WICHITA PUBLIC SCHOOLS e Stucky Storm Watch
Transcript of WICHITA PUBLIC SCHOOLS e Stucky Storm Watch
It's more important now than
ever to stay connected and in-
volved in your child’s education.
Even though middle schoolers
may push parents away as they
struggle with a desire for inde-
pendence, we all know they still
need a strong support system to
see them through.
To the right is a list of 10 ways in
which you can support your
middle school student in finding
success. Some of these are
about gathering information.
Others are suggestions for or-
ganization. And finally, several
are about developing the habit of
talking with your student about
school: classes, friends, social
challenges, and organization.
I hope you will implement at
least one of these strategies to
help your student find success.
The full article can be read at
www.m.kidshealth.org.
I’m eager to see you all at our
conferences next week.
10 Ways to Support Your Middle Schooler
I N S I D E
T H I S I S S U E :
6th Grade
News
2
7th Grade
News
3
AVID
News
3
8th Grade
News
4
Assessment
& Library
News
5
Math
Information
6
AVID Impact 7
Book Fair 8
Calendar of
Events
8
W I C H I T A P U B L I C
S C H O O L S
Stucky Storm Watch S E P T E M B E R 2 0 , 2 0 1 7 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 1 7
The
Leslianne Craft, Principal
Monday September 25th
Wednesday September 27th
4:00 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.
Parent
Teacher
Conferences
- - -
Sept. 25 & 27
4:00 - 7:30
P A G E 2
Aubrey Steele, Anyia
Grant, and Cecil Hol-
lis using team work
and problem solving
skills to build a bal-
loon tower in math
class.
6th Grade News Mathematics
We started off the year in
math with lots of fun introduc-
tory and team building activi-
ties. The second week of
school, we dived right into our
new math curriculum and
began our unit on factors and
area. Students learned all
about the distributive proper-
ty, finding the area of parallelo-
grams, triangles, trapezoids,
and then applied that
knowledge to finding the areas
of kites and other composite
shapes (shapes that are made
of several other shapes put
together). We took a brief
break from Carnegie Learning
to take our math benchmark
assessments and we will finish
out this unit by learning how
to find the greatest common
factor (GCF) and the least
common multiple (LCM) and
applying that knowledge to
solving word problems. After
our first middle school math
test, we will jump right in to
our next unit and learn all
about identifying rational num-
bers and multiplying/dividing
fractions. If you have a com-
puter or tablet with internet
access at home, a great re-
source is Mathia— the online
practice that comes with our
new math curriculum. Feel
free to encourage your stu-
dent to log on and work on
some math clicking on the
Single Sign On application
(bit.ly/USD17SSO). We rec-
ommend you bookmark this
for easily returning to the
Carnegie Math site called Ma-
thia. Students should know or
know where to look for their
logon and password.
English Language Arts
English Language Arts began
the school year with a Parts of
Speech review mini-unit. We
are now in our Relationships
Unit and we will be reading
short stories, non-fiction text,
and poems that explore vari-
ous examples of relationships,
including “The Story of my
Life” by Helen Keller.
Science
Mrs. Medlam’s Science class
has researched a scientist and
created a lab environment in a
shoebox using a potato as the
scientist. It is amazing to see
the creativity of the students.
Currently, 6th graders are
learning about metric meas-
urement and using the tools of
measurement.
In Mrs. Overstake’s science
class students collaborated to
save Fred . This STEAM pro-
ject involved saving a gummy
worm named Fred, which had
tipped over its boat, a jar.
Students had to get the life
preserver out from under the
boat and get Fred back into it.
They were only allowed to use
2 paper clips as tools and
could not touch anything ex-
cept the paper clips.
S T U C K Y S T O R M W A T C H
Students collaborate
to save Fred .
Top photo l. to r.:
TreJohn Bell and Natalie
Lujano
Bottom photo l. to r.:
Thomas Gracy and
Blake Scott
Above from l. to r.:
Cayla Johnson, Jennifer
Balderas, Mia Ackerman,
and Morice Ayers.
