7th Grade Learning Previews - January 2020

7th Grade Learning Previews - January 2020
Posted on 01/14/2020
netpalsScience: Mr. Mahoney, [email protected]
As we wrap up our unit on thermal energy students are designing and testing their box ovens and documenting their work. The unit will end with students eating cake! This is the time of the year students will begin their own scientific investigations that will culminate in the NetPal Science Fair. In the weeks following students should begin the scientific process by asking a question they are interested in answering in any area of science that suits them. Suggested topics can come from hobbies, sports and other personal interests that students decide. Deadlines and rubrics will be given and students will follow guidelines throughout the process. Our next science unit during second semester is called “Exploring the Mysteries of our Universe”. More on that later!

Social Studies: Ms. Thomas,
[email protected]
The next unit will have students working on their first research paper. Students will be answering the question “How can people persevere when they face persecution in their lives?” With the help of Ms. Thomas and Ms. Musher, students will research a subject, create virtual notecards, and cite their sources. Afterwards they will draft an outline and study the structure of a research paper. By the end of the unit students will create a 2-4 page paper of their own. All research paper materials will be available online via Google Classroom. Updates and due dates will be sent out as the unit is going on. Please encourage students to come for help before or after school if they need it! Ask your student what they are researching and why they chose that person. Also encourage them to share with you what they think people should know about this person and why that is important to know. These conversations are super helpful--when students talk about their research, it helps them to process their notes and start making deeper meaning of what they learn. The more they talk, the easier the writing process becomes!

ELA: Ms. Gonzalez, [email protected], Ms.Kupchunos, and Ms. Dear (Harvard intern)
Unit Title: The Plight of Refugees---> A Long Walk To Water Discussion Unit
In ELA, we have begun reading our second whole class novel, A Long Walk to Water by Linda Sue Park. It is a historical fiction novel that explores the experiences of people of Southern Sudan during and after the Second Sudanese Civil War. It is based on the true story of Salva Dut who became a refugee when a Civil War reached his village in 1985. His story is told alongside another character named, Nya, whose voice represents a collection of interviews from people who lived in Sudan during 2008. Your reader is expected to take notes from the reading in their student packets. They are reading the book primarily in class. In addition to reading and taking notes, readers will come together in small groups to discuss questions and ideas from their reading. At the end of the whole class novel, readers will create a Found Poem and engage in a Socratic Circle. Essential questions we will consider are: What choices do people make when faced with oppression? How does reading, writing, speaking and listening deepen our understanding about important social issues in the world? These are great questions to reflect with your student on. To further help your child discuss some of the bigger social issues that this book raises, please visit the UN Refugee Agency website (www.unhcr.org/en-us/ what-is-a-refugee.html) and take a look at Salva Dut’s program Water for South Sudan (www.waterforsouth sudan.org/). For homework, students are expected to be reading an independent book for 30 mins. Monday through Thursday.

Math: Mrs. Tyler, [email protected]
Unit Title: Rational Number Arithmetic
We are at the start of our fifth unit - Rational Number Arithmetic. In this unit, students interpret signed numbers in contexts (e.g., temperature, elevation, deposit and withdrawal, position, direction, speed and velocity) together with their sums, differences, products, and quotients. (“Signed numbers” include all rational numbers, written as decimals or in the form ab.) Students use number line and chip models to represent sums and differences of signed numbers or changes in quantities represented by signed numbers such as temperature or elevation, becoming more fluent in writing different numerical addition and subtraction equations that express the same relationship. They compute sums and differences of signed numbers. Students use multiplication and division equations to represent changes in position on number line diagrams or distance traveled, and interpret positive and negative velocities in context. We will be having a formal Unit Assessment at the end of the month, study guides and more information will be sent home as that date approaches. Ask your student how they are doing at using number lines and chip models and what situations one might use one of these methods for representing sums.
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