Mrs. Marita's Room

Update

2012-01-23T09:49:00.004-06:00

Winter greetings! So much has passed by since my last update, and for that I apologize! I want to remind parents to be asking students for their newsletters each month. A Catholic Schools Week newsletter has been handed out that has some pretty important info in it! If you are not getting your newsletters, please call or e-mail me or Ms. Sara and we can hook you up!

Today starts the beginning of the 3rd quarter. Conferences have been set up by Ms. Sara, and they are scheduled for Feb 9th. Please let us know if something comes up where you can't make it to your scheduled conference and we can make alternate plans to meet or talk by phone.

The 5-8th grades will be going skiing at Mt.Ashwabay on Wednesday, the 25th. (This Wednesday!) The students need to come with their fee of $18 (unless they already have gear and/or a season pass) and their permission slip.

On Tuesday, January 31st, 10 am @ OLL, we will join Park Falls (St. Anthony's) and Superior (Cathedral) Schools in celebrating Mass with our Bishop, celebrating Catholic Schools Week together! OLL students and guests should wear RED!!!!!

Lastly, we will be collecting items for silent auction baskets this week to sell at the end of Catholic Schools Week. Our 7th grade class has a Christmas theme. If you have many items to donate following another theme, the school would welcome a second basket to sell for each class. Please only donate what you feel comfortable with. If we get an abundance of donations, we can always save some for a later auction or fundraiser.

Thank you so much for your support and loyalty to OLL!

Please join us if you can for skiing on Wednesday. We are always looking for help with driving and chaperoning!

Blessings!
Mrs. M

Our classes are composing some silent a

2011-12-01T13:33:00.003-06:00

Dear school families,

Welcome to the season of Advent! I would like to begin by thanking you for sending in money for our Advent project, which is much like the Heifer Project last year. We are raising money for World Vision, an organization which supports the poorest people of the world. 85% of our donations will directly reach those people, the other 15% goes into supporting World Vision's mission. Any donations will be collected here at school and we will count the money raised before we leave for Christmas break. The students can designate how they want their money spent, which we will be voting on as a junior high group.

I was very proud of the 7th grade in our first Advent liturgy, and the first Mass in which the new liturgical responses took place. Thank you to my 7th graders, and to the parents who reminded the students to look nice and to practice their readings. Thank you to Mrs. Westlund, Mrs. Betzold and Mr. Bell for helping us with the music and to Fr. Gary for his cool homily!

We do have a science test in the 7th grade tomorrow on Plants. We will be testing on photosynthesis, plant/flower reproduction, and the general anatomy and physiology of plants with correct terminology.

7th grade math students have been working on graphing linear equations, and were quizzed on it today. We are now moving into solving proportions by using cross multiplication.

Thank you for all the items brought in for "Stuff the truck!" Our class was in 2nd place for pounds of food collected. It is an awesome feeling to help out the mission of the Brick!

Please encourage your student to pick up some extra chores at home without being rewarded as a part of Advent preparation. We will be trying to help them out with this while at school too!

Wishing luck to the Bruins basketball team tonight as they play Park Falls and also thanking Coach Hoglund and Coach Mattes for all of their VOLUNTARY time, patience, efforts and talents during this basketball season!

Another special thanks to Mr. Bloss for all the time he is putting into helping our church and school with the Christmas tree sale. He and his wife are extraordinary people and I wanted to recognize them for all of their contributions for the Christmas Bazaar and the Christmas tree sales! You two ROCK!!!

2011-11-06T17:18:00.005-06:00

Dear School Family,

Thank you so much for your awesome support of our student teacher, Mr. Ness. We will miss him dearly, but wish him luck as he continues his practice teaching at Washburn High School! Thank you for the money contributions toward the scrip cards for him. While giving him a gift to thank him, we were also contributing back to our school with the scrip program! We were able to purchase Barnes and Noble, Black Cat, Ashland Food Co-op, and Book World certificates.
Thanks again for your generosity and thoughtfulness!

Thank you parents for all of your great support during the Iowa Basic Tests. Special thanks to Mrs. Sara Bichanich for the treats that you sent for our class! Testing made us very hungry! We should get our results within the next couple of weeks.
Thank you very much to the volunteers who took the time to proctor some tests for junior high students, especially to Mrs. Melissa Rasumssen who continues to help us out in so many ways!

Parent-Teacher conferences will be here before you know it, so please be looking for the confimation slip, which will be sent home with your student within the next week.

Picture re-takes are on Wednesday morning. Students need to bring back original pictures if wanting to re-take, or bring their money and form if they were absent that day.

Thanks for checking in. Please communicate with your student the best that you can about their daily classes. It shows them that you care and helps them to remember what they did that day, and reminds them about assignments that are due. Please encourage and remind them to use their planner that you paid for!

You can always call me to check up on your student's progress, or send me an e-mail!
nmarita@ourladycs.org
Thanks so much,

Mrs. M

!

Good stuff!

2011-10-17T18:04:00.002-06:00

Dear OLL families,

We are working hard on Iowa Basic tests this week. Students should be getting good sleep and eating well so that they are at their best for the mental challenges that lie ahead! Snacks are welcome!

Grandparents day will be held this Wednesday! Please bring your family to celebrate this special day by joining us from 7:30-8:45 for breakfast in the social hall, and then Mass at 9:00 am. Grandparents and family members are welcome to visit classrooms after Mass if you choose.

Mid-terms were handed out last week and I'm looking for them to be signed and returned so that I know that parents are aware of student progress.

Thank you to our parent volunteers for driving us out the Maxwell Property (owned by Northland College) last Friday. We had a great "Environmental Awareness" day for grades 5-8! Special thanks to Mr. Ness for getting the permission and the keys to use the facility on the property, and to Mrs. Swiston for the majority of the planning for the outing! Please ask your student about the kinds of activities we did out there. We were lucky that it only sprinkled, otherwise, Mother Nature was kind to us!

2011-10-06T16:32:00.001-06:00

Dear OLL families,

Just an update on mid-terms:

My daughter Molly ended up in the hospital from Monday night through today (Thursday), and I was unable to calculate mid-terms when I wanted to. I will be working on that tonight and hopefully will send them out tomorrow (Friday, Oct. 7th.) I appreciate your patience. Thank you for praying for Molly if you knew about her illness. Mr. Ness did a fantastic job filling in, as well as my subs Mr. Kroes and Mrs. Zifko. Many thanks to them and the students for their hard work this week.

Blessings,
Mrs. M

Mid-terms

2011-09-29T13:03:00.002-06:00

Happy Mid-quarter!

Tomorrow the junior high teachers will be collecting any missing assignments and "redos" in order to calculate mid-term reports over the weekend. We will be sending those reports home with your student next week, so please look for them or ask for them by Wednesday of next week.

2011-09-18T16:10:00.009-06:00

Dear Parents,

We just finished the tenth day of school on Friday! We are starting to get back into the work mode. I finally had a quiet study hall towards the end of the week! Looks like the kids had enough to do to keep them busy!

The 6th graders are learning about motion, speed, acceleration, and Newton's 3 laws of Motion. Ask them to tell you about their inclined plane lab! Mr. Ness helped us to graph our data and then we looked at the shape of the graph to analyze our results.

The 7th graders have been learning about the requirements to be a living thing, the 5(or 6 depending on who you are) Kingdoms of Classification, and how to use and make a dicotomous key to identify a living thing by its characteristics.

The 8th graders have been learning about minerals, uses for these minerals, how to identify minerals and are working on a project to advertise the mineral of their choice with a poster or video clip.

In Math 7, students have been learning how to write standard numbers
(Ex:67,598,000,000) in exponential (67,598 x 10^6) and scientific notation (6.7598 x 10^10) and vice versa.

In Math 8, students are working with adding and subtracting integers,
Ex 1: -9 + 6 = -3
Ex2: -9 + -6 = -15
Ex3: -8 -(-2)= -6
We will be spending some more time on it this week, as well as trying out multiplication and division of integers too!

I hope the kids have had a good ten days so far! I have! I'm really happy to have Mr. Ness working with me to make school even more interesting and fun for the students! Take care and please let me know if you have any concerns or questions!

Lastly, the 7th grade Liturgy is this Wednesday. Please join us if you can! If your son or daughter is of Native American Heritage, please have them wear their Native dress for this special Mass.
Thanks!
Mrs. M

Big Top Field Trip

2011-09-05T15:34:00.004-06:00

Dear Parents,

I hope you all received a permission slip for your jr. high student to go to Big Top Chautaqua on Thursday, Sept. 8th. The students will be transported by teachers and parent volunteers. We are looking for a few good men and women to help out with the driving and chaperoning! Please let me know if you are able to help us out with this field trip. I am excited to hear the Blue Canvas Orchestra and their very generous gift of a free music show for the area schools! Thank you!
Mrs. Marita

Welcome Back!

2011-09-01T19:13:00.004-06:00

Dear Parents and Students,

Welcome to the school year! I'm so happy to be in my 11th year of teaching awesome OLL junior high students! We will have a fun and busy year ahead!

Just wanted to take a minute to give you a new e-mail address to reach me at this year, which is: nmarita@ourladycs.org

Please look for handouts to come home with your student tomorrow, introducing you to our classes and giving you some contact information as well.

Hope to see you at our family dinner on Sept. 7th in the OLL social hall!

Blessings on our new school year!

Nancy Marita

Final weeks

2011-05-22T12:48:00.004-06:00

Dear Parents,

There will be one more science test for the 7th/8th grade class, which will be given on Tuesday. The test covers Protists and Fungi (info covering pages 210-233.)
We will review as a class tomorrow (Monday, May 23.)

6th grade science students will be presenting a bird project to their class, much like the bird calling contest that was held at the Great Lakes Visitor Center last Tuesday. (Congratulations to our OLL jr. high students Maggie Hart and Nicole Bichanich for their winning skits and bird calls!)
Students will be teaching us about the habitat, migration habits, adaptations, diet, clutch size,and field markings for identification purposes. Students will either dress up like their bird or draw and color a picture of the bird, and present the bird call to us as well. Skits or regular informational presentations will be accepted.
This next Friday (May 27th)the 6th graders will be taking a walk to the Black Cat Coffee house around 10 am and taking the walking trail (corridor) back to school while bird watching. Money for items at the Black Cat and binoculars for the walk are two things they should bring, if able. Ask for a permission slip from your student if you have not yet received one.

7th graders will be spending most of the day at Kreher park for a barbecue and some beach fun on Wednesday, June 1st. If they are able to bring items to share like hot dogs, hamburgers (patties already made), chips, cold salads, etc., I would appreciate it! I will be the "griller."
That night is also 8th grade graduation, in which I need my 7th graders dressed up nicely and at the church by 5:45! We will be providing the readers, singers, and other Mass parts for the 8th grade liturgy, which starts at 6:00. After Mass, we will be helping to serve dinner down in the social hall, as well as helping to clean up afterward. I am counting on 7th grade parents and students to be the help that we need! Thank you in advance!
This will count as a final religion grade for them. If there are schedule conflicts that cannot be avoided, please call me or e-mail me. If I know in advance, I can try to get some 6th grade helpers as replacements.

There are still yearbooks in the school office for $10.00 each.
Please check with Sara B in the office to make sure all your accounts are caught up before the end of school,(especially lunch accounts.) Many students forget to bring mail home to their parents.

Many thanks,
Nancy Marita

News

2011-05-15T12:34:00.004-06:00

6th graders did fantastically on their toothpick bridges, especially with coming up with many different designs! The tie for weight capacity was 41 lbs on bridges constructed by Ian and Nathan/Eric! Way to go!
6th graders also took a camping trip to Stockton Island with Ms. Shields and some courageous parent volunteers last Wednesday-Friday. I heard that they had quite a good time out there,despite the rainy weather! I'm anxious to find out about it (they can teach me what they learned) tomorrow!

7th/8th graders just "rocked" an Ecology unit test last week-nobody scored below a 90%, and most scores were in the high 90's! We will venture out into a bog on Tuesday in the Cable WI area. They will need $3.00 each, old tennis shoes, water shoes or boots, layered clothing and rain gear which will prepare them for a variety of weather, and a lunch, either from home or from school. I'm excited for the trip and hope the weather is lovely for us! We will leave at 11 am on Tuesday!

Graduation for the 8th graders is Wednesday, June 1st at 6:00pm. 7th grade parents, I hope you received an e-mail and/or a paper copy of the plans for that night. If you didn't, please let me know. 7th grade students will be singing for the graduation Mass and 7th grade students/parents are asked to help serve the meal (as well as clean up afterwards)that night. We really need your help to make it a special occasion for them!

The Chequamegon Audobon Society is hosting their annual bird calling contest on Tuesday, May 17th at 6:00 pm (at the Visitor's Center in Ashland.) Join us to support our 4th and 6th graders who are participating in the contest! Good luck to them!

Sending lots of thanks for all you do! Wishing you well....

Mrs. M

Big thanks!

2011-05-04T07:44:00.003-06:00

Dear Parents,

THANK YOU for all the work that you did in assisting your student with their science fair project! We had a very successful fair, and all students were deserving of awards for their efforts! I'd like to thank Aaron Jareki, Carissa Beeksma, and Connor Kehoe (OLL alumni and AHS seniors)for taking the time and efforts to judge our science fair for the 5th and 6th grade projects!

Thanks for all your support so far this year! With the help of OLL parents, our school can achieve so many good things!
Thanks to our chaperones and drivers for our past and future field trips! Thanks to our presenters and project leaders like Mrs. Honkala!(We appreciate all your time, efforts, patience and resources that you have shared with us!) Thanks to the Mika family for letting us tour their awesome organic beef farm in Marengo!

For 6th grade parents, bridges are due next Tuesday, May 10th. We will be grading the bridge structure 1st and then testing the weight of each bridge afterward. Each student has been given a grading guide to make sure they know the requirements and bridge measurements.

