Welcome to the Middle School Blog! Every other week the Middle School Team will post a classroom update in this space to help parents stay connected to the ongoing learning happening in the middle school hallway.
God Bless,
The Middle School Team
General Updates
1. Did you know that the 1stClass Relics of Saint Padre Pio will be available for veneration next week (May 8th) at Saint Ambrose Cathedral from 8:30am to 4:30pm. Read more about this event here: https://www.dmdiocese.org/events/st-pio-relics-coming-to-des-moines?event=a517353b-0456-4dbf-b557-8b22630289b8
Our SPX 8thgrade class will be attending this event on the morning of May 8th!
2. As the end of the year approaches, the Middle School Team would like to share with you some important dates to add to your calendars…
May 8th– 8G hosts Mass
May 14th– Middle School Musical
May 20th- Service Hours Due
May 20th-23rd– 8thgrade Finals
May 22nd– 6K hosts Mass
May 24th– Field Day
May 28th– 8thgrade Class Trip
May 29th– 8thgrade Awards Ceremony @ 2pm
May 29th– 8thgrade Graduation Mass @ 7pm (reception to follow)
May 30th– Last School Mass (no School Mass on Wed., May 29th)
May 30th– 5ththru 7thgrade Awards Ceremony/Last day of school/Noon dismissal
3. Remember to check the Middle School Homework Site @ https://sites.google.com/stpiusxschool.org/middleschool
Daily assignments will be update by teachers each afternoon by 4pm!
4. The last day for Pius Academy will be Tuesday, May 28th. Thank you to all those who have taken advantage of this program!
Teacher Updates
6thgrade & 7B Language Arts with Mrs. Bartscher
6th Grade- The sixth grade students will continue to work on their nonfiction unit. In this unit, the students are introduced to text structure and text features. They will also work on comprehension skills, vocabulary development, and text analysis through this study. In addition to the nonfiction work, students will be finishing up their study of verbs and will end the year with a study of phrases and modifiers.
The last day to take an A.R. test for third trimester will be Friday, May 17.
7th Grade- The seventh grade students have begun reading an adapted version of Romeo and Juliet. Through this unit, the students will continue working on vocabulary development and comprehension skills, and the unit will have a strong focus on the analysis of literary elements found in the text. In addition to the study of Romeo and Juliet, the seventh grade will also be finishing up their study of verbs and will end the year with a study of modifiers and phrases.
The last day to take an A.R. test for third trimester will be Friday, May 17.
Mrs. Bartscher
6-8 Math with Mrs. Gipple
6th Grade Math
We have finished up our chapter on Measurement and Geometry and students will take the chapter test today. Those scores will be available to view on PowerSchool early next week.
The next chapter is and introduction to integers. We will begin to explore negative numbers and then at the beginning of 7th grade students will learn how to calculate problems with negative numbers.
7th Grade Math
This class has been having some fun exploring Probability! We have worked on how to use experimental and theoretical probability and then used these methods to make predictions. We have also worked with dependent and independent events, combinations, and permutations. We will finish up with compound events and the 2nd quiz for this chapter will be Wed, May 8th.
7th Grade Pre-Algebra
We have been working with multiple types of transformations in this class: translations, rotations, reflections and dilations. The quiz over these transformations as well as similarity and congruency is today. The posttest over this chapter will be next Tues, May 7th. Then we will continue in our geometry unit as we explore real numbers and right triangles.
8th Grade Pre-Algebra
This class has been exploring linear functions and their graphs while working on finding intercepts and then writing linear equations in several forms: standard form, slope intercept form and point slope form. We have also worked on finding how y varies directly with x and will finish up next week by working with systems of linear equations through graphing. The posttest for this chapter is next Thursday, May 9th. After that we will spend the following week reviewing for the math final. Finals for 8th grade are May 20th, 21st and 22nd.
8th Grade Algebra
We are working on our last chapter Radical Expressions and Equations. In this chapter we cover the Pythagorean theorem, distance & midpoints formulas, simplifying radicals, operations with radical expressions, and we will finish up by learning to solve radical expressions. This class will take a test over these concepts next Friday, May 10th. The following week we will review for their Algebra final. Finals for 8th grade are May 20th, 21st and 22nd.
