8th Grade Red Team
8th Grade Red Team
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Image Source: https://hop.concord.org/h1/phys/h1p.html
Mr. Nye
8th Grade Science
We have completed the Energy Transformations Unit. Most students created effective catapults, paper airplane launchers, or rubber band cars. Some groups/individuals chose to create a paper roller coaster or a Rube-Goldberg device. After days of designing, testing, and redesigning students got to show off their work to see if it met their group goal.
Currently, students are determining the best method for heating Bellefonte Area Middle School. They will choose either a groundwater heating system or a water heater. Students will be investigating heat transfer and thermal energy with several hands-on experiments and simulation activities.
As an aside, MAP Conferences for ELA, Math, and Science will occur in February with Science being done in core classes and Skills. The student will discuss the easy problems and the challenging ones from the Science test, and then, the teacher will conduct mini-lessons on the topics students found difficult in order to prepare them for the Science PSSA Test in early May.
Mrs. Bucha
Mrs. Bucha
8th Grade Social Studies
We are currently into our last Civics and Government unit of this school year - time is flying by and it is hard to believe that Spring is quickly approaching! Our most recent lessons have been focused on the Bill of Rights, starting with the five essential civil rights and liberties protected by the First Amendment. Ask your student if they can name and describe each of our first amendment rights. To help them understand these freedoms, the students have been working on developing an interactive notebook. This is the second time we have used this approach this year. For each freedom, we have been noting what actions are protected or guaranteed for citizens, how the government may be limited when guaranteeing these rights, and how citizens may be limited in exercising their rights.
Last month, I mentioned our Break Up Letter assignment we completed while learning about the Declaration of Independence. Check out our Taylor Swift inspired class bulletin board we decorated with the student created letters!
Mr. McManus
Mr. McManus
8th Grade Math
As we work our way through March, the Intro to Algebra classes in 8th grade will continue their geometry work with the Pythagorean Theorem and then with transformations on a coordinate plane. The Algebra 1 classes will be wrapping up their work with linear systems and then continuing into discovering exponential relationships.
Starting in March, we will also begin to review and get ready for your student’s last round of PSSA testing. We will continue to utilize the Get More Math website to focus on reviewing concepts from earlier in the year and to focus on areas of need for each individual student. If you ever want to see what your student is working on in GMM and need login information, please contact your student’s math teacher and we can provide that.
Mr. Dowd
Mr. Dowd
8th Grade ELA
In ELA we have continued to work on Text Dependent Analysis writing. We analyzed the writing that we did in January for “On Sea Turtle Patrol.” We are now continuing this writing work with other readings. Recently, the classes read a piece from the February 2024 issue of Scope Magazine titled, “Should We Switch to the Metric System?” Students wrote their claim and backed it up with textual evidence along with further explanations and analysis. This practice will help students in future writings.
In addition we have moved on to a new unit in our textbook titled, “Modern Technology.” In this unit students will read and respond to different texts centered around the essential question of “How is modern technology helpful and harmful to society?” This is a fun and thought-provoking unit.
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