For 7/8th grade: We will have a chapter test on Interactions with animals(Ecology) on Monday. It covers Chapter 24 in their science book.

Thanks for checking in!
Mrs. M

2011-04-26T13:18:00.002-06:00

Dear Parents,

Happy 4th quarter to you! There are lots of things coming up in the days ahead.
Jr. Parents, if you don't yet know, our science fair is this Thursday, April 28th!
We will be in the Social Hall from 12:30-3:00, presenting our projects to anyone who wants to come and watch! A small group of judges from AHS will be awarding first, second and third place awards to the top scoring science fair participants. Awards will be given around 2:30. Only 5th and 6th graders will be judged on their projects. 7th and 8th will be presenting their modern marvels for a grade, but no awards will be given for them.

Mrs. Swiston and I sent home a packet of three permission slips for local field trips. We are still looking for a couple of drivers.
Please ask your student for it if you haven't seen it. The first trip is to Mr. Tim Mika's farm in Marengo on May 2nd. The 2nd is to the Bad River Fish Hatchery on May 4th. The 3rd is to Cable Natural History Museum on May 17th, when we will tour a bog!

Also, there is a Skatetime permission slip to fill out for your student to be able to roller-blade in gym class. There is NO cost for this program, as the Knights of Columbus have paid the cost. Please ask your student to see this form if you have not already signed it. There will be pads and helmets to use with the roller-blades!

Thanks for checking in! Hope to see you at the Science Fair!

Mrs. M

2011-04-02T13:29:00.004-06:00

Dear Parents,

Happy Spring! Maybe if we say it, it will happen!?? (And winter can GO AWAY!)

I wanted to say Thank you to all the parents who have been helping their child(and their child's science fair partner)out with the project so far! I have seen some awesome progress and talents coming out, and I do appreciate all the guidance and resources that you have provided!
I do pray that the bulk of the work is being done by students though, and parents are providing assistance, but not taking on the majority of the project. I have great memories of my dad helping me out with various school projects, especially in science. A teamwork approach is applauded, while a parent dominated project takes away much of the learning experience for the student(s) involved.

If there are any questions at all regarding project requirements, please let me know.
Call me at school or at home! You can even check out old blog posts here if you are looking for requirements.

Report cards for 3rd quarter will be coming home Friday, April 8th. Please look for them! They should be signed and returned by the following Friday, April 16th.

Many thanks,
Mrs. M

Science due dates

2011-03-14T18:47:00.005-06:00

Dear Parents,

6th grade: Pages A-6 through A-10 (from their science fair packet) will be due on March 28th. This date is exactly a month away from our science fair. I will help them to get started on it at school. If they don't finish it at school, it will become homework.
Just a reminder though, in addition to their scientific procedure (Purpose, Hypothesis, Procedure steps and materials, Analysis of Data, Graphs representing data, and Conclusion) the kids will find some background information on their topic and relate it in a two-page paper. For example, if a student was doing an experiment on whether a mouse could learn it's way through a maze where a reward was waiting for it, they might write about Pavlov and his animal studies and experimentation with rewards called conditioning. The Bibliography to record the sources used for this research is on p. A-8 of the packet. I want at least one book source and one Internet source. Please do not let students use Wikipedia or other Internet sources that can be posted by anyone. The Library of Congress has a site for kids who are researching information, and you can click on the link to it on this site (it is the first listed under the link list to the lower right hand side of my blog.)The other reminder is this: I want students to rephrase or paraphrase information found in their own words. Please, no plagiarism! Cutting and pasting information is only okay when put in direct quotes, and then author and page number need to be listed in parentheses behind each direct quote.) If paraphrasing from a source, I still need an author and a page number in parentheses after the information that was borrowed.

Thanks for your help! Please call or write with questions!

7th and 8th grade parents, half of the modern marvel project is due on March 28th.This means either half the model and half the information board is complete, or the whole model is complete without information, or the information is complete without the model. Information boards should look like a landmark sign or a very organized and aesthetically pleasing museum display. Information needs to be typed (with little to no errors) and there should be several visuals like historic pictures of the making of the marvel or the people responsible for creating the marvel. Thank you for ENCOURAGING THEM to get this done and to do a great job on it!

Mrs. M

P.S. I am still looking for a few progress reports. Parents, have you seen your student's mid-term report yet? They received them the Friday before last! Please sign and return!
Thanks!

Midterms, skiing and Science Fair

2011-03-05T17:20:00.011-06:00

Hi! It's mid-term time in the 3rd quarter! Your Jr. High student received their mid-term report on Friday, March 4th. Please sign it and return it with your student by Wednesday, March 9th. Call or write with any concerns and questions.

We are planning on going skiing again at Ashwabay on Wednesday, after Ash Wednesday Mass. Your student will have to decide by Monday if they are bringing a lunch or having a school lunch.

The Science Fair will be April 28th from 12:30 to 3:00 in the social hall at OLL. Judges will start about 1 pm and finish by 2:30 for the awards. If you think that you won't be able to get to the science fair to see your student's project in this (12:30-3:00) time frame, please let me know. I could possibly extend the science fair a bit longer if you are willing to pick up your child instead of having them ride the bus.

7th and 8th graders will be presenting a "Modern Marvel" Model and information and will not be judged this time around. (As a 7th/8th combined class, they voted with their eyes closed and chose not to be judged on a project.) These students will have to show me at least their information board (like a landmark sign) by March 28th to get some credit for showing progress on the project. The history of the marvel, cool facts about it, how it has affected society (both negatively and positively), who was the architect or head of the project, why it was built, what types of materials it took to build it, the total cost of building it, etc., would all be good things to write on the landmark sign.

5th and 6th graders will be taking part in answering a question by using the scientific method--the same procedure that is typically seen in science fairs. They will be judged by Ashland high school and Northland college students who excel in the studies of science. Medals will be given based on their correct use of the scientific method (covering the purpose, hypothesis, procedural methods, analysis of information, charts/diagrams, and conclusion), verbal presentation, knowledge of their subject, appearance of their tri-fold presentation board, and how well they can answer questions about their topic..

Both 5th and 6th grade students have been given a packet of information to help them prepare for the science fair. We will be taking SOME time in school to help them with the research for the two page paper and to help them lay out the steps of the scientific method. We will not be doing the actual testing and recording of information during science class. I ask you for your help with that at home. I will be making progress checks along the way (for a grade) to make sure that the entire project is not put off until the last week before the fair!
If there are any questions about expectations that you did not find in the packet, please let me know. If you did not see the packet yet, please let me know! 5th grade parents can contact Ms. Smith.

You can also find all kinds of tips on this website: www.sciencebuddies.com
Please click on the tab for parents and/or students.

In the packet that I handed out, page A-11 (at the back) has the full check-list of components that it will take to make this project complete.

Many thanks!

Nancy Marita

Science Fair Website

2011-02-18T16:37:00.004-06:00

6th grade parents,
If your student did not bring home his or her packet of science fair material yet, you can go to www.sciencebuddies.com and help your child to get started with the process of choosing a project and what things they will need to know and research for their project. Click on the parent or student tab, or both to see what is out there. This is a good website that will help the students to organize their plan.

Thanks!
Mrs. M

Life Science Test on Tuesday!

2011-02-17T14:07:00.002-06:00

7th and 8th graders have a Chapter 15 Science Test on Tuesday, Feb 22nd! (Birds and Mammals) We have done a review together, but we will have a test without notebooks so please know the information well. (Bold words/main points at the beginning of each section.)

Science Fair

2011-02-15T14:03:00.004-06:00

Dear Parents,
We are gearing up for the start of the Science Fair Project process! Grades 5 and 6 will be carrying out the scientific method in order to answer a question that they have in a science related subject area. Tomorrow, I will be sending home a packet of information on what requirements these kids will have for this mandatory project. The proposal form for this science fair project is included in the packet and MUST be returned for a grade on February 28th.(2 months of prep for the science fair.) The Science Fair is scheduled for April 28th in the social hall, from 12:30-3:00.

The 7th and 8th graders voted that they did not want to participate in a judged science fair project, but they WILL be present at the "science fair" and have a different sort of project to display, which will not be judged but will be graded by me. Their project will be called "Modern Marvels," in which they will be constructing a model of an existing " Marvel of Science." (Eiffel tower, military craft, stadium, or even the popular i-pad.) Students will then make a landmark sign to go with their structure, telling its viewers things like when it was made, what kinds of materials it is made out of, what design features makes it so durable and aestheically pleasing, how much money it cost to make it, its impact on society, and other interesting facts. I need to know what marvel they are trying to replicate one month in advance. (About March 28th)

Another possibility is to dress up and role play/act like a famous scientist, discussing their scientific achievements and how those achievements or discoveries impacted the world. If a 7th or 8th grader does change his/her mind and wants to join the science fair, they are welcome to do so. They must also give me at least one month notice if they do want to enter the science fair.

Thanks for your help in guiding them toward a project that will be fun and interesting for them!
Mrs. Marita

Math Websites to use for improving skills

2011-02-08T18:24:00.006-06:00

Hi! Here are some websites for math practice at home. (Some have other subjects included as well.) If your student gets bored of these, I'm sure you can find many more good sites if you google math games for jr. high students. I did go to these sites and played a few of them myself. It's a fun way to learn and refresh the memory for ALL ages!

Thanks so much for taking the time and efforts to attend conferences last night. I so much appreciate all the things you do for your children and our school! Wishing you a great 2nd half of the school year!

www.aaaknow.com
www.algbra4children.com
www.softschools.com/grades/6th_and_7th.jsp
www.dr-mikes-math-games-for-kids.com
www.funbrain.com
www.coolmath.com
www.math-play.com/7thgrade_math_games.html
THESE ARE ALL OVER ON MY LINKS TO THE RIGHT OF THIS BLOG PAGE SO YOU CAN CLICK ON IT AND GO RIGHT TO THE SITE!!!Good luck and have fun!
Mrs. M

2011-01-24T17:31:00.006-06:00

Hi! Today was the 1st day of the 3rd quarter! We have come a long way, but we still have half of the school year left! Thank you, parents, for all that you do to help your child in becoming more organized and prepared for their assignments, projects and tests!
I will be expecting more from all my junior high students as the school year progresses. Rules and expectations have been well established and there will be little room for excuses and poor behavior/work habits.

Parent-Teacher conferences are set for Monday, Feb 7th. Sara will be sending out the times for each of you. If you cannot attend, please call or e-mail and we can arrange another date to meet.

Many many thanks to all of you who have contributed to our 7th grade silent auction baskets. With the items that have been donated to our basket and the money that has been collected, we have been able to purchase some cool "photo/memory" themed items.
If you have not contributed yet, I will still take your contribution up until Wednesday. We would rather have them a few days late than not at all!

Please encourage your student to keep using their planners and please sign their notebooks each night so that I know that you are aware that they are receiving assignments and completing those assignments. They should be checking off the assignments after they complete them. With my school teaching schedule, I do not have the time to list all the assignments on this blog. The assignment notebooks are supposed to serve that purpose. If you are not seeing this notebook on a regular basis (that you paid for), please call me, e-mail me, and keep on asking your student to bring it home!

On Wednesday, we will be baking again in our 7/8 grade exploratory class. Students have signed up for an item to make a few different types of muffins. Thank you in advance for any item that you could send in for that purpose!

This Saturday is the kick-off to Catholic Schools Week with a sock hop in our school gym. PLEASE COME! 6:30 - 10 pm!!!!! There will be lots of fun with dancing, food, games and prizes!

And lastly, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE sign your student up for our ALL SCHOOL LITURGY on Sunday, Feb. 6th. Come and have your students wear their new red Bruins shirts!!! It's my Molly's 7th birthday that day and SUPER BOWL SUNDAY, and I'm going to be there at church too! I know you are all busy, but please do participate in celebrating our school as a united school family!

Blessings,
Mrs. M

Catholic Schools Week approaching

2011-01-10T19:12:00.003-06:00

Dear Parents,

Catholic Schools Week is soon upon us, starting on January 30th and culminating in an All School Liturgy at 10:00 on February 6th! There was a school newsletter that was just sent out with some of the details about Catholic Schools Week. If you didn't get one, please ask your student to bring it home to you or let me know so that I can make sure it gets home!
There will be many fun events that we are inviting you and your family to join in on!
Please start making plans to attend the Sock Hop, Blow Out Bingo, the KC pancake breakfast and bakesale and the All School Liturgy!

Along with the festivities, there is an opportunity for us to do a bit of fundraising. One fun way to raise some money is to make some "silent auction theme baskets." How it works: each class will decide on a theme for the basket, and each student will bring in one item to contribute to that theme. Some past ideas include movie, gardening, bath, beach, cooking or baking, scrapbooking, sports, winter fun, kid's art supplies, and other fun themes. If any of you parents have an idea for a theme, please share it with us. It could be a gift certificate for a business that a parent owns or an item or certificate from a parent's place of employment. It could be a homemade or storebought item too! We hope to start collecting as soon as possible so that the baskets will be ready for display during Catholic Schools Week (everyone has time to admire them and can place their bids on the baskets of their choice.) The winners will be named during the pancake breakfast on Feb. 6th! Any ideas on themes, please let me know!

We are heading to Superior next Wednesday, Jan 19th to have Mass with our Bishop.
We need permission slips to come back as soon as possible. There is a choice of school lunch or cold lunch from home, please select which type of lunch they will need. Please let me know if you need a permission slip to sign....they tend to get lost in desks, lockers and backpacks!

We have been busy studying nutrition in 7/8 grade science and energy/electricity in
6th grade science. 8th graders are working on geometry in math and 7th graders are working on coordinate planes and graphing data. 6th grade religion students have been discussing the negative affects of rumors and gossip the past few days. Ask them about the RUMOR WEED! Veggie Tales continue to address all kinds of pertinent moral issues in a very fun and lively (but meaningful) way!