Please let me know if you have any concerns or questions and have a wonderful weekend!!!
Mrs. Gipple
6-8 Religion with Mr. Tallman
6thgrade: This week the sixth grade classes has been learning about the three divisions of the Communion of Saints: The Church Triumphant, The Church Suffering, and The Church Militant. There will be a unit test over this content on Friday, May 10th!
7thgrade: This week the 7thgrade classes have been working on their Sacramental Cereal Project. This project assesses the students’ knowledge of the Sacraments of Initiation. This project is due Monday, May 13th.
8thgrade: This week the 8thgrade started their final religion unit of the school year: Virtue and Vice. We’ll be taking notes over this content leading up to their class final on Wednesday, May 23rd.
Have a blessed weekend!
Peace,
Mr. Tallman
6-8 Science with Mrs. Erickson
As we reach the end of the year, I want to remind everyone that there are many resources online at https://sites.google.com/view/mrsericksonscience. Everything we use and discuss throughout the unit are available here. They can’t edit the documents in this location, but their own copies are in Google.Classroom. There are even extra resources and study materials available!
6th Grade: This week we started talking about how more cells are made. This has lead our discussion to Mitosis and Meiosis. During Mitosis the cell doubles all its material so it can split into two new cells (asexual reproduction!). Meiosis is more complicated because it makes cells that will join with another cell to create new life (sexual reproduction). Initially the words used to describe these two types of cell reproduction are uncomfortable due to their connotations in modern society, but we will not be going past what happens to the DNA inside the cells during Mitosis and Meiosis. We will show our learning of these two processes by creating a poster project highlight each step in the processes. This will be due around May 7th, next Tuesday. We will then start looking at how scientists sort living things into different groups based on similarities. This will be the last unit of the year!
7th Grade: We finished up our disease projects this week and are excited to learn from each other about the different diseases we researched. Our next unit will be dissection of the frog. Students will receive a permission slip to fill out and return with parent signature. I completely understand that dissections are not “fun” for everyone and some students would benefit from an alternative learning tool. I do have a virtual dissection option for students that are unable/ unwilling to do the dissection with the class. Our dissection unit will include several days of pre-lab preparations and at least two days actually working with the frog. Our final unit for the year we will discuss ecosystems and the environment!
8th Grade: We will finish up our unit over weather with an assessment Monday, May 6th. Our last unit will be a research project over climates. Students have had a brief introduction to this project, but we will have a few days of dedicated research and work time. We will then begin recapping information that will be covered in their science Final.
Mrs. Jaci Erickson
6-8 Social Studies with Mr. Klein
6th Grade:
We recently started a unit on Russia. Next week we will be learning about the history of Russia. There will be a test on Friday May 10th.
7th Grade:
We are halfway through Central Africa. There will be a test on Thursday, May 9th. After that, we will finish up Africa as we look at Western Africa before we begin our final project/presentation.
8th Grade:
We have spent the week looking at the political and cultural differences between Antebellum America. There will be a short quiz on these differences on Wednesday. We will then spend the remainder of the school year learning about the Civil War.
Mr. Klein
7T & 8th grade Language Arts with Mrs. Pedersen
7th Grade- The seventh grade students have begun reading an adapted version of Romeo and Juliet. Through this unit, the students will continue working on vocabulary development and comprehension skills, and the unit will have a strong focus on the analysis of literary elements found in the text. In addition to the study of Romeo and Juliet, the seventh grade will also be finishing up their study of verbs and will end the year with a study of modifiers and phrases. The last day to take an AR test is Friday, May 17.
8th Grade - Students are almost finished reading To Kill A Mockingbird. There will be a quiz over chapters 26-28 on Tuesday. We will finish reading the novel next week. We will do some end of the novel activities and take the final test for the novel. Students are writing the rough draft of their research paper. The printed out rough draft with the Works Cited page is due on Tuesday.
Have a great weekend!
Mrs. Pedersen
Thank You for reading the SPX Middle School Blog!
Our last blog post of the year will be posted on Friday, May 17th, 2019
