s Day, and will offer them as a thank you to our brave service men and women who continue to fight for our rights to write and speak freely. Additionally, students have been working diligently on their G major scale patterns, chipping away at the very challenging “Brandenburg Concerto No. 3”. This piece introduces students to counterpoint, and we are learning to fit many different moving parts together.
6th Grade Music Studio: Brittany Phillips
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Sixth grade music studio students are wrapping up their final hip hop unit project, and will be presenting their slideshows to the class at our next lesson. Many students have expressed enthusiasm for our next unit on acoustic guitar. For this unit, students will learn fundamental guitar techniques, and will learn to play some of their favorite songs. Our long term goal is to put together a mini rock band!
7th & 8th Grade Music Studio: Joshua DeWitte
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Grade 7: We continue to explore music and emotion. Students are working on creating a music video with the goal of using music and video to create an emotional response in their audience to make a difference. Students chose a song with a positive message and are filming and editing their videos to correspond with the music.
Grade 8: Students recently presented their labels to the class. The labels are Smacc, Grocery Records, Sum Light, Armade, Crystal Records, and Rocket Fuel. Throughout the year, we will explore music’s impact on society in the context of these label groups. Students are responsible for performing, recording, and producing at least one song by members of their group that is representative of the vision and story of their label. Students chose jobs within their label; sound engineer, marketing, graphic design, artist, and CEO. Groups will market their label to other students and attempt to “sell” their recordings. Students will gain experience in music business, production, and singing and recording their voices.
Chorus, Grades 6-8: Joshua DeWitte
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Grade 6: Students are learning the fundamentals of proper vocal technique and choral singing. We have practiced posture and our vocal warm-ups focus on isolating the diaphragm and learning to tune vowels so our sound blends. I am impressed by the sound the choir is already making! We began our exploration of musical theater by watching excerpts from “Phantom of the Opera.”
Grade 7: Students continue to work on maintaining posture and proper breath support throughout a rehearsal. We have moved from singing 2-part to 3-part music. We continue to work on repertoire. Students are working in groups on a Lip Sync Challenge.The goal of the project is to think about how physical gestures and facial expressions are a critical part of effective performances.
Grade 8: We continue to work on singing singing in 4 parts; first and second soprano, alto, and bass. Students continue to develop their music labels. Each group is currently working on their label reveal in which they present the vision and story of their label, the artists they will sign, a clothing line they are developing, and a performance of their own arrangement of “Believer” by Imagine Dragons.
Our first performance will be at the Veteran’s Day Assembly in November where we are joined by the Early Bird Singers choir from Peabody.
Library Technology: Sam Musher
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6th Grade: In Social Studies, students will begin a geography research project. They’ll choose places to visit in a country and write about how those places represent the Five Themes of Geography they’ve been learning about. Using Google Maps, students will create virtual brochures to advertise their country. This will build their skills in reading for research, taking notes in their own words, writing strong paragraphs, and map creation. Ask your child where they’d like to visit in the country they’re researching!
7th Grade: Math students will use a tool called VoiceThread to explain how they solved a set of problems. VoiceThread allows you to draw on a picture while recording commentary, making it ideal for this sort of assignment. Students always enjoy using computers in class, and it’s exciting to try this sort of multimedia work in math.
8th Grade: Last week, students walked to the Cambridge Public Library to hear Nidhi Chanani, author and illustrator of the new graphic novel
Pashmina. Students related to her desire to choose her own career path, even though it wasn’t what her parents expected her to do, and enjoyed seeing how her clever animal drawings improved with time and effort. Every student received a copy of the book, and many started reading it on our way home! Ask your student what they thought of
Pashmina.