September 26, 2025

Science 7

Next week students will be introduced to the Photosynthesis Summative Task. In groups of four students will identify variables and decide the growing conditions for their plants for the next month. Writing scientifically is something we will practice all year and will students will become more fluid with their wording. October 1st is the start of Zero Waste. Each student is tracking how much food they are wasting. Questions to ask these next two weeks:

What is your role on the Task? What do you have to write?
When writing a Claim Evidence Reason, what are the components of the Evidence section?
When did you last update your Food Tracker? Can I see it?

SPANISH-1

We are starting our second chapter of the year (#1B).
In this chapter we'll be learning to describe ourselves and others. In other words, we'll explore some of the most common adjectives used to describe people.
This is always "tricky" because in Spanish the Adjectives need to match in Gender and Number the noun they are describing. This is a big challenge for English speakers because in English adjectives have only one variation but in Spanish they have four!
Ex: White = Blanco / Blanca / Blancos / Blancas

As a reminder, we spend 3 weeks working in each chapter, which means that our next chapter test won't be until 10/17.

Math 7

We are finishing up with Simple and Compound Probability. We have done a little review of adding and subtracting fractions. Our next unit will be in the area of Signed Numbers and Absolute Value. This will include adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing integers (positive and negative numbers). We will also do more review of adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing fractions and mixed numbers.

Pre-Algebra

PE 7

Rembrandt: We are moving to the outdoor space this week, and our class sessions will be taking place on the blacktop surface. We will continue to work through our first complete round of physical fitness testing over the next 3 weeks (push ups, mile and half-mile runs, sit ups check, PACER aerobic capacity check, flexibility measurements), interspersed with traditional and non traditional court games. We will re-visit volleyball, but also try RINGO, Ultimate Ringoni, Diabolos, as well as other old school favorites.

CORBOLOTTI: Students did a fantastic job completing their baseline scores for the mile run and pacer test, lots of excellent effort all around. We’ve now moved onto the turf, where students are beginning to develop their forehand and backhand frisbee throws. This focus on skill-building will help make our upcoming games more fun and engaging.

7th Grade Medieval and Early Modern World History- Mr. Jake

Chapter 2 Section 5: In A Weakening Empire, students will learn about the political, geographic, and cultural factors that contributed to the fall of the Roman Empire.

Essential Question Why did Rome decline and fall?

WH.7.1 Students analyze the causes and effects of the vast expansion and ultimate disintegration of the Roman Empire.

WH.7.1.1 Study the early strengths and lasting contributions of Rome and its ultimate internal weaknesses.

WH.7.1.2 Discuss the geographic borders of the empire at its height and the factors that threatened its territorial cohesion.

WH.7.1.3 Describe the establishment by Constantine of the new capital in Constantinople and the development of the Byzantine Empire, with an emphasis on the consequences of the development of two distinct European civilizations, Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic, and their two distinct views on church-state relations.

Intermediate Band

This class is making great progress each week. One of my concerns though, is related to behavior and focus. At times, the students (in larger numbers than expected) are distracting and distracted....and it curbs learning. I think the students are excited by our new latin jazz piece called, "Orinoco Cocoa." This is a challenging piece and the only way we'll put it off, is with outside practice. Hoping to see improved behavior going forward, so I can keep challenging them with fun and tough pieces. Looking forward to playing with the jazz band this Fri at Blue Barn Novato from 4:15-5!

Language Arts

Ms. Hensley's class is continuing with Unit 1 of 3 in our first Module: The Lost Children of Sudan. See below for some adjustments since the previous newsletter for pacing of reading our anchor text, A Long Walk to Water.

READING:

I encourage students to read for about 15-20 minutes a day at home. They can read the assigned text for class or a personal reading book. See details about each below.

A Long Walk to Water: We are beginning to pick up the reading pace for our first anchor text for the first module, "A Long Walk to Water" by Linda Sue Park. The chapters are short and most students are able to complete a chapter in fewer than 20 minutes.

Here is the reading schedule for the next two weeks:

By Friday, October 3, students should have read through Chapter 9 (of A Long Walk to Water);
By Friday, October 10, students should have ready through Chapter 11.

Personal Reading Book: Our class visits the school library on Wednesdays and students can return and check out books then for their independent reading. They should take that book home and read on their own when they don't have reading to do in the assigned anchor text. Every student should now have an independent reading book selected. Please ask them what they're reading!

Students should bring their personal reading book to class on Fridays. The rest of the week it can be at home so it's available to them when they don't have other reading to do.

WRITING:

I really enjoyed reading students' survival narratives! They worked hard and told fun stories about surviving (or trying to!) on an island with their peers, facing challenging situations.

Writing assignments for the next several weeks will primarily be short writings, done in class, about the anchor text and other short articles. Students will also be preparing for text-based discussions that will serve as their end of unit assessment in mid-October.

i-Ready:

Students have now all completed the diagnostic in i-Ready and should be completing two i-Ready lesons for homework each week. Sometimes these assignments will be teacher-assigned; otherwise, they should do their My Path lessons or select a topic.

ART

The 7th and 8th grade art students have just finished an engaging 3D cardboard sculpture/relief project—planning, building, and decorating their designs in cardboard—and are now transitioning into an exploration of color theory with watercolor. Over the next several classes, they’ll experiment with mixing tints, shades, and muted tones, and explore warm vs. cool color variations. Their culminating task will be to create a small landscape or still life using what they’ve learned about value, saturation, and temperature. I look forward to seeing how their understanding of color deepens through this hands‑on watercolor work!

STEM

Students have been working on their skills of both drawing and creating in STEM. In designing, we learned how to draw multiview sketches of objects. Students are learning how to draw multiview sketches of rectangular cubes (blocks) which we will then use to CAD design (Tinkercad) and finally use these designs to create cube puzzles.

In two weeks, we will have our competition where students compete against each other to see who has made the cube that is the most difficult (take the longest) to solve.

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