SOLs Covered: 6.PFA.3 Write & Solve One-Step Linear Equations
Math Unit: 09 One-Step Linear Equations
Daily Agenda: February 24-28, 2025
Upcoming Assessments: SUM Quiz 10 Exponents & Roots (Tues. 3/11)
Greetings! I've still got a lot to do before leaving and then some errands to run, so let's get straight to this week's math happenings. After meeting with the rest of the 6th grade math team, Mrs. Lee and I found out that we were ahead of the rest of the grade level, so we took Monday as a catch-up day with the kids to work on both improving grades as well as reviewing/improving our math skills. While many students are academically in good standing, we have a few friends who need to do a bit of work with their grades, so we've sent letters to all families of students who are currently in the "danger zone" with a D+ or below informing them of what those students can do to improve their grades. Thank you to everyone who has returned the letters! Some students have said they've given their letters to their grownups, but haven't returned them, so we ask that those come back as soon as possible to allow us to reallot the time needed to complete another form of contact back to helping the students directly with improving those grades.
Additionally, if everyone can look over grades on ParentVUE, it would be greatly appreciated. Even students who aren't in the "danger zone" likely have something they can do to improve their grades. At the very least, many still haven't attempted the first extra credit opportunity and I'm already working on the next. A note in regards to ParentVUE, after talking with one of my sister's about my nephew's work and grades, I helped her navigate the ParentVUE app as I realized she was likely not seeing a good chunk of the grade page. I discovered that on the app, there are multiple columns that do not show up on each subject's grade page, so you might not be seeing the grades and extra notes such as the "Missing" mark at all. You can improve on this by enabling landscape mode on your phone and turning it sideways, but if possible, I encourage you to log in from a browser (on a computer if at all possible) to see the missing columns.
In regards to the work covered this week, we continued our algebra unit and while we didn't complete a ton of individual assignments, we covered multiple components of the SOL with each task completed. The most difficult part for many of the students is the verbal translations of expressions and equations, AKA word problems. Word problems have forever been the bane of most math students' existence, but that can be especially true for this topic as one little word can complete change a problem. For example, "6 less a number" would translate to 6 - x while "6 less than a number" is x - 6 and unfortunately if you don't have the order correct, it's counted wrong, even sometimes for problems (addition and multiplication) where the order doesn't matter for solving purposes. I allowed the kids to use their notes for this part of the quiz in part due to the difficulty, but also because the snow had cut into our learning time this unit. The rest of the team wanted to push the quiz back, so we started the quiz today. Some students still need a bit of time to complete it on Monday, but I'd already planned that for an additional catch-up day and to allow students to get help with their second attempt of the quiz as needed.
That should cover the highlights but as always, please feel free to email if you have any questions or concerns. Have a great weekend!