Middle
November 13, 2020
Seventh-graders Write Children’s Books
Each year, science teacher Kristin Suer asks her seventh-graders to use their newly acquired knowledge of the solar system to write and illustrate children’s books about planets. Students recently worked collaboratively, in masks and face shields, to write their books. “Students were tasked with including 10 facts about their chosen planet while making a fictional story about life between other planet friends or new inhabitants on the planet itself,” Suer said. “They really enjoyed creating the books and used various APPs to do them electronically!” First-graders will also be studying space in the winter so the seventh-graders will Zoom their new buddies during that time to read their books.
Sixth-graders Assemble Fraction Puzzles
Theresa Keller’s sixth-grade math students recently studied fraction and decimal equivalents. To put the pieces of the lesson together, Keller asked students to assemble a 24-piece fraction puzzle on the plexiglass shields around their individual desks. Each side of each puzzle piece had a fraction or decimal. “The goal of the activity was to take the puzzle pieces and create a 4×6 rectangle where every piece that touched contained either equivalent fractions or a fraction/decimal equivalent,” Keller said. “Students used problem-solving strategies, such as finding corners and edges to begin the puzzle.”
Eighth-grade Chinese Students Write Children’s Ebooks
To mark the end of finishing their first textbook, eighth-graders in Mia Wu’s Chinese class wrote children’s ebooks. “Students used the knowledge, including grammar and vocabulary, they have gained in the past year and a half to craft a story in Chinese,” Wu said. “They were encouraged to be creative!” When students were done with their books, they shared their work with their classmates.
Eighth-graders Meet in Book Groups
During the second quarter, English teacher Laura Clemens asked her eighth-grade students to meet weekly in book groups to read and discuss four different novels written in verse. All four novels feature protagonists with different cultural backgrounds who struggle to deal with questions of identity, loss, and discrimination. The novels include “Inside Out & Back Again,” by Thanhha Lai, “Long Way Down” by Jason Reynolds, “Brown Girl Dreaming” by Jacqueline Woodson, and “Full Cicada Moon” by Marilyn Hilton. In addition to discussing their books, the students extended their collaboration online to answer questions on Google docs, post on a class discussion board, or peer edit analytical paragraphs. This unit also includes opportunities for students to express their own experiences in poetic form in an ongoing poetry journal.
Previewing the Class of 2025!
Eighth-graders learned about life in the Upper School during a modified Move Up Day in early November. Each year, eighth-graders attend classes and learn more about Upper School from their older peers. Move Up Day was a little different this year. Students gathered in The Schiff Center, in a socially distanced way, and watched informative videos about the Upper School featuring current students and learned more about athletics and the Experiential Learning program. Students also heard from a panel of seniors, who answered frequently asked questions about what the Upper School is like. The event was coordinated by Seven Hills’ Admission Office and students received a “Class of 2025” t-shirt.
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Five Stingers Sign to Play in College
Five Stingers from the Class of 2024 signed their letters of intent to continue their athletic careers in college.
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