Left, Above:
Orville & Wilbur Wright
Inventors
Left, Below.:
Dorothy Vaughn, NASA
Mathematician
7th Grade News
P A G E 3 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 1 7
8th grade level. In the spring AVID
will be recruiting for a total of four
AVID classrooms in the fall of 2018
-2019.
AVID chooses students in the mid-
dle who, with the right support,
could achieve well in more rigor-
ous courses in an effort to be col-
lege ready. AVID has a 35-year
track record of developing college
ready students. In Wichita alone
the numbers are remarkable. For
The new 7th grade class, shown in
the picture to the right and above,
are already learning skills in collab-
oration and inquiry that will pro-
vide a lifelong advantage. We
know that AVID provides this ad-
vantage so the AVID site team is
looking for even more students
who could benefit from the addi-
tional rigor and support the AVID
program has to offer. Currently
there are three AVID classes, one
at the 7th grade level and two at the
example, of the 172 AVID Seniors
who graduated in May of 2017 52% of
them were taking dual credit courses;
79% of them were enrolled in Ad-
vanced Placement or International
Baccalaureate classes; 74% of them
had parents who had not graduated
from college; and 87% of them had
been accepted into a four year college
or university. For more details on the
advantage AVID students gain, see
page 7 and the AVID website at
www.avid.org/avid-impact.ashx
English Language Arts
English Language Arts classes are
working on a relationship unit.
Students are responding to ques-
tions such as what defines a rela-
tionship, how they are developed,
as well as how relationships impact
life experiences. Students are also
beginning a review of basic gram-
mar skills.
Social Studies
Following our first week in Social
Studies, Ms. Parnacott and Mr.
Tyner are navigating a new direc-
tion. Students are learning skills
such as using a compass rose, find-
ing latitude and longitude, and read-
ing maps. In the future, if you’re
lost in the forest with only a map
and a compass, our 7th graders
should be able to lead you to safe-
ty. (Take a GPS and a fully-charged
cell phone, just in case!)
AVID Students Gain A Lifelong Advantage
Mr. Sobonya’s 7th
Grade AVID
students are
learning how to
conduct tutorials
to deepen their
learning.
Seventh graders
Jonathan Patton,
Asher Blevins,
Christian Canales,
Jaden York, and
Gabriel Hulsopple
practice
identifying their
U.S. states in Mr.
Butler Geography
class.
At left, 8th Graders: Canyenn McAllaster, Alaura Fowler, Jaylen
Hardwell, Christopher Johnson and Malachi Reed, 8th graders,
examine artifacts from other parts of the world including a Rus-
sian military hat, chop sticks from Japan, an artwork from Colom-
bia, in Mr. Butler’s 8th grade social studies class.
P A G E 4
8th Grade News Mathematics
In Math we have enjoyed get-
ting ourselves familiar with our
new curriculum, Carnegie
Learning. The students have
seemed to enjoy the online
component, Mathia. If you
have a computer or tablet with
internet access at home, a
great resource is Mathia— the
online practice that comes
with our new math curricu-
lum. Feel free to encourage
your student to log on and
work on some math clicking
on the Single Sign On applica-
tion (bit.ly/USD17SSO). We
recommend you bookmark
this for easily returning to the
Carnegie Math site called Ma-
thia. Students should know or
know where to look for their
logon and password.
Our first Module is called
Transforming Geometric Ob-
jects. We have been busy
translating, rotating, and re-
flecting objects with patty
paper and on the coordinate
plane.
In Algebra students have also
been enjoying their new text-
book! We’ve started with a
basic overview of every func-
tion and its graph that they will
see throughout the year. We
will start diving in further to
learn more about functions
every day!
Social Studies
Can you survive, on your own,
in a new place, in an unknown
land with strangers always
watching your every move?
That is what our students are
learning about the early English
settlement including lost colo-
nies, mysterious disappearanc-
es, disease and famine. This is
exactly what the settlers en-
dured as they escaped reli-
gious persecution to start a
new life in a new place! Also,
September 17th was Constitu-
tion Day. History classes
learned about the Bill of Rights
and how it specifically applies
to students in middle school.
