For the Week of 1/29 - 2/2

A Message from Dr. Clapp
Classroom Peeks
Drive to Thrive
Happenings
Get Involved!
Community Clicks
and Upcoming Events

Dear HKMS Families,

I have new neighbors who recently immigrated from Israel. I was speaking with them the other day and they asked about this "giant rat who comes out of a hole in the earth and predicts the weather." When I explained what Groundhog's Day was, they politely nodded along, but I'm not sure they believed me. Having gone to college in Pennsylvania I was able to closely observe Groundhog's Day and its peculiar traditions and customs. The ceremonies and pomp and circumstance are taking very seriously, and are a strong marked of that areas historical culture.

How culture is passed down and sustained in certain areas is fascinating and can tell us a lot about groups of people and their values. As David Brooks states in How to Know a Person (2024), "The eastern English who settled New England, were highly moralistic, had an acute awareness of social sin, strongly valued education, were very industrious, were highly time conscious, were emotionally buttoned up, valued town halls, and were active in civic life. That sounds a lot like New England today." (p 241). It sure does! Those settlers in New England and Pennsylvania brought their "ways of life" to these shores over 350 years ago. It seems unlikely that those settlers are still influencing us today, but as Mr. Brooks points out, they are clearly impacting our world views, beliefs, values, and traditions today. When trying to "know a person" well, understanding where they were raised and the historical culture is a vital part of the equation.

I had the pleasure of being part of Dr. McKinnon's book club on How to Know a Person this week. With the PTO we also held our own book club this week on Smart But Scattered Teens. On the surface these two works do not seem to have much in common, I found a through-line, in order to truly understand what our kids go through in these years, and how we connect to each other requires careful listening while providing voice and agency to our students and members of the greater community. One of the aspects that makes Keller a special place to learn and work is our belief in a "relationships first" approach to learning, growing, and teaching. In my experience, only by having trusting relationships can we truly educate young adolescents and help them realize their potential.

Speaking of potential, we had a week of showing off our student potential! Friday featured our 7th-Annual HKMS Scripps Spelling Bee contest! All students had an in-class test, the top 16 spellers coming out of that test were invited to participate in the bee. Check out the happenings section for all the pictures and a video of the championship word being spelled! Our 8th graders continued with their air cannon contest, sixth graders wrote 6-word personal narratives, and seventh graders continued their diagnosis of their fictitious 12-year old patient. All of that and more is in this week's newsletter, enjoy!

Wishing you and your family a wonderful weekend!

Sincerely,

Steven Clapp, Ed.D.

A glimpse inside of the terrific teaching and learning going on this week at HKMS!

Grade 6

Mrs. Burke's young writers are summarizing their personal narratives with a "6-word" narrative that represents and can be a title for their full narrative.

(Some examples from previous students below.)

Our amazing ILA Intern, Ms. DeMaso, helped the 6th graders get ready for their personal narrative writing unit! She created and ran a jeopardy competition that reviewed their prior learning of figurative language.

This week our young mathematicians are dividing fractions and mixed numbers (whole number and a fraction).

Grade 7

In ILA, Mr. Rogers' students are working on the organization of their argument essay about the impact of Rats on the world. Their graphic organizer helps them to develop an articulate and persuasive 5-paragraph essay. These essays are due on Monday!

On this episode of "That's so Baca", our budding physicians continue their investigation of their patient's mysterious abdominal pain. They are analyzing endoscopy pictures for additional "clues" to help their patient.

Grade 8

Algebra students continue to study from their textbooks, taking and using their notes and to determine the type of function, linear or exponential.

Mr. Jockers activates learning by challenging students to use homonyms in logical sentences, and of course, the pun of the day!

FPAs

It's volleyball time in PE! Students ran bumping drills that included keep points and running laps. It was a great way to warm up as they then launched into practice games.

Orchestra students do not usually receive a Smart Music account until 7th grade BUT our 6th graders are making such incredible progress that they are ready for it! This program allows them to play a piece of music that is displayed on the screen, it records their notes and shows them color-coded feedback on their performance.

Last week the math club took on the problem below. We challenged all of you to ,,,figure this one out, without "Googling" the answer? (The solution, is below.)

Staff SOLUTION! (by Dr. Pocchiari)

Events, activites, and other occurrences that happened at HKMS this week outside of the classroom.

The 7th Annual HKMS Scripps Spelling Bee!

IMG_5955.MOV

With 16 participants, it was an exciting start to our Friday! The championship word was Calcitonin. After a tense 11 rounds, one student emerged victorious! Congratulations to our school champion Annabel!

The PTO Principal's Coffee Book Club

We were a small but mighty group who discussed part 2 of Smart But Scattered Teens (SBST) on Tuesday. In the photos below you'll see some of the strategies and structures we are using as parents to support our children in developing their executive function skills! In addition to SBST we also discussed the fascinating article linked below about the trend of puberty starting younger, and how schools are handling these changes. We will "book club" one more time in March when we focus on the last section of SBST (part 3). We still have a few copies of SBST left to share. Just send Dr. Clapp an email and he'll send a copy home.