Take care and thanks for checking in!
Mrs. M

Heifer Christmas Blessings

2010-12-28T19:23:00.006-06:00

Dear OLL families and friends,
Merry Christmas! Blessings in all of your Christmas and New Year's celebrations!
I just wanted to take the time to say THANK YOU for all the wonderful cards, gifts and wishes that you blessed our family with. I am the lucky one to have you in my life and I thank God for all the support that you give me as a teacher at OLL.

Some really good news that our jr. high students are proud to present to you:
We raised $400 and will be able to buy many animals, including a WATER BUFFALO, HONEY BEES, A FLOCK OF HOPE (CHICKS, GEESE and DUCKS,) A TRIO OF RABBITS, AND ANOTHER FLOCK OF CHICKENS for the poverty stricken families that Heifer International will bless with these life-changing gifts!!!! I am SO EXCITED for the check to be mailed and for Heifer to find out about the OLL jr. high students who were involved in this Advent
service project. THANK YOU for everyone who contributed to this cause. There is nothing better than giving the gift of a brighter future!
THANK YOU endlessly for your generosity!

Thinking of all of my students and their families and hoping that the Christmas break is fun, safe and healthy for all!
Love,
Mrs. M

2010-12-12T17:11:00.003-06:00

Update:

Science 7/8 has been learning about how muscles work, skin and its functions, homologous structures in skeletons across all animal species, and about organs of our body and what processes they carry out. (Students did research on a particular organ of choice and we took notes as a class about all organs researched.) Our test will be on Tuesday, as I'd like another day to review all this information with them. In our science book, the pages to study at home would be 490-505, paying attention to the New Vocabulary words and epecially figures 9-12. Please have them study their notebooks as well. I reminded all students to bring their science home to study this weekend but I have a feeling that they did not. I will be playing a review game with them tomorrow, asking the VERY SAME questions from the test. If students pay attention to the questions and right answers, they will ace the test.

Tomorrow 6th grade science students are being quizzed on the concepts of work, power and simple machines. We carried out a mock quiz on Friday, preparing them for types of questions that will be on it. Again, if they have been paying attention to our daily review questions and student responses, they will do wonderfully! Students are also trying to invent or make changes to an existing compound machine that contains at least 3 simple machines. This invention can be drawn or constructed through a model that may or may not work. The students need to point out and discuss the use of the simple machines on their model or picture. It must have a name and they must tell us how the machine makes life easier for the person who uses it.

In math 8, students are representing statistical data by using visual organizational tools like: line graphs, stem and leaf plots, venn diagrams, pie charts, etc.
They have also spent time learning about how statistical data can be skewed or biased, in favor of the advertiser or person who is trying to persuade someone else.

7th graders are graphing inequalities, which uses algebra to solve the equations before they graph. Integers remain a concept that the kids need to practice at home.
They have difficulties combining positive and negative numbers and knowing if the final result will be positive or negative. I will keep plugging away with my examples at school, but I could use some reinforcement at home too.
Ex: -5 + 7 = 2 (Explanation: You have 7 dollars in your pocket and spend five, now you have POSTIVE 2 left!)
Ex: -6 - 5 = -11 (Explanation: You spent 6 dollars at Dollar cents, then spent five more at walmart. You spent 11 dollars total. Or...You were 6 dollars overdrawn in your checking account and then you wrote another check for 5 dollars, now you are 11 dollars overdrawn in your account. Or....You owe Dad 6 dollars and then you owe Mom 5 dollars, how much do you owe total? Remember that owing is "negative money" in your pocket!)
Thanks for any help that you can give me in supporting your student's academics!

Our Heifer project is going very well! Thanks for all the contributions, students, parents, and friends of OLL!

Hope you had a great weekend!
Mr. Marita

Service Project

2010-12-02T18:31:00.005-06:00

December 1, 2010

Dear Parents and Students,

It has been a tradition in the junior high to exchange “Advent Angel” gifts within our homeroom classes. Although it has been fun for the students to receive
various angel gifts throughout the weeks of Advent, we feel that the purpose of Advent has been lost in this exchange.

We would really like our junior high students to donate to Heifer International instead of exchanging gifts. Please ask your student what the Heifer Project is all about. You and your student could also check out www.Heifer.org to see how we will be changing people’s lives with the gift of an animal for their family or community.

Students might decide to donate a certain amount of money each week of Advent or just whatever change they can offer along the way to our Christmas celebration. We are only asking students to donate whatever they can afford, perhaps the amount that would have been spent on a weekly Advent angel gift. With all of our contributions, we can make a difference in the lives of these severely poverty stricken communities, all across the globe.

Instead of the final exchange gift that we would have given to our Advent Angel during our Christmas party, we would like the kids to participate in a KING sized candy bar exchange with each other. One candy bar should be brought to school on the day before our Christmas vacation (Dec.22). Students should also bring in any final donations to the Heifer Project that day. During our party we will count up our donations to the Heifer Project and then decide what animals we can afford to buy for the people who are on the Heifer animal waiting list. Then we will celebrate our service project with our candy bars as gifts to each other.

Thank you in advance for your help with our Advent service project!
--OLL Junior High Staff

For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me....Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.” -Matthew 25:31-45

Science Tests

2010-11-15T20:17:00.005-06:00

Dear Parents,

Just wanted you to be aware of our tests coming up!

Wednesday, Nov. 17th: 6th graders are being tested on Fluid Pressure (What pressure is, Hydraulic devices, Buoyancy, Bernoulli's Principle, Archmedes' Principle and the relationship between pressure and gravity)

Friday, Nov. 18th: 7/8 graders are being tested on the bones and muscles of the body. They have been given a study guide for both the bones and muscles and should take these home to study, even though we will continue to review in class each day.
The students will have a word box and diagrams to fill in. I will also go through and point to the parts of the body that I am testing them on so that they are sure to understand which parts that the diagrams are referring to.
I know that we usually test on Mondays, but I cannot expect the students to recall all of this perfectly when we get back from a week long vacation.

Hoping to see you all at conferences!
Blessings upon your Thanksgiving celebrations!

2010-11-01T18:55:00.002-06:00

Just a reminder: If you drink SunnyD orange juice, please be saving the UPC labels, and sending them to school with your kids, just like you do with Campbells Soup Labels, Box Tops, Milk Caps, etc. We have until the end of November to get in 20 labels in order to receive 20 free books for our school! If we get double that, we get double the books!
I am personally collecting for the junior high, so send the labels in an envelope with "Mrs. Marita" written on it. Many thanks for helping to build on our resources!

Happy Halloween!

2010-10-31T17:42:00.004-06:00

I have many more cute pictures of pumpkin carving with jr. high students, but there happens to be one or two students in each picture who I can't include because I don't have publishing permission. Thanks for the fun, kids!

2010-10-31T17:02:00.007-06:00

2010-10-28T13:11:00.005-06:00

7th grade test (Monday, Nov. 8th) material
Science text pages: 252-255 Vocabulary terms (stomata, guard cell, xylem, phloem, and cambium) and be prepared to label (fig 14) diagram on p. 252
Also, all vocab terms under "new vocabulary" on p. 74 will be on test. (Types of Transport in cells.) Figure 11: Visualizing Cell Membrane Transport, on p. 79 is a diagram that should help students learn the differences/similarities between these types of transport. Material found on pages 81-85 will also be on the test (photosynthesis, respiration, metabolism, fermentation.)

2010-10-27T17:08:00.002-06:00

Many thanks to our parent volunteers who took the time to bring us to the Band and Choir concert at AHS last Friday! It was nice to take a break after all the tests, and listen to some music! It was also fun to see our OLL alumni performing!
I give thanks for all the opportunities that our school parents allow us to have because they are willing to help us make it happen as drivers and chaperones!

This afternoon, Mr. Bitzer came to present an Indroduction to Astronomy to our Exploratory class. He brought a few telescopes and showed us diagrams/explanations of how they work, as well as how other types of telescopes work. He also made some scale models for how far away some of these heavenly bodies are from us and each other. He shared so many good tips for successful star gazing and showed us star charts, constellation guides, and some Astronomy magazines too. Many thanks to Mr. Bitzer for all his efforts, time and talents!

The 7/8 grade science class has explored respiration (yeast and plant leaf demonstrations), and also completed 3 lab activities on diffusion and active transport. Today we experimented with celery and hot water with food coloring vs. cold water with food coloring, to see which temperature water would diffuse more quickly. They discovered that hot water works to diffuse the colored water further up the celery stalk than cold water. Active transport (using energy to help diffuse molecules across a membrane) was taking place with the heated water, while osmosis (free diffusion not requiring energy) was occurring with the cold water, but at a much slower rate.
We will finish up with plants within the next week and study for a test which will be Monday, Nov. 8th. (Test will cover cross section of a leaf, the parts of a leaf,
photosynthesis, respiration, and types of transport across a membrane.) I will put the page numbers down within a few days, so parents can help students study if they choose. After this unit, we will be switching over to humans and learning about the bones of the body. (Followed by the muscles and then circulatory system.)

The 6th graders will be tested this coming Monday, Nov 1st on Chapter 2. Their test will cover forces, gravity, acceleration, friction, velocity and units of measurement for mass, volume, distance and time. Students are studying for their test by making and reviewing flashcards with questions from the chapter on one side and answers on the other. I will be making the test based off of their flashcards.
Mr. Brandon Gassi (Edu student from Northland College) will be working with this group over the next two days and helping me to teach them about calculating density. We will be making a colloid called Gak and comparing/exploring the characteristics of Gak compared to Jello and Playdough!

Students may bring in treats for Friday as well as pumpkins to carve if you have grown them or have extras. Please do not go out and buy pumpkins--it's only if you have extras. We will be doing business as usual on Friday morning and having a party in the afternoon. Students may dress in costume only for the afternoon.
Many thanks for checking in!
Mrs. M

Iowa Basics and other fun!

2010-10-20T12:34:00.003-06:00

Many thanks to Mrs. Starosta, Mr. Bell, Mrs. Urling, Ms. Eaton and Melissa Rasmussen for helping to proctor the Iowa Basics testing this week. Students are working their way through the assessments and are hopefully doing their best to give us an idea of what concepts in the curriculum they have mastered and what concepts need to be reviewed or covered if they haven't been thus far.

We should be done with the testing by tomorrow.

Again, if any parent is willing and able to drive some students to the high school on Friday after lunch (12:30) and bring us back to OLL by 2:45, we'd be so grateful!
These kids are ready to be out of the classrooms!

Many thanks to Mr. Bitzer for presenting to the Jr. High today about his research and love for History from the time period of 800 A.D. to around 1300 A.D. Mr. Bitzer brought in all kinds of equipment (much of which HE MADE HIMSELF) representing the fielddress/gear for warfare from that time period. Mr. Bitzer continues to amaze me (and so many others) with his knowledge, talent and expertise on so many subjects. Thank you, Mr. Bitzer! I learned a great deal today,and have more respect for what the soldiers of that era endured too!

Mr. Buckley (Northland College Edu. Student) gave a lesson/lab today on air resistance for the 6th graders. Students dropped objects from the railing in the gym to test out the speed of various items (balls, paper crumpled, sheets of paper, etc.) They will be calculating the various speeds of the items and discussing the concept of air resistance with him further on Friday.

It's turning out to be a pretty cool week!

Thanks for checking in!
Mrs. M

2010-10-14T12:23:00.007-06:00

For Monday (Oct 18th): 7th/8th grade science test on Gymnosperms, Angiosperms, parts of a flower, vascular and non-vascular plants and how they attain nutrients, and Monocot vs. Dicot traits/ being able to name at least two of each! We will review tomorrow, but students should bring their books and notes home to study for the test over the weekend.

Conservation poster is due tomorrow if students want to enter in the contest. Parents have to sign the form that I handed out to grant permission for entry. If not participating in the contest, please hand in the poster by next Friday(22nd)for extra credit in math or science.

Mid-terms should all be signed and returned, as soon as possible! They were handed out last Thursday, Oct. 7th.

Next Friday, the 22nd, our jr. high students have an opportunity to attend the AHS jazz band concert/choir concert. Would any parents be willing to drive us to the high school in the afternoon at about 12:30 and drop us back off at OLL around 2:30? Please let me know if you can! Thanks!

Many thanks for checking in!

Mrs. M

2010-10-07T13:07:00.003-06:00

Reminder: The leaf collection project is due tomorrow, October 8th.
Students have been given the scoring guide/requirements.
I have received some AWESOME projects so far! Thank you parents for all the time and help that you have given your child! I have not started grading them, as I am waiting to grade them all together this weekend.
Jr. High mid-terms will have all been handed out by tomorrow. **The leaf collection project grade has not been calculated in yet.**

Thank you to the parents and grandparents who joined us for Grandparents Day yesterday! Thank you for all you do for us, every day! We love you!

7th grade students are going to be tested on algebraic expressions, simplifying like terms within expressions, and substituting in given values for the variables in the expressions or equations. I was going to test them tomorrow (friday), but I will need to review with them more tomorrow. They will be tested on Monday.There will not be a science test this coming Monday. Students had one this past Monday and did quite well. I am pleased with the efforts of all of my jr. high students, and proud to be their teacher!

Mrs. Marita

Science Test on Monday

2010-10-03T16:47:00.002-06:00

Just to let 7th/8th grade parents know that there is a science test on Chapters 1 and 2 on Monday. Science tests for 7/8 will always be on Mondays (about every other.)
I did REMIND students to take their books home. The information is on cell types, organelles inside cells, early scientists like Aristotle and Carlous Linnaeus who grouped living things into differnt classification schemes,and the idea of spontaneous generation vs. biogenesis as well as some of the experiments that were done to defeat the theory of spontaneous generation!

All final magazine orders are due on Tuesday! Thank you for your particpation and support!

Nancy Marita

2010-09-26T13:46:00.002-06:00

This past week in school, the QSP magazine fundraiser began! The first turn-in day is Tuesday. Students will earn double points that day towards their prizes, for each magazine that they sell. Thank you parents, for your selling encouragement (in helping to get the kids on the phone or e-mail with their relatives)!!!