English Language Arts
English Language Arts has been
working on learning about
relationship with the people
closest to us. Our focus this
week and for the remainder of
September will be about how
we interact with our siblings
and adults that care for us. It’s
been interesting talking about
how much of an impact close
relationships have on our
lives.
Honors students have been
working on the pitfalls of social
media and what role it can play
in bullying. We’ve looked at
several media examples and, in
small groups, students have
talked about the role social
media plays in their lives. We
are working on broadening
our thoughts about using so-
cial media as a tool instead of
as a toy.
In addition to all those things,
English Language Arts classes
are diving deeper into using
technology in the class-
room. Students are learning
to use computers to turn in
and pick up work from teach-
ers. They are also able to use
their phones outside of the
school day to download work
and pick up missing assign-
ments.
Science
As we got comfortable with
the new school year and class-
room operations, we have
spent time understanding how
to measure the physical
world. We will next turn our
attention to the concept of
energy: its conservation, vari-
ous forms, and transfer be-
tween objects. We will dis-
cuss heat and heat transfer
focusing on conduction, con-
vection, and radia-
tion. Students will construct a
solar cooker to harness the
Sun’s energy to cook food!
S T U C K Y S T O R M W A T C H
Assessment News
P A G E 5 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 1 7
FastBridge is our district’s new
screening test replacing AIMSweb.
Students will complete the Fast-
Bridge screening tests in reading
and math on computers. The
screeners will be given in the fall,
winter, and spring to help teachers
see which students are likely to
meet the end-of-year learning
goals, and which students need
more help. Since they are on the
computers, students will need earbuds
or headphones. We request that
they have a pair in their locker or
pencil pouch all year.
If your child has a low score on a
screening test and other infor-
mation shows that the student
needs extra help in reading or
math, extra instruction will be giv-
en automatically during the daily
school schedule. All of the stu-
dents who participate in extra in-
struction also take regular and brief
progress monitoring tests to see if
their skills are improving. These
tests are given weekly, biweekly, or
monthly, depending on the stu-
dent’s learning needs.
Both screening and progress moni-
toring score reports will be shared
with you by his/her teacher during
parent-teacher conferences or at
other times during the school year.
These reports help the teacher,
student, and parents know if each
student is likely to meet this year’s
learning goals.
If you have questions about your
child’s school performance, screen-ing scores, or progress monitoring
results, please contact your child’s teacher. For more information
about these tests go to the Fast-Bridge Learning website at http://
www.fastbridge.org/assessments/.
Hello from the Library. My name is
Mary Sumner and you may contact
me at (316) 973-8409 or
[email protected]. I am here
to support your child develop a
passion for learning through read-
ing and support their interest in
reading. I welcome your sugges-
tions on how I can nurture that for
your child. At any time you are
welcome to come to the Library to
view the books and material that
we offer.
Barnes & Noble Book Fair - December 3rd Join us on Sunday, December 3rd,
from 1:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. for our
annual Barnes and Noble Book
Fair. This is a fundraiser for the
library and other student organiza-
tions. Just mention Stucky at
checkout, either in the store or
online, to help us earn a percentage
of the Barnes and Noble’s profits
during this time period.
Library News Hello from the Library. My name is
Mary Sumner and you may contact
me at (316) 973-8409 or
[email protected]. I am here
to support your child develop a
passion for learning through read-
ing and support their interest in
reading. I welcome your sugges-
tions on how I can nurture that for
your child. At any time you are
welcome to come to the Library to
view the books and material that
we offer.
How to support the new math
curriculum (Carnegie Learning) at home.
Official Calendar of Events
Click Here or on the calen-
dar below to see the most
current calendar of events.
Click Here to Like
Check out the fun on FB. See pictures of your teachers, friends,
sports events and much more!
Monday September 25th
Wednesday September 27th
4:00 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.
The first Book Fair will be held during
Parent/Teacher Conferences. Please stop
by and enter your child in a drawing to
win $10 from the book fair on display.