Stuart's Samurai - Friday 9/29/06

READING
Today we took our final test from the "Give it All You've Got" theme (Mae Jemison). Both this and the spelling tests look good from the initial tests I've graded. I'm happy to report that performance on the vocab section was greatly improved over last test. On Monday we'll share strategies for improving performance on the essay questions. I am pleased with the amount of detail that is being included. The next improvement is to begin with a topic sentence.

For example: "Describe Mae Jemison's scientific duties during the voyage of the space shuttle Endeavor. Use story details in your answer." A suggested way to begin would be "On the Endeavor, Mae Jemison was a mission specialist astronaut who was in charge of important scientific experiments during the voyage." THEN include the details. Most students began their writing with the details.


In small groups we'll continue to work on individual skill weaknesses. I've identified these based on last Monday's assessment. It's very exciting to see the fire in their eyes when I sit down with them and tell them "You succeeded on 79% of the test. You failed on 21% of the test. These are the skills that are holding you back (i.e. author's purpose, context clues, compare and contrast). You are weak in these areas. We are going to attack these areas of weakness today, tomorrow and however long it takes until YOU ARE NO LONGER WEAK at this skill. You will become more than you are today!"


It warms my heart to see your child believe in themselves and truly begin to Dream Big about their own possibilities. Two students have already told me they feel unstoppable; that they really believe they can do and be anything they want. So 2 down, 19 to go. After they are 100% confident in themselves, the other part of the equation is being able to actually be anything they want. And that takes a whole lot of Doing Big. Identifying and overcoming weak skill areas is critical.

SOCIAL STUDIES
I was very pleased to hand back the test results from earlier in the week. The class average was 88% which is a BIG improvement over the beginning of the year results. I feel (hope) that this is a direct result of students taking their own abilities more seriously and holding themselves to a higher standard.

The History on Parade project is in full swing. I haven't been too successful communicating one point with your kids so see if you can do any better. The PowerPoint template has already been made. This part is worth a whopping 5 points. The content, or meat of their project is what they should be working on, as it is worth 55 points. Why they ignore me and continue to work on the format of their slides versus the content?........I don't know :-) (See "Why....I Don't Know" if you haven't already.)





MATH
In preparation for Wednesday's Unit 3 test, study guides were handed out to do over the weekend. It's very important that they identify what they know and don't know. On the parts they don't know they need to try and figure it out. In class we'll go over the answers and then I'll pull them in small skill groups. This helps me understand why they don't know how to do certain problems (examining their recognition brain network).

Once I "recognize" this with my recognition brain network, I can then teach them strategies for their strategic brain network. If they can't recognize a solution to a problem they can't develop a strategy for solving it. You can begin this process at home by asking them why they tried to solve a problem a certain way. This helps develop their reasoning skills at the same time. It may help to do what we do in class. "I don't know" means "I'm not thinking", which isn't allowed in the Mr. Stuart's Mental Giant Gym. Encourage her or him to justify their claim (answer). Email me with any findings or possibilities.

SCIENCE
We had a guided inquiry lab experiment making recycled paper. As you can see from the pictures, they had a lot of fun.




Even though it looks like they were playing and not learning, they were both playing and learning. I refuse to believe that high learning cannot be combined with high fun. Work needs to be balanced with play. And as hard as I expect them to work, I feel responsible to make it as fun and enthusiastic as possible. In this way I hope they discover that learning can be fun.



That also goes for us as parents. I provided an additional study guide for their Chapter 10 test on Monday. Hopefully helping your child prepare will be less stressful and more fun. Have a great weekend.