Science 7/8 had their first major test of the school year. Ask them what was on it and see if they recall?!! Now we are learning about the difference between prokaryotic and eukaryotic cells. Also, the names of specific organelles within eukaryotic cells (and what job each organelle does to help the cell to function.)

Science 6 students are preparing for an acceleration lab in which they will create a "roller coaster" for a marble and need to attain two different velocities along the coaster path for which they will do an acceleration calculation. Acceleration is defined as the change in velocity over a period of time. Students are accumulating props from home and also utilizing any tubes/resources that I have to help them construct their roller coaster.

Math 7 students had their first 50 point quiz on scientific notation, exponential and standard form (converting back and forth between), converting units using the metric system, order of operations, and some properties of operations (commutative, distributive, associative, and identity properties.) We will be going over the mistakes on the quiz tomorrow and doing some follow-up problems like the ones that were on the quiz. We have more work to do in these areas and it's safe to say that we are not ready for new material.

Math 8 students are working on solving algebraic equations with integers. With substituting both positive and negative numbers into equations, there is naturally going to be some confusion on signs. We will keep working through this as well.

Religion 6 students just had a lesson on Today's Saints....which happen to be US.
At least, that is what we are shooting for. We worked on skits (in groups) in which students were presented with a situation that they could either choose to handle in a saintly or non-saintly way. The first 3 skits were presented and the acting was quite lively. I am glad to say that at least one of the skits had a saintly solution. We all know how we are supposed to handle situations...it is all together another thing to actually practice the saintly way in our real lives, every day. We will keep trying!

Thanks for checking in!
Mrs. M

2010-09-17T12:44:00.004-06:00

Our first FULL week of school is completed, although it is the 3rd week of school!
We are doing well in the junior high! After much reviewing and reminding, students are being held fully accountable for upholding our 5 main rules.
It's no surprise that we can achieve so much more in learning when our students are adhering to classroom expectations.

What is being learned?
6th grade religion students have been discussing courage, and what it takes to be courageous. Courage can be exemplified in many ways, but a courageous act is simply defined as someone doing something that goes beyond their comfort zone and usually helps someone out in some way. Today we talked about the courage and the life-long service of Mother Teresa to some of the most poverty stricken people on earth, in a place that was dirty and disease ridden. Other topics of conversation have been the courage to stand up for what is right, even when you are standing alone. Or to be a witness to a crime/breaking of a rule and report the offender, even when it could be your "friend." It takes courage to seek out the truth and live everyday as God calls us to live.

7th/8th grade science (Life Science)
Have been learning about the 5 kingdom classification scheme, the requirements to be a living thing, how to identify trees by certain characteristics, how to make and use a dichotomous key to identify an unknown object or species, how and why leaves change in the fall, what kinds of pigments are found underneath the chlorophyll in plants, and they did a leaf chromatography lab to see those hidden colors revealed on filter paper. THE WILL HAVE A TEST ON ALL THIS INFORMATION ON MONDAY.

6th grade science (Physical)
These students have been participating in a number of activities. The latest was a "motion lab" to test the motion of toy cars on both a steep and shallow incline. The students were testing how the degree of incline affected the motion of the car. Students then added more mass to the cars on both inclined planes and observed/recorded their results.
Today we discussed and modeled the "frame of reference" concept, and discussed how you can prove that something is moving by having a fixed reference point in the background to compare the change of positioning to. This conversation somehow morphed into a deep discussion on black holes, and although off topic, it was an exciting scientific tangent with many excellent ideas put forth by all students in the class.

7th grade math students were quizzed yesterday on converting metric units, which we reviewed again today. Next,they learned about the difference between exponential form, scientific notation, and standard form. We converted scientific notation to standard form and vice versa, we also converted exponential form into scientific notation. We will be spending more time on that in the days to come as well. Today we also worked on some problems using order of operations. Some problems were very long but the students learned how to pick them apart and work on them in sections to make them easier.

8th grade students are working on integers and additive inverses (a number and it's opposite on a number line: 4 and -4) and adding integers together. -8 + -9 + 3 = ?
We worked on this last year too, but it really seems a source of confusion to them. When does it get more negative?, when does it get less negative?, what is the sign on the answer?, etc.

A good start!

2010-09-08T18:21:00.007-06:00

We have been back to school for a week now, and things are running fairly smoothly for us. I'd like to thank Mr. Bichanich (maintenance) and Brett (custodian) for all of their hard work in both school buildings, but especially for helping us to make improvements in the junior high.

Tomorrow night there is an All School Dinner in our Social Hall at 5:30. Please come and bring your whole family! Dinner will be provided, no need to bring an item.

The junior high teachers would like to invite junior high students and their parents to an Open House Tuesday, Sept 22 at 5:00-5:30.

Thank you to Nikki Lindman and the OLL Home and School Assoc. for setting up and paying for the North Coast Sailing lessons and opportunities for the 7th and 8th grades! We have had a lot of fun with the instructors and even took a short sailboat ride today! More sailing lessons in the next two days!

Please ask your student about their classes so far. The 6th graders have had a couple of different lab activities that they should tell you about. (Pendulum and Criminalistics labs....ask them to tell you about them!)

The 7/8th grade class has a leaf collection project to start working on
(due Oct 10th.) They should start to collect and press leaf samples. They must have a twig sample with the leaves too. A requirement sheet has been given to the students.
This class has also been learning about making/using dichotomous keys as an identification tool. They made a dicot key of their class, using characteristics of each person that we could see at first glance. In identification books for plants, animals, rocks and minerals, etc, there are dichotomous keys to help separate one species (or sample) from another.

7th grade math students are learning about unit conversions with the metric system.
8th grade students are learning/reviewing algebraic terminology and working with evaluating algebraic expressions.

6th grade religion students have learned about St. Monica and St. Augustine, who are mother and son saints who know the power of prayer. St. Monica prayed and prayed for her wayward son, Augustine, and through the power of the Holy Spirit, Augustine turned away from his sinful life to lead a very holy one.

We also read about King Nebuchadnezzar, who was a very proud, boastful, glory-seeking king. This king was "put in his place" by God. It wasn't until Nebuchadnezzer was turned into a beast and cast out of his kingdom, that he changed his heart and his ways. He learned that the gifts that he had been given and the power entrusted to him as a king was of God, not of his own being. We could all do well do recognize that our gifts and talents are from God, and that we should give our credit to HIM when we share and celebrate these gifts.

Thanks for checking in!

Welcome to 7th grade!

2010-08-30T16:23:00.005-06:00

Dear School Families,
Welcome to our new school year! I appreciate all of the school shopping that you have done already to prepare your child for the year of learning ahead!
If it would make it easier for your student, please stop by to drop off your child's materials at the junior high tomorrow (August 31st from 9 to 3.) The junior high teachers will be working upstairs, so please come on up and we will be glad to help you put your new materials in the appropriate places (lockers, desks, storage areas.)
If you are unable to stop in, your child can bring the materials in over the next week or so, a little at a time.

We will be having an All School Dinner in the OLL Social Hall on September 9th, at 5:30. Please come and bring your whole family! (No need to bring anything else!)

Within the first few days of school, your child will be bringing home classroom policies for you to read, sign and return. Please be looking for them.

Thank you for everything you have done this summer to foster your child's academic skills and help them to retain what they have learned this past school year. Thank you for challenging them to do their very best. Thank you for supporting the teachers at OLL by helping us to really know YOUR CHILD. Please feel free to make some suggestions (based on what has or has not worked in the past) for your child's individual needs in areas like motiviation, organization, behavior incentives,etc. Life gets busy and overwhelming sometimes, but please do remember to show interest in your student's daily or weekly proess by asking them specific questions about things that they are learning, and not accepting "fine" or "okay" for an answer.

Thank you for sending your child to OLL! Let's have a great year!

Sincerely,

Nancy Marita

School is about to begin!

2010-08-13T12:58:00.002-06:00

Dear OLL school families,
Late summer greetings! I am thinking of all of you and hoping that this summer has had some great highlights for your family!
Soon it will be back to school and back to exploring new ideas and concepts for our jr. high students.

Parents, please know that I am always available and happy to answer questions and address your concerns for your student/child. Your student will be provided with my home phone number as well as my e-mail address. You can always leave a message in the school office (with Sara) for me to call you back as well.

We will be holding an open house for all families to come and visit the jr. high, including a short meeting where you can listen to all three junior high teachers speak about the school year ahead. We will discuss expectations to promote student success, as well as opportunities that we will be providing for academic, physical and spiritual growth this year. Our first school newsletter will provide the date and time of the open house. I will also post it here when I know the exact info.

Thank you to all of the parents who have been so supportive of your child's education at OLL. Thank you to our volunteers who have driven on countless fieldtrips, provided resources for us, chaperoned or aided us in some way during fun activities/outings, etc. We could not make our school as special as it is without you.
I am excited and honored to be able to teach at OLL for yet another year. Teaching and learning are, and will always be my favorite "hobbies."(They go hand in hand.) Thank you for choosing Our Lady of the Lake Catholic School.

Blessings to you in your last few weeks of summer!

Mrs. Marita

Update

2010-05-14T13:24:00.004-06:00

Good Friday afternoon! We are just finishing up a very good day and (overall) week in the junior high.
Because the 8th graders are gone today on their field trip, I had a chance to spend more time with the 7th graders. We finished up the end of their book, The Diary of Anne Frank, which they were reading in English. I was reminded about all of the sheer evil, terror, sadness, despair,heartaches,etc. that the Jews faced from the Nazi regime. Every little problem or worry that I had prior to "re-reading" this book today has just blown away in the wind. I am so grateful for the life that I have been given, thanks to the Allied troops of Nations (including ours) who would not tolerate the Evil domination of the Nazis. My mind is loaded with images of this though....unfortunately not such a light, happy thought for a Friday afternoon.

Kids are counting down the last days of the school year, but much can still be learned in the days ahead.
7th graders are working with rotations, reflections, symmetry, and more work with polygons.
8th graders are working on surface area and volume of 3-D objects yet. The problems take them quite a while, especially because they are drawing out the figures first.
7/8th grade science students are just finishing up Oceanography, and are entering the Rocketry Unit. We will learn the parts of a rocket, how a rocket is propelled, how to calculate height by using the tangent formula, and we will do our best to construct some awesome (and recoverable) rockets!

Monday Update:
Rockets arrived in good order! Thanks again for your support, parents!
We identified rocket parts today and started on the construction phase. We will need to help each other out quite a bit on directions since there is only one adult to help. Please sign and return student's Rocketry field trip forms if you have not. Thanks! (May 25th, leaving the junior high parking lot at 12:35 pm)

6th graders tested their bridges today. Ottman Construction Crew's (Jared,Matthew, Ben, Jacob Buvala, Jackson) toothpick bridge held 13 pounds! They were the champions of the bridge contest. Collin's bridge took 2nd place! Hooray for the END of this fun but lengthy project!
We will be spending more time this week on Sound and Light Waves, and characteristics/activities of both of these concepts.

Thanks for checking in!

Mrs. Marita

Mid-quarter

2010-05-08T16:27:00.003-06:00

Dear School Families,
Mid-quarter reports were sent home Friday, May 7th, in 7th grade. Mrs. Swiston and Ms.Shields will be sending theirs out within the next few days, if they have not already. We are in the home stretch....keep up the good work, kids!

7/8th grade students will be starting a rocketry unit very soon. Rockets have been ordered from Mid-west Model Supply, and should be on the way! Thank you, parents for being willing to let your student participate in this fun event! Thank you also, if you gave your child money for the rocket. These kids are so blessed to have parents like you! I appreciate it! We will be blasting off in the afternoon on May 25th if it's a good weather day, and May 27th will be our "rain date."
Currently, we are studying oceanography and ocean pollution- a very pressing topic right now! Students are also learning about the critters in the ocean as well as their habitats and food chains.

6th grade science students are constructing toothpick bridges right now. We have had some productive days of construction, and some days where the student building "companies" have slacked off on the job. I intended to have the bridge contest this coming Monday, but that is not going to happen. This will be the last week of construction for them, and I intend to teach them about concepts of sound at least a couple of days this week so we can make more ground on their 6th grade curriculum goals. The students are learning and reinforcing the notion that sometimes cooperation is the hardest aspect of a job.

7th grade math students are doing a good job calculating missing angles in triangles, quadrilaterals and various other polygons. They are trying to keep all the rules for specific naming of polygons in their heads, without mixing them up (what qualifies to be a parallelogram, rhombus, square, rectangle, trapezoid, regular polygon vs. polygon, etc.)

8th grade math students are doing multi-step calculations for finding surface area and volume of 3-D objects. There are MANY different formulas to keep straight.
Students have had some hands-on practice measuring cylinders, triangular prisms, and quadrilateral prisms as well. We will be calculating pyramid and spherical volumes next. We did some review on simple interest this week too. It's tough to remember all this stuff from past years when there is so much new stuff to learn too!

Happy Mother's Day to all the wonderful, generous, patient, forgiving, talented MOMS out there. Cheers and thank you for all your sacrifices!
Mrs. Marita

2010-05-01T12:08:00.003-06:00

Awesome job on the projects, kids! I'm so proud of you! Thank you parents, for all the help, running around to get items, and "strongly encouraging" your kids to get their projects done on time!

Jr. High Science Projects!!!

2010-05-01T10:34:00.010-06:00

Update

2010-04-14T16:29:00.005-06:00

We're back into the swing of academics after a nice Easter break. Wishing all of you a very peaceful Easter Season and Spring.

6/7 Religion
We are hosting the next two liturgies, so please come and join us on Wednesday(s)at 9 am for our school masses!
In the past week, we have concentrated on the Book of Kings (Solomon's Wisdom and then his downfall as he turned from God and started being materialistic,greedy, and haughty.)
We have also been discussing "self fulfilling prophecies," and how important it is for us to strive for success instead of making excuses for our failures. It is so necessary for us to stay positive and think of things that are good, pure, right, noble, etc., instead of thinking of negative thoughts that might bring trouble to us or those that we influence. These negative ungodly thoughts often become words, then actions, and then we become something that we never intended to be, and it ruins our relationship with God, family and friends.

7th Math
Students are working with percents and doing a lot of problem solving involving percents, tax rates, percent increase or decrease, etc.

8th Math
Students are working on calculating the area and perimeter of rectangles, squares, parallelograms, trapezoids, triangles, and circumference and diameter of circles (finding Pi.)

7/8 Science
Students are finishing up a chapter on Ocean waves--they will be tested on this material on Monday, April 19th. We will study oceanography a bit further and then we will turn to a chapter on weather. Soon we will be ordering rockets for a rocketry unit. We will be launching the rockets towards the end of May. Parents will be invited to the launch!

6th Science
Students just finished up the lengthy unit on Electricity. There was so much to learn! Students were tested on this material today. We will be constructing bridges out of popsicle sticks for the next few weeks, as well as learning about famous bridges that exist and what makes them so strong or aesthetically pleasing.

Thank you to all the families who contributed to the St. Jude's Mathathon. We were able to raise several hundred dollars with your help!

Thanks for checking in!

Mrs. Marita

The path of Holy Week

2010-03-30T06:51:00.003-06:00

Dear OLL families,

We are in the final chapter of our journey to Easter. Hoping that this special time brings you even closer to God, so that Easter may be all the more meaningful.

Our jr. high students are in the midst of a service project, in which they are completing math problems for our annual St. Jude's Mathathon. By asking friends and family to sponsor them for their math work, we will be able to raise money for the children being treated for life threatning illnesses at St. Jude's hospital.
Please consider sponsoring your child in this project, or encouraging them to ask family members to support this important cause. No family is ever turned away from St. Jude's because they cannot pay for treatment. It takes all of us to make sure this awesome hospital is able to serve those who need it most!
Thank you!

7th/8th grade science students are learning about Ocean life ( What causes the differences in water density, currents and where they stem from, theories of origin of the oceans, mineral components of, etc.)
They are also working on a science project for the science museum which will be on display in the Social Hall on April 30th.

6th grade science students are learning about electricity and circuitry. They will also be learning about resistance, current, volts, amps, and how to calculate each of these. They also are working on their own special project to display at our jr. high museum.

Parents, students received a rubric for their science project. I will be sending more home with students who misplaced theirs. Please read through it and make sure that your student has all the components that make for an "A" project.

8th grade math students are working on finding area and perimeter of different shapes; currently, rectangles, parallelograms, triangles and squares. They will be learning how to find volume and surface area of cylinders, prisms and pyrimids as well.

7th grade math students are learning how to estimate when using percents; especially when dining out and needing to calculate a 15% tip, using mental math. Also for those shopping trips, when there are percent reductions in prices, students can be able to quickly calculate how much money will be taken off the price tag, and if it's a good deal or not.

Thanks for checking in! Have a Blessed Easter Season!

Update

2010-03-09T18:21:00.003-06:00

Religion 6/7 Today students heard a story about Barnabus (formally called Joseph)who sold a piece of his property and brought the money to the apostles for them to use in serving others. We thought about how hard it would be to give up something so valuable for others. We also talked about almsgiving, and how we are supposed to be giving a percentage of what we earn to the poor. This becomes increasingly harder to do when you feel that you are among the poor. Perhaps if we do not have money to give, we can give more of our time and attention to those who need it.
Students then used children's Bibles to look up 3 heros who served God and their neighbors, and to write down some of those good qualities that the heroes displayed.

Math 7 Students are working on solving problems about similar figures by setting up and solving proportions. We also learned how to calculate the area and perimeter of similar figures and how to calculate the ratio of two similar figures as well as the ratio of their perimeters/areas.

Math 8 Students have been learning ways to present data, with stem and leaf plots, Venn diagrams, number plots, and box and whisker plots. They are learning about central tendancy (mean, median, mode and range) and well as variance in the lower and upper quartiles of data. They found out how to read a box and whisker plot today and also how to make one.

Science 6 Students had an activity on Gravitation Potential Energy today, where they tested to see how high a ball would bounce (cm) when dropped from various heights of 100 cm, 75cm, 50 cm and 25 cm. They also saw how friction, mass and floor surface affected the bounce and we compared the numbers in our data chart. We know that an object that is huge in mass and at a high height will have the MOST gravitational potential energy. We also had a quiz on energy transfer, and the law of energy conservation. We have been focused on types of energy and transferring one form to another. Now, we will be learning more detailed information about electricity and magnetism, and how they are related.

Science 7/8 Students will be tested on Thursday on the information from The Sun, The Earth/Moon System, and how the sun, moon, and earth's positions affect our seasons and things like eclipses, solstices, equinoxes, etc. In groups, each student learned about a specific mission to the moon as well; what year that mission took place, what the purpose of the mission was, and if they accomplished their mission. Today students listened and responded as I asked them the answers to the exact questions that will be on the quiz. They should be ready for the 25 question "quiz" on Thursday.

Thanks for checking in.
Mrs. Marita

2010-02-11T14:36:00.002-06:00

6/7 Religion students have been researching some differences between Catholicism and other world religions. We have also been busy with preparing for Ash Wednesday, Lent, and refreshing our memories with important things like the ten commandments, the Nicene Creed, and talking about the opportunities for reforming ourselves such as Lent and Advent, during the Liturgical year.

7th grade students have been learning about function tables, how an equation of the line changes with certain functions, and linear versus non-linear graphs.

8th grade students have been learning how to write the equation of the line when only given two sets of coordinates (find the slope of the line when given two coordinates and also finding the intercept of the line once the slope is found.)
We will have a quiz tomorrow on this info.

7/8th science students have learned about stars and will be tested on this information tomorrow as well. They just finished up presenting a chosen constellation to their class, as well as the mythology that is behind their constellation.

6th grade science students are learning about various forms of energy and energy transformations. They will be learning about nuclear energy in the next few days and doing an activity in order to understand radioactivity/isotopes.

6/7th students will be hosting Ash Wednesday Mass next week. Please join us!

Many thanks for the drivers and chaperones for both our bowling experience last week and our skiing trip this past Wednesday. We had a great time during both outings, and it would not be possible without parent volunteers! Thank you!

Happy Valentine's Day! Students will exchange Valentine's tomorrow!

Have a great weekend!

2010-02-02T06:26:00.002-06:00

6/7 Religion:
We are still focusing on learning about the wisdom that comes from knowing God, showing gratitude, using good manners, treating people with respect, and reading books in the bible that speak about these expectations of God's sons and daughters.

7th Math:
Students are plotting points from given coordinates, and identifying the coordinates of already plotted points. We will be doing timed math drills regularly, to increase our memory skills and to be better at taking tests under time constraints.

8th Math:
We are working with computing/calculating the slope of a line when given two sets of coordinates. Students are also learning about direct and indirect relationships with a set of data that is plotted.

7/8 Science:
Students are learning about distances in space, parallax (apparent shift of an object by the viewer, which decreases with distance away from the object), constellations, and some greek mythology that relates to the constellations.

6/7 Science:
We are starting on the energy unit, learning about forms of energy, energy transformations, and discovering/using alternative sources of energy as our fossil fuels deplete.

Notes:
All School Liturgy on Sun at 9:30....need more jr. high participation!
Swimming at Northland on Friday afternoon--forms, $3, parent drivers?
Report cards due on Friday
Skiing Feb 10th, forms, $, parent chaperones/drivers?

Thank you!
Mrs. Marita

A week in review

2010-01-18T17:18:00.002-06:00

Religion 6/7
We have been focusing on vocations, and learning about Catholic religious orders. Students have been instructed to listen more and talk less....it not only saves them from getting in trouble, but helps them to hear what God wants them to do with their lives. Almost every student said that they thought making a committment to a religious life as a brother, sister, priest, bishop, etc. would be too hard. I stated that living the communal life would be hard for me, but that we should pray for all people who are meant for this type of vocational "calling," not make fun of them because it is different from the path that we desire.

Math 7
Students have been practicing dividing with mixed numbers, both positive and negative. Also, deciphering what operation to carry out in problem solving with word problems involving mixed numbers.

Math 8
We have finished up the system of equations unit. We will be working more with linear graphing and being familiar with calculating the slope of the line and finding the y-intercept when given a couple of points on the line.

Science 6
Students are learning about simple machines and how they increase mechanical advantage, by either multiplying the effort force or decreasing the distance that the effort force travels over.

Science 7/8
Students are learning about our solar system, combined with information about the layers in our atmosphere and what our atmosphere is made out of. Students did a good job sharing information and questions/answers about each of our 8 planets. Sorry Pluto...you weren't reported on!

The 4-8th grade Spelling Bee is tomorrow after lunch. Good luck and "do your best" to our participants!

Thanks for checking in!

Mrs. Marita

Peace be with you

2010-01-09T12:51:00.005-06:00

A review of last week:

7/8 science learned about the Greenhouse Effect and how Volcanoes could contribute to this with all the gas emitted into the atmosphere. On the other hand, Volcanoes have been known to affect the climate in an opposite nature when the ash emitted blocks out the sun, making the climate colder instead of warmer.
Students presented their Volcano models and information on Thursday and Friday. All students did a fantastic job and I appreciate the help of ideas, materials, labors of love, etc. from the parents! It is so fun to see presentations from students--there is so much variety in the way that the students teach/present their knowledge to the rest of the class.
In an interest survey I found that students are curious about entities in the solar system, so that will be the focus of our next unit.

6th grade science students have been studying about what "work" is. The scientific definition of work is a bit different than their understanding of what work is.
For some of the kids, they believe that taking a shower or being nice to their siblings surely HAS TO BE WORK! We did an activity on Friday where they calculated their work done (their body weight in Newtons was the force, and the distance up the stairs was multiplied by this force to get work output,in Joules) and the power produced when they walked and ran up a flight of stairs (Joule/Sec = Watt). We will discuss why the same amount of work was done for both the running and walking, but that the power produced would be different because it took less time for the work of running to occur. Power tools are useful and prized because they do the same amount of work that a simple machine can do, but they do it in less time.

7th grade math students are working with subtracting/adding/multiplying and dividing with mixed numbers. Students are also working hard in simplifying their answers and making sure that they have the proper unit of measurement labeled for word problems.

8th grade math students are taking on some tricky and lengthy problems in which they are finding coordinates by solving a "system of equations." It is a long process, but some of the students are finding that it is fun and are helping me to teach their classmates when they catch on! I appreciate the love for learning that many of them have and that they are so eager to help others to learn as well! We have a good time in math in 8th grade, even when the work is difficult. I'm very proud of this group.

6/7 Religion students have been discussing this Post Christmas "Season of Peace." We have been talking about situations that call for the help of a peacemaker, and how we must bury the weapons of hatred, cruelty, jealousy, dishonesty, disrespect, etc. and use the fruits of the spirit (things like patience, goodness, kindness, honesty) to create peace in our communities. Peace starts with each of us, but we need to keep in touch with the Spirit of God for that Peace to live in us and pour out of us.

Thank you for checking in to the blog. Thank you for all of your contributions to our school. Teachers cannot succeed at education without the help of parents and the reinforcement of what we are learning/teaching at school.
Blessings to you, in every day.

Mrs. Marita

Merry Christmas!

2009-12-21T20:26:00.002-06:00

Merry Christmas! Actually I missed Thanksgiving on this blog, so happy belated Thanksgiving too. Life with a baby is busy, and I don't want to miss much in the couple of hours that I have with him after school before he goes to bed.
During the day I haven't had time to do this, I've been teaching and helping kids to understand their math during study hall.

The 8th grade students have been busy learning about algebraic expressions, simplifying expressions, solving equations with expressions on both sides of the equal signs, and graphing inequalities, which also uses a lot of algebra. They are also getting better at problem solving using various strategies, such as drawing pictures, working backwards, making an equation using the information, making a chart to keep track of data, etc.

The 7th grade students have spent a lot of time with adding, subtracting, multiplying and dividing with integers (positive and negative numbers) and also they have been doing some estimating with adding/subtracting decimals that are both negative and positive. They get frustrated with all the negative signs, but they will be thankful one day when they can do it with ease. We will get there.

7/8th grade science students have learned about why volcanoes form, the types of volcanoes, and what kind of materials are ejected out of each volcano type (and why!)They have also spent a bit of time learning about tectonic plates and how all of this action affects the land. We spent a couple of days talking about and making simple topographic maps too.
Students have picked a Volcano that they will either make a model of, or make a poster of, with all the information about the Volcano.(They have received a paper with requirements on it.)Presentations are due January 7th (Thursday)after school resumes.

6th grade students have done all kinds of activities and simple experiments regarding fluid pressure. They learned about Bernoulli's principle (fast moving fluid air-- which allows planes to fly), Archimede's principle, which explains why things float (buoyancy), Gravity, which pulls down on everything, increasing pressure especially deep beneath the sea, Hydraulic machines and how/why they work, and many other interesting things about air and liquid pressure. If they can't explain these things to you, they must have been asleep--we spent a lot of time critically thinking about how these things could work, discussing and doing experiments, and summarizing again what we found out in the experiments.

6/7 Religion students have been focusing on Advent. Mostly, I have been trying to share stories of people helping people. I know that the students hear the scripture stories about important people of faith from centuries ago, but those people's ancestors still exist today and are doing wonderful work in serving God and God's people. Today I read an article that appeared in the weekend edition of the paper about a 15 year old student in Plymouth MN who is raising money for the homeless in the Minneapolis area by sleeping outside in his cardboard box. He has been doing this since he was about 8 years old. His mother made him sleep on the porch where it was locked and safe, but he still braved very cold conditions to help put families in low income housing. Kids have the ability to do great things when they think outside of themselves. We all need to remember how MUCH WE HAVE and to see what we can do to help others who don't have as much. Time is a wonderful, irreplaceable gift.

Merry Christmas and thank you so much for ALL the things you have done to contribute to our classes, our school and our parish! I am in awe of the generosity that our parents/grandparents and other friends of OLL!

2009-11-16T14:09:00.003-06:00

In Religion, we started watching a movie about Pope John Paul II, and what he and his family endured throughout the Nazi invasion of Poland. This is a glimpse into his young adult life before he entered into the religious life. Already, I can see how much terror and hardship he faced early on in life. It is amazing how much he was able to accomplish, given his circumstances.

Math 7 students have been practicing finding the greatest common factors and least common multiples of at least two different numbers, sometimes 3 or 4 different numbers. They have also been problem solving with these concepts, so they know some practical uses for finding GCF's and LCM's.

Math 8 students have been solving one and two-step equations, where they have been "undoing" the initial operations by completing the opposite operation, trying to get the variable alone. I thought that they had a good handle on it last week, but today in giving them a quiz, I found out that they need more practice with my guidance.

Science 7/8 students are either completing a test on the Rock chapter or are completing a power point presentation, a brochure, or a travel commercial on a rock formation of their choice. Examples are: Carlsbad Caverns, Copperfalls, Everest, etc. Presentations will start tomorrow, and tests should be handed in by Wednesday.

Science 6 students are just finishing up a chapter on Newton's Laws of Motion and Universal Gravitation. Today we completed a gravity lab in which students tested 4 types of paper to see which one was the strongest when a weight was pulling down on the end of each strip. The practical application is that materials need to be made using products that will be strong enough to hold things up with the added stress of gravity pulling down on it. For example, chains for swings and hangers for clothes or even heavier objects. Students should be learning and able to give examples of both positive and negative affects of both gravity and frictional forces.

Thank you for all your donations, time and efforts towards the Holiday Bazaar!

Hope to see all of our 7th grade parents at teacher's conferences tomorrow.

Stay healthy,
Mrs. Marita

2009-11-08T13:14:00.002-06:00

November Greetings!
The flu hit Molly hard this past week, so it has been tough for me to get to the computer in my "spare" time to report on the classroom progress.

6th graders learned about Newton's 3 laws of motion last week, and also made some parachutes to experience the beauty of air resistance. The students picked out their parachute materials from a pile of resources that I provided. A popular choice was birthday balloons to attach their string and weight to. Those students who chose to use plastic bags with their parachutes landed much softer! We'll be discussing why tomorrow.

7/8th grade science students have made very nice posters illustrating the rock cycle. The students were quizzed on 10 samples of the 3 main types of rocks last week and most scored very well on it. Small quizzes will frequently find their way into our lessons from day to day, in holding the students accountable for the information presented to them. We will also be choosing famous landforms, such as the Black Hills and Carlsbad Caverns to make power-point presentations, travel brochures, or video commercials on their rock formations and story of origination. Students will have time to research this project on Thursday.

7th grade math students have started working on solving equations. They have been using negative and positive integers with their equation sums,products,differences and quotients as well.

8th graders have been solving tricky story problems involving mixed numbers with uncommon denominators, and remembering how to borrow from a fraction or mixed number in subtraction problems, as well as getting correct unit measurements and simplifying to lowest terms. We are moving on to solving two-step equations that will also use rational numbers within.

Religion 6/7 has focused on the virtue of charity this past week. Students learned about several non-profit agencies that exist entirely for the welfare of specific target groups, such as Native American Tribe Preservation, Empowerment of Women, Direction and homes for troubled teens,etc. I asked the class why they thought that so many charities currently exist. Some students realized that people are inspired to help others after they have gone through a hard time and they don't want others to have to endure what they did. Also, perhaps someone special helped the founder of that charity when they were in despair, so they are returning the favor for thousands of people experiencing the same hardships. I have been stressing the point that all of God's children deserve to have their needs met, no matter how different they are from us.

I'm looking forward to a healthier week ahead! Hope you are all doing well!

Mrs. M

2009-10-28T12:43:00.003-06:00

Religion 6/7: Liturgy
Great job singing and reading, students! Thank you Jacob Berlin for playing your trumpet for one of the songs.

Math 7: Adding and subtracting integers
p. 85, 46-52 and 55, and start on p. 90 1-20

Math 8: Dividing Rational Numbers
odds 1-23 and evens 24-46

Science 6: Friction demonstration results and Newton's 3 laws of motion; no work assigned today.

Mrs. Marita

back at it!

2009-10-27T13:33:00.005-06:00

Hello! This is my second day back, so I'll tell you what is going down....

Religion 6/7: We are hosting liturgy for the next two weeks. Please come join us tomorrow! Also, the students decided what 5 commandments teenagers should absolutely obey. Some were not directly out of the 10 commandments, but ones that the students thought affected teenagers. We also decided one out of the 5 was the most important for us, personally. Then, we wrote the one that we struggle with the most, personally, and why it was so hard for us to follow.
Yesterday we attended Eucharistic Adoration in the church, and offered thanks, asked for forgiveness and prayed for those people in our lives who need extra prayers.

Math 7: Students are learning how to use a number line to add and subtract integers. We are learning how to think of negative numbers as in a debt and positive numbers as in a deposit in our checking account. We make a check ledger today and completed some debit and deposit transactions.
We also worked on 13-28 on page 84 to be corrected tomorrow morning.

Math 8: We corrected the 15 odds chosen at random by students from p. 78 that was on multiplying rational numbers. This means that we multipied fractions, whole numbers and mixed numbers that had both positive and negative signs.

Science 7/8: We looked at rock samples and decided which ones fell under the sedimentary, metamorphic and igneous categories and the characteristics that helped us to assign their type.

Science 6: Students played tug of war yesterday, trying to create balanced forces with no movement of the rope and unbalanced forces with one team pulling hard enough to get the other team across the victory line. The most balanced force we could create was with Jackson opposing Matthew! What strong guys!
Today the kids designed demonstrations of how friction slows down objects, in which they used various object like marbles, tennis balls or toy cars on different textured surfaces. They are supposed to state how the surfaces affected the speed of the object and how much of that speed reduction was due to the friction forces at work.

Thanks for all the donations for the Halloween party for Friday! We appreciate all of your support and help!
Good to be back!

Mrs. M

School is underway!

2009-09-04T11:06:00.003-06:00

School has started and looks to be going well already! Molly is excited about her year as a Kindergartener! Junior high kids, you have grown over the summer, that's fun to see! Keep in touch and let me know how things are going for you. Making two trips into town each day is not very practical, but at least I get a chance to see all of you and feel like I'm still connected!
Hoping that your learning (and playing) is fun and rewarding!

Love,
Mrs. Marita

Wishing you well

2009-08-24T08:59:00.002-06:00

Dear School Families,
One week left of your summer before school starts! As I take care of our newborn son, Samuel, I am thinking of all of you and hoping that you are gearing up for a positive school year.
I will not be starting out the school year in the classroom, as I continue to be on maternity leave until the 26th of October. I will be available for calls and e-mails though, and you will see me around school, as our daughter Molly will be attending Kindergarten.
My maternity sub is Andrea Haugo. She has been busy these last few weeks, preparing for a good start to the year in the jr. high. Please maintain good communication with her during her long-term sub position as the 7th grade homeroom teacher. Please contact her with any concerns that you have, or if you are able to help or volunteer in some way. I will also be checking in with her to stay in tune with the students and their progress.
Thank you for your support. Wishing you all the best at the start of this 2009-2010 school year!

Mrs. Marita

Molly and her brother, Samuel Christopher

2009-08-16T15:59:00.002-06:00

End of a school year

2009-06-07T11:42:00.004-06:00

Thank you for a good year, parents and students!
We are in our last week of school, with many things to get done before the end.

Congratulations to the 8th grade class at OLL, who will be having their special grad liturgy and ceremony/dinner on Wednesday, June 10th.

Congrats also to the preschoolers who will be entering Kindergarten in the Fall. Molly will be among the preschoolers graduating on Tuesday morning in our social hall.

We end this year with changes on the horizon. Our dear friend and teacher, Mrs. Ellis will not be returning in the Fall. It will be hard to see her go. We wish her well and are proud of her for all she has done at OLL and all she will continue to do as a daughter, a mother, a wife, a grandma, and a friend to so many.

Many thanks for all the volunteering from our school parents! We depend on you so much, and are so thankful that you come through time and time again for us. Thank you for all the extra work you put into being a parent at OLL, and your deep commitment to your child and their education and faith.

I will be available by phone/e-mail and will be stopping in to visit our school at various times throughout the beginning of the school year, but will be on maternity leave until the end of the first quarter/beginning of second quarter. We are currently looking for a long term substitute to take my place for the first two months of school. I have confidence that the sub selected will do well in my place. Please pray for our whole school over the summer. There will be other changes in addition to Mrs. Ellis leaving and my maternity leave, and we could use some extra prayers.

Take care and God Bless your family,
Mrs. Marita

P.S. Many thanks for the baby shower given by the junior high kids, teachers and parents!
I am so grateful for our OLL school family!

Science Fair

2009-04-24T16:58:00.003-06:00

Science Fair is Friday, May 15th in the OLL gym from 12:45-3:00. Projects are due May 7th, in order to watch presentations and make any improvements before the judging occurs.
Students need to have their graph and diagram or two graphs ready to check by this coming Thursday, April 30th.

Please help out your student in any way that you can, but don't do their project for them!

Thank you!
Mrs. Marita

Holy Week

2009-04-06T16:27:00.003-06:00

Holy week blessings and prayers for it to be meaningful for you......

Jr. High students made "freeze frame" poses of the stations of the cross today in religion. We had 7 groups represent two stations each, in which they didn't talk or use props, but used positioning and facial expressions to show us what took place in each station.

Tomorrow we will be completing a crossword puzzle on facts related to Holy week. Wednesday, we are hosting liturgy at 9:00, please come join us. Students did a good job volunteering for the Mass parts, many thanks to them for that.

Father Henry and Father Frank would really love to see as many students/families as possible at the Holy week events. Maundy Thursday, we remember the last supper and there will be washing of the feet (6pm). Good Friday, there is a special Mass with Veneration of the Cross (1:30 pm). Mass on Holy Saturday is at 8pm, and on Easter Sunday, Masses are at regular times: 8:00, 9:30, 11:00. Make Easter even more special by celebrating the events leading up to Jesus' resurrection!

Students will turn in their bibliographies (need to have 3 sources) on April 16th.
The following "check point" (April 23rd): their charts/graphs will be due to illustrate the data on their science fair testing. Thank you for helping them with any part of it that you can.

On April 23rd, the Ashland High School band will be performing a dress rehearsal in their auditorium. They have invited us to come and listen. Would any of you parents be up for driving us over there on that day? I think the performance is at 1:30, but we'd need to get there early to get good seats, as the invitation is open to all the Ashland schools. Please let me know if you are able!

That's enough for now! Thanks for checking in! Sorry that I don't get this updated much these days. I'll try to do better.
Mrs. Marita

2009-03-23T16:51:00.002-06:00

Hope spring break was a good one for you. We're back to work today!

The students' science fair "research" paper (rough draft-3 pages total) is due on Thursday. It should have citations (giving authors/websites credit) within the paper, not just at the very end. I need to know which info came from which source. Also, if it is directly quoted, without any summarization, it needs to have quotation marks. The bibliography is not expected on Thursday, but today I did give the students the format for magazines, books, internet sites, newpapers, and "interviews"(info received) from family members.

On Wednesday, we have reconcilation scheduled for our OLL students. Our priests are always very gentle and insightful with all of us, so I'm looking forward to this Sacramental gift.

In math, 7th graders are working with squares and square roots. 8th graders have been solving problems using scale factors, proportions, and are now learning about dialations. (When the geometric shape is similar but the size has increased by a specific scale factor.)

In science, 7/8 th graders are learning about natural selection, adaptations, geographic isolation, variation in population, etc.
6th and 8th graders are also learning about magnetism and will be learning about electricity (electrons and circuitry) afterwards.

Please e-mail with any questions or concerns. Hopefully students are working on their science fair projects at home. If you can lend any help to them or communicate to me that they need specific help, please do!

Thank you,
Mrs. Marita

2009-03-02T18:22:00.002-06:00

March greetings to you.

Tomorrow we will be heading over to the Brettings Center for phy-ed class with Ms. Shields so she can teach us more about gymnastics. Please make sure that your child has returned a permission slip to go.

On Wednesday, we will be going to Ashwabay for some down-hill skiing.
If you are interested in driving, please let us know--we'd be so grateful for your help!
Again, a permission slip needs to be filled out and returned for the skiing trip, as well as $9.00 for the lift ticket and $9 to rent equipment if they don't have their own. (You can write a check to Mt. Ashwabay for $18.00, please.)

Science Fair projects have begun. Students had a parent letter to get signed that was due last Wednesday to fill you in on the project requirements and due dates. Last Thursday, most students turned in a proposal for their project. If you haven't been included in the proposal part of it, please ask your student to see theirs or tell you about it. I need to know that these projects are feasible before too much time goes on. I'm not sure how much help each student receives at home. It's not the parent's assignment, but I do need some communication between student and parent and teacher in order for the project to get done successfully.
The next due date is March 12th, when the Introduction of the (3 page) research paper is due. I will give them more examples of what an introduction looks and sounds like.

In math 7, students are learning how to find the slope of a constant graph.
In math 8, students are learning how to solve proportions when one value is missing.
In science, we are finishing up two units--simple machines in grades 6&8 and genetics in grades 7&8.
In religion, we are focusing on Lenten themes, making sacrifices, trying to reflect on how we can change ourselves to be better people and reading about Jesus' journey to the cross.

Our prayers go out to the Lulich family right now. Our deepest sympathy in the loss of Julie Lulich. We pray that God keeps all of them in his loving care.

Thanks for checking in.
Mrs. Marita

2009-02-21T11:19:00.002-06:00

Hello! It's been a few weeks, my apologies.

The trip to the Bad River Environmental Fair for the Jr. High was a good one last week. Thanks to Mrs. Ellis and all the drivers/chaperones for making it possible! We have great parents at OLL! Mrs. Lynn Hall who was the coordinator for the fair (and also an OLL parishioner) really made us feel welcome and was generous in giving out many wonderful gifts to our students through a drawing. Special thanks to her!

The science fair for our school will be Friday, May 15th in our school gym. Students will be getting a set of directions, requirements, due dates (to check for progress on components of project), and a letter to parents on Monday.

Our ski trip has been rescheduled to March 4th. If you are interested in driving, please let me know. We'll be very grateful for your help!

Thanks for checking in and helping your student to achieve to the best of their ability.
Mrs. Marita

2009-02-04T19:40:00.005-06:00

Dear Parents,

It's good to be back at school and functioning properly. The flu hit Molly on Thursday night and then spread to my husband and I. It was a miserable time, but we are on the upswing now. May you NOT get this strain of flu. It was "brutal."
The kids did well while I was gone. I was told by both subs that they were cooperative and pretty well behaved. I also saw that they accomplished their lessons and practice work for the two days that I was out. Thank you for raising thoughtful kids. I appreciate hearing good news, especially after being sick!

If you would be willing to buy/donate a food item for a jr. high breakfast on Friday, we would really be thankful. Breakfasts have been a tradition for several years now. The students help to cook on skillets and grills. We all contribute an item and share efforts in setting the table, cooking, buttering toast, etc. We put all the desks together and then cover them up with a table cloth. We pray before we eat and then enjoy some good food and company. Thank you for letting your student participate. This is yet another special aspect of being in our close knit Catholic School!

Next Wednesday (Feb 11th), we will be going to Ashwabay to cross-country or down-hill ski. Are any of you willing to drive/chaperone? We will leave after church around 10:00 and be back before the buses come. Students received permission slips today. They should return the slips by next Tuesday. The cost is $18.00. If this cost is a financial burden, please let us know.

Students are learning about: Coordinate Planes and Ordered Pairs in Math 7.
Pythagorean Theorem to find a missing side of a right triangle in Math 8.
Genetics and inherited traits in Science 7/8
Work and Power, as well as simple machines in Science 6/8
The search for God going back to ancient times, as well as religious beliefs
of Hinduism, Islam and Buddhism --and how they contrast/compare to Christianity.

Mrs. Ellis was kind enough to show us some slides and even garments of an Islam Country (Pakistan) on Tuesday. She did a wonderful job explaining their culture, and sharing experiences from her missionary work there. We are blessed to have someone in our realm who has lived among other religions/cultures for as long as she did. It helps us not be so narrow-minded and stereotypical when we hear the positive stories of their people. It also helps us to be so thankful for what we have here in America. We feel safe and have liberties that others just dream of. Please ask your student to share some of the stories/perspectives they learned from the slide presentation.
THANK YOU, MRS. ELLIS!

Look for report cards on Friday! We had 15/16 on the Honor Roll in the 7th grade, and 4 students with 4.0 G.P.A.s!
Congrats to them! Encourage them to keep up the great work!

Thanks for checking in!
Mrs. M

Yeah, team!

2009-01-31T16:31:00.003-06:00

Lime green pigs rule! This is our class pig from the QSP magazine sale pig race.
Our pig tied with Mrs. Punjak's lime green pig!
Both classes (3rd and 7th) won an ice-cream party for our winning tie!

Sledding at Valhalla

2009-01-22T18:22:00.000-06:00

Thank You

2009-01-22T17:55:00.003-06:00

Thank you parents for sending the food items for our sledding outing today. We had all kinds of great food, thanks to your generosity!
Thank you parent chaperones/drivers "extraordinaire for all that you did for us to get out to Valhalla and have a good time. Special thanks to Brad Lundmark, Sammy Hicks, Leanne Thannum, Chris Grubisic, Kathy Skingel, Mrs. Ellis, and Ms. Shields! We are blessed to have great parents at OLL!

Tomorrow is the last day of the quarter. Most students have been doing well in completing assignments and turning them in. I foresee grades to be much like the first quarter. Look for report cards the following Friday (Feb 6th).

We'll have an academic day tomorrow, after two days of field trips. Next week is Catholic Schools Week. There will be both fun times (Spelling Bee on Tuesday afternoon, bowling on Thursday) and more academic challenges.
Join us at 9:00 for Wedneday's alumni liturgy and Sunday (Feb 1st) at 9:30 for our All School Liturgy to culminate Catholic Schools Week.

Thank you for encouraging your child to read at home. Practicing multiplication and division of two and three digit numbers and decimals would also help your child to get further in their math concepts during our math classes. Math facts still slow some of our students down.

Thank you for your dedication and interest in your child's education.

Mrs. Marita

Updates

2009-01-13T14:34:00.002-06:00

Sledding for Thursday the 15th has been postponed to next Thursday (22nd.)
Parent chaperones/drivers, would you still be able to help us out on that day?
Students should bring an item of food to share for a potluck/picnic type lunch. There is a sign-up sheet in my room.

Next Wednesday, we will be travelling to Superior to have Mass with the Bishop. If you student would like a lunch from school, please let us know as soon as possible. Otherwise, we will be bringing our own lunches. There was a permission slip that went out with the school calendar and news. It should come back as soon as possible. We will be riding in buses.

Please ask your student about some of the things they learned while in school. It is a nice way to find out about their interests and show that you care about their learning and their experiences during the day. Refer to what they have written in their assignment notebooks and ask about those subjects. Learning is occurring, but they don't always convey that to you when you ask. Ask specific questions and don't let them off the hook with generic answers.

Please have students reading at night. I don't send them home with work unless they wasted class time or the concept was hard for them to grasp, and they ran out of time. These jr. high students should have some time (make time) to do pleasure reading at night. Books on tape are available at the library for those students with reading disabilities. Even hearing the vocabulary and the flow of well written sentences is good for them.

We just finished up the 10 plagues on Eqypt from the book of Exodus in Religion.
We are learning about standard and exponential form (scientific notation) in math and how to switch from one form to another.
We just finished the unit on blood (jobs of, components of , types of) in science.
We are starting into genetics.

Thanks for checking in!
Mrs. M

Merry Christmas

2008-12-29T18:48:00.003-06:00

Merry Christmas!
Thinking of all our school families, and wishing the best for you this Christmas and New Year!

Thank you for all the wonderfully thoughtful and generous gifts you gave me (and even Molly) this Christmas!
I am always in awe of the love that is shared with me and my family by my students and their families. I pray that God blesses you in the same great way that you have blessed me! Thanks be to God for my supportive network of school friends!

I hope you had a chance to see some of the OLL Christmas music productions this year. The junior high band, choir, and the elementary students all did a fantastic job! Hats off to Tresa Betzold and all her creativity, patience and persistence! Many thanks to Mr. Bell and Mrs. Panasuk for leading the 4th Wise man story and music.

I'm hoping that the students are getting some reading in. This is a perfect time to let them indulge in some "fun" reading. (Not text books!) Visit the library! Cuddle up with a book during the day for a few hours! I've been reading magazines, books, newspapers..... and even digging out some old books that I want to reread. Please encourage your child to read (and write; perhaps some thank-you cards to relatives for the christmas gifts they received.)

Have safe and happy New Year's Celebrations! Praying that 2009 will bring good things to all of you!

2008-12-12T13:01:00.003-06:00

The end of the week report:

We've been working on solving proportion equations in math 7 for the past few days.

The students have learned two different ways to solve for the unknown rate. Example of the type of problems: 5/30 = 15/t Students would solve for t.

Our assignment today was 16-30 on p. 289. I will allow the students some class time on Monday to finish up this assignment.

Science 7&8 students did a very nice job presenting their medical advancement info. We had presentations about Botox, plastic surgery, hip replacements, heart transplants, eye and brain surgery, cloning animals, etc. It was a nice variety of new information that the students seemed interested in.

8th graders have been subtracting very complex sets of polynomials (containing whole numbers and variables), and have been applying standard math rules to their solutions.

Example: (6y^2 + 8j^3 +7) - (5y^2 + 3j^3 +8) The solution would be:

1y^2 + 5j^3 - 1 because all the numbers in the second set of parentheses would become negative, as there is a minus sign in front of the second parentheses.

It takes the kids a while to determine the final answer when there are also negatives inside of the parentheses. They are doing a good job with the task! We'll be multiplying and dividing polynomials next.

Today in Religion, we Read John 3: 1-21 about how God so loved the world that He gave his only begotten son to save us and lead us to eternal life with Him. We also read a story about a soldier who gave a bag of donuts to a starving orphan, and as he walked away from the boy, the boy asked, "Mister, are you God?" We can invite God into our lives and serve Him well by serving his most needy people.

Have a good weekend!

Mrs. M

2008-12-08T17:51:00.002-06:00

2nd week of Advent Greetings,

We started off the day with a nice Mass to honor Mary, mother of Jesus, who was born without sin. The Feast of the Immaculate Conception was celebrated today, December 8th, as it has been celebrated in the Catholic Church for hundreds of years.

The 8th graders have been simplifying the multiplication of polynomials (using the distributive property) We played our math board game today with some of those problems, as well as reviewing unit conversions from things like Kg to cg, Dkg, mg, etc. It's good to revisit those problems.

7th graders will continue to review complex multiplication and division problems, working on their computation skills, and accuracy.

6-8 Science students carried out a yeast fermentation lab today to see how much CO2 was produced and captured in a balloon by the combination of sugar, hot water and fast acting yeast. We also took the pH (level of acidity) of the yeast mixture after it "brewed" for a good hour.
We'll be spending some more time on discussing/ reading about metabolism of humans and other critters.

Congrats to the OLL marching band who did a brave job being merry as they fought the cold on Saturday! We heard that they did a good job, singing and trying to make their instruments play in the cold temps!

Thanks for checking in!
Mrs. M

Welcome back from a great break!

2008-12-01T19:16:00.005-06:00

Advent Blessings of peace, hope, love and joy to you and your family!

This morning I read to our jr. high students about the meaning of Advent. Even though our Catholic school teaches about Advent each year, we still need to remind ourselves of it's importance in the Liturgical year.
Then, students begun making an Advent calendar of their own. Each student is to "open up a door" on a good deed for the 24 days of Advent.

I also proposed that we "tweak" Advent Angel gift giving within our jr. high. I believe that the St. Nick Project (which our church supports) is a worthier cause. I'm going to have students choose a recipient of the St. Nick project, for which they will buy a small gift (or a couple of small items) each week. They should get the recipent group (ex: Prentice House or ABC Healthy Families) the same amount of things that they would give to someone in their class if they had a student as an Advent angel. It seems that each year, our students are involved in this secret santa type of gift giving, and someone always feels left out or neglected. I don't want our students focused on what they are not getting, but rather on what they are giving! And I want us to be giving to families and people who are really in need. These people are likely not to get a gift, without our help.
Students will not be required to participate, but highly encouraged!
Students may draw names for the exchange of one gift with their peers ($10-15 max) before Christmas break. Again, they do not have to participate in this either.

If you have any questions or ideas about the advent angel gift giving in general, please ask me.

7th and 8th grade students who did poorly on the first bone test have retaken it and most have improved their grades by at least one letter grade. Good job! This second test was done without notes.
Most 7th and 8th students took a quiz on the organs (anatomy) of the urinary system and the digestive system. Some have yet to take it--but most that took it scored well.
We continue to learn about the excretory system, how it works, why it's necessary, and some diseases and complications of the excretory system. We will also read about progress in organ transplants and students will research an advancement in a medical topic/field of their choice.

6th grade students will be working on simple machines and learning about the scientific definition of WORK. Some people's idea of "work" is very different than others!

7th graders have been working on making and solving word problems. They are working on solving multi-step problems, and then putting the data together for one final answer.
They will continue with problem solving, still using percents and fractions, which I want them to really feel comfortable doing. (real life situations!)

8th graders have been learning how to use coordinates to find the equation of a line. ( y= mx + b)
They have been shown how to manipulate an equation that is not in the proper form and divide or multipy to get the equation solved for Y. We continue to work on graphing skills and also on simplifying expressions. We will be working on monomials and polynomial expressions in the days to come.

Congrats to my students who shot their first deer this year! Yeah Matthew and Mack!!!!

Thanks for checking in!
Mrs. Marita

Thanksgiving

2008-11-20T17:47:00.002-06:00

Pre-Thanksgiving Greetings to you all!

One more day of work for the kids before a little rest....

7/8 grade students will be quizzed on the digestive and urinary system organs tomorrow. They will just be quizzed on the anatomy and not the physiology yet...that will come after the break.
They could get a head's up on the physiology if they have nothing to do for the break! Ha ha--is that likely to happen??

The students who didn't fare very well on the bone quiz will be re-quizzed on that tomorrow.
There is basketball tonight in Solon Springs, so I'm thinking that most kids will not get too much extra time to study tonight if they haven't already.

6 graders were quizzed on Newton's laws of motion yesterday. 5 out of the 7 scored A's! Way to go! They also reviewed the Urinary system that they learned with Doctor Gradillas, my sub from Monday.

7th grade students created some fun/amusing word problems today in math that they will work out tomorrow. The word problems were focused on division and multiplication operations. They need some practice with creating word problems that have all the necessary information in order to solve! They have to learn how to proof read to look for errors--we'll keep working on that!

Thanksgiving dinner was awesome today! Thank you to Cook Nancy and Cook Sherry, and also Robyn Lulich and Kelly Carlson! They did an outstanding job cooking and/or serving!
Thanks to Mr. Bell for excusing tables and waiting until everyone had been fed before he ate. He is very selfless. We are so blessed.
Thank you to Ms. Shields and the 6th grade for their Thanksgiving play. Thanks to all who set up and contributed to the decorations, and of course to the junior high and Mrs. Bietka for cleaning up!

Lots of action going on in Mrs. Ellis' room--please check out her blog too! There are things that are due tomorrow! Bug presentations, spelling test, essay pre-write ideas.....

Hope your hunting and thanksgiving experiences are positive!
Be safe and thank you for all you give, every day.

Mrs. Marita

Bazaar Bonanza !

2008-11-13T18:19:00.005-06:00

Make sure you come to the Our Lady of the Lake Holiday Bazaar this weekend!
8-2 on Saturday and 9-1 on Sunday! Share the joy of great food, wonderful Christmas shopping, and chances to win awesome raffle prizes!

Thank you to all parents who attended conferences! We so much appreciate the time you are taking to make sure your children are getting the education that you want for them.

A special thank you to Sammy Hicks and her family for having the Junior High in their home yesterday for craft making/baking to benefit the Bazaar. We all had a great time and are very grateful for the Hicks/Hagen graciousness.

For the past two weeks, the junior high has hosted Wednesday liturgy. I must thank Mrs. Betzold and Mr. Bell for their musical talents and ideas for making the music selections very special. Thank you to Josh Blair for playing drums, Jacob Berlin for playing trumpet, and Aaron Tardiff for playing the trombone! Thank you to the scripture and intention readers, servers and song leaders! We host our third consecutive junior high liturgy this coming Wednesday, come join us!

Happy 60th Birthday to Father Henry! Happy "naturalization" to Brother Tingh, a new American citizen!

Lots of learning going on! Keep reading and asking questions about the contents of the assignment notebook, parents. The kids don't always write a lot of detail about the lessons, but you can ask questions to trigger their memories!

Thanks for checking in!

Mrs. Marita

Diffusing my thanks....through the kids

2008-11-03T18:14:00.005-06:00

Happy Post Halloween!
Hope all of you had a safe and fun holiday weekend!

This week is red ribbon week!
Students will be sporting their red ribbons to stand up against drug/substance abuse.
Students have a chance to earn daily prizes for wearing their ribbons, as well as a chance to win a grand prize on Friday through drawings (one grand prize per class.)
Please speak to your children about the consequences of using drugs and alcohol. They need to hear it from you too.

Teacher conferences will be one week from tonight, and we (7th grade parents) will be meeting in the band room on the elementary side. Please call or e-mail if your time does not work out for you. Students were given the slip to tell parents what time the conferences are scheduled for.
If you did not receive yours, give Sara or I a call.

6-8 science students worked on cell diffusion using small blocks of agar today. One block was a rectangle (2 x 1 x 4 cm) and the other a square (2 x 2 x 2 cm). Students watched the blocks (representing cells) turn pink as the Sodium Hydroxide diffused across the agar membrane.) Since the agar contained an indicator for a "base" (Phenolphalein), the agar reacted to the Sodium Hydroxide by turning pink. We cut the blocks down the middle to see how much of the block turned pink within. We found that the thinner cell (rectangle) had better diffusion because their was more surface area exposed to the base. Students were taught that there should be a larger surface area in a cell compared to it's volume within cells, to get the best transportation of fluids/minerals inside and wastes out in an efficient manner. We will discuss this concept more next week, in the follow-up lab.

In Math 8, students are graphing linear equations. They were refreshed on how to solve and graph a linear equation. They also learned what a linear equation does not look like (an equation with exponents makes a parabola, so not all solutions to the equation fall on a line like they do on a linear equation.)

In Math 7, students are solving problems using the multiplication and division of fractions.
We are practicing word problem solving strategies, so that students will understand which operation to use in solving. We are looking for key words to understand how to set up our problem. We completed some problem solving on the chalkboard as a class today. No follow-up work (homework) was given today.

Religion 6-8 students payed tribute to a family member or friend who they think has Saint-like qualities. The results are on our bulletin board, as you go up the stairs to the junior high. Many parents and grandparents were nominated for Sainthood! Your influence is great--don't forget it!
Junior High will be hosting the next three school liturgies, starting this Wednesday.
Join us!

Many many thanks for all of you who contributed prizes, time and efforts for our Halloween party last Friday. We appreciate it more than you can know! Today I sent out "thank you" cards for the 7th grade parents who helped--hopefully my trusty students will get them home!
Thanks again!

Good night,
Mrs. M

Lot's going on....

2008-10-27T15:58:00.004-06:00

Hi All,
Welcome to the beginning of winter! We awoke to snow on the ground here in Highbridge, and there is still some covering the low shady spots on the landscape tonight.

Iowa basics are done for the majority of the class. I am proud of all the students for their efforts and behavior during the tests. Many thanks to Mrs. Ellis and Ms. Shields for their flexibility in scheduling and help with testing arrangements. Prior to school starting, a representative from the Iowa Basics company told us tha parents/instructors will be provided with a website that will show your student's results and explain what the scores mean. I will let you know when I hear more about the website.

Students are back to the "grindstone" this week, with a little relief on Friday, when we plan to hold the Halloween Honor party from 1:30-2:30. If you are able to provide some small token prizes (things like spinning tops, yo-yo's, small packs of gum, small candies, stickers, etc.) please send them in with your student. We are very grateful for whatever you contribute!
If you are able to show up and help out with games/chaperoning/setting up or cleaning up in the gym--let your student know or e-mail me, please.

Students are learning about All Soul's Day and All Saint's Day this week. They will learn what the Catechism of the Catholic Church says about respecting the dead, and what the Catholic church believes will happen after death. We will make some Halloween masks/puppets out of paper bags as well, and carry out an activity with our spooky mask.

7th grade math students are multiplying and dividing with both fractions and mixed numbers again this week. We reviewed Greatest Common Factors and Least Common denominators today, since we lost a week of math with the testing. Students had a worksheet with review problems today that we will correct tomorrow at the beginning of class. A reminder to them to use the GCF to reduce/simplify to lowest terms!

8th grade math students also worked on a worksheet today, but theirs had to do with problem solving and working backwards to find an answer. Many were able to be solved by concocting an equation and solving for the unknown letter, using the order of operations. (complete operations within parentheses first, multiplication and division next, then addition/subtraction last.) Kids are good at coming up with answers, but not too good at showing their work to verify their answers.

Last week our science students found their resting heart rate, upper and lower target heart rates, and their maximum heart rate. Today the students exercised for a minute at a time, doing jumping jacks/sit-ups/push ups, high knees jogging. They took their pulse immediately afterwards and found that it had entered into their target heart rate. We then tried to see how long it took for our heart rate to return to normal. We learned that many of us are out of shape and that we need to condition ourselves slowly in order to not rise above our maximun heart rate and do damage to our tissues/heart. We studied the blood flow within the heart and also learned that there are chambers and valves that keep our blood flowing in one direction, to prevent back-flow/pooling of blood/collection of bacteria in our blood.
We are now into learning the bones of the body--goes along with skeletons for Halloween!

That's enough for now. Remember STUFF THE TRUCK items and HEIFER CHANGE to be brought in on Friday (Knights of Columbus are matching our funds up to $150.00!!!!!)

Take care and stay warm! Remember to remind kids to dress with winter gear!

Thanks,
Mrs. M

BUSY TIME--GREAT OPPS FOR SERVICE!

2008-10-18T09:15:00.004-06:00

Good Saturday morning to you all,
Hoping that you have had a good week. It feels pretty good to stay in the house this morning, drink some coffee, and catch up on some household "projects."

This past week went fine, but we missed our principal and held him in our thoughts and prayers.
We are sad to think of Mr. Bell losing his dear Grandma. In hearing how close the Bell family was, it will be a tough loss for all. We especially pray for his family on Sundays and on holidays, when the Bell house was THE PLACE TO BE for gathering!

Science 7/8 students are researching a virus of their choice, and reporting to us with a visual aid on Thursday, the 23rd.

Science 6/8 students are studying and experimenting with Newton's Laws of Motion. We made simulations of Inertia yesterday. The kids had fun--so did I!

Math 7 students are working with finding Greatest Common Factors so that they can reduce fractions to simplest form. They just learned about Least Common Multiples too--listing the products of two or more numbers (such as 20 and 40 times one, two, three, four, etc.) and circling the lowest multiple that they have in common. This method helps especially for problem solving, when you are looking for how long it will take for two people (traveling at different speeds) to meet up/pass one another.

Math 8 students have been working on some serious 'International System' and 'Customary Units' of measurements. Some of these problems can get pretty lengthy. We are getting really good at cancelling out previous units as we convert to new units.
Also, students were practicing problem solving involving the addition tax rates and calculating prices of sale items, once they muliplied by the sale rate and subtracted the discount.

The "Stuff the Truck" County Market campaign has begun. Please send any canned goods/non-perishable items that YOU CAN SPARE. We know that it is a tough time on finances all across the nation. Please only do what you feel you can. We are also aware that being in a Catholic school means fundraising much of the year. The positive aspect of it is this: Service is lifelong. We are blessed if we CAN help out.

Iowa Basics are being completed this coming week. 6th and 7th grades will be tested by Ms. Shields and I. Mrs. Shields will be giving students with IEP's extended testing time and more instructions/reading some passages for them. I will have the rest of the students in my room. Even though the students are in two separate grades, the instructions read the same (the problems are different.)

Progress reports were handed out on Friday. They need to be signed and returned for Monday.

Any questions or concerns, please contact me.

One last opportunity for service: If you have any little fun prizes at home: pencils, packs of gum/candies, prizes from past magazine sales, toys that your kids don't play with, etc. :
There is a Halloween Honor Party on the 31st that we could use the prizes for.
If you are able to help make popcorn or help with any of the games, we would love to have you in the afternoon of the 31st! The Honor Party would only last an hour, but we'd need some help cleaning up afterwards. Students who have received too many yellow slip points (number of points to be determined by Mr Bell) will not be attending this party.

Thank you!
Mrs. Marita

Moving right along

2008-10-12T13:01:00.003-06:00

Dear OLL family and friends,

We're moving along quite nicely in school. Students are trained in on the expectations of good school behavior and improved academic practices.

Two Northland College students have visited our classroom on two separate occasions, observing science classes for one of their college courses in teacher educ. We expect them to spend a few more days with us, so that they can log in ten hours of observation. I believe Mrs. Ellis will also have a student observer in her room within the next week.

Mrs. Ellis has been helping me with a Religion service project to benefit Heifer International (providing animals like cows, pigs, chickens, ducks, etc. in order to sustain third-world families in deep poverty. We would like our Jr. high students to participate in a Halloween "Trick-or-treating for coins" campaign!
Mrs. Ellis has picked up some containers in which we will decorate tomorrow and use to collect quarters, nickels, dimes, pennies during the next few weeks before Halloween. On Halloween, we will have a party in which the students will bring their money collections in and we will celebrate how much money we have raised for Heifer. We will continue to have more fundraisers this year to benefit Heifer. The money for these fundraisers will accrue for one big check to Heifer in the Spring! Please help your student get excited over service projects. Giving to God's children in need helps us to feel closer to Christ, with every good deed.

7/8 students had their science quiz on Thursday. I will correct it tomorrow, and your student should tell you how they scored by Tuesday. It is already mid-term time. I will be trying to get those out as soon as possible. You should look for them by Friday. If your student doesn't say anything to you about their mid-term--ask to see it, sign and return, please!

Math 7 students are learning how to multiply and divide mixed numbers right now, and then reduce to simplest form.

Math 8 students are busy with algebra--lots of creating and solving multi-stepped equations!
Also, we are busy learning how to solve metric conversions. (How many Hecto-meters in 540 mm? How many Kg in 230 Cg?)

In Religion, we have been talking about the presence and intercessions of Angels. I have read them some stories of real experiences from people who had their lives or the lives of their loved ones saved by an Angel of God. Students have been sharing stories from their lives to support this spiritual notion of guardian angels. It gives me the chills, but it's so incredible!
Also, students have been looking for positive stories in magazines or in the media to show us that God is working through his children to help out other people. We need not feel like hope is lost in this day of "bad news." God lives among us, and God lives through us! It is up to each of us to keep on passing on his GREAT LOVE in big and small ways!

Blessings,
Mrs. Marita

Apple Fest and St. Francis!

2008-10-04T08:02:00.004-06:00

Happy Apple Fest Weekend! Happy Feast of St. Francis!
Hoping that your weekend is relaxing and fun!

7/8 grade science students constructed some animal and plant cells this past week, using various supplies such as uncooked noodles, yarn, clay, felt, beads, and pipe cleaners to represent the parts of the cell. The students really used creativity in this assignment! They labeled the jobs of each organelle within the cell, so they can remember the purpose of each organelle, and what it does to keep the cell functioning.

In art, we took our hand at drawing some pictures using "pastels" (sort of like a crayon-but softer) and Vincent Van Gogh's technique of combining colors in swirls and brush stroke lines. The kid's favorite picture is on the side of this blog,"Starry Night." This nature art is in dedication to St. Francis' Feast Day, Oct. 4th!

In math, students are solving multi-step problem solving questions, often involving the set-up and solution of equations (solving for a variable.) Some of these problems include finding the missing number in equal proportions and solving inequalities and then graphing.

6-8 students have rough draft persuasive essays (on why we need an animal shelter) that are due on Monday for Mrs. Ellis. Brochures on states were due on Friday--so if kids haven't presented their brochures yet--they better be ready for Monday! (and be super good!)

Wishing you a great weekend!
Mrs. Marita

Beautiful Sunday

2008-09-28T12:25:00.007-06:00

Dear OLL family and friends,

A happy and a beautiful weekend to you. You can't beat sunny, cool days like this, when the leaves are such as contrast against a blue sky!

7th graders should have turned in their Dichotomous "critter" keys on Friday. I only had two that didn't (who were both present that day.)

Many 7th graders are struggling to divide correctly with decimals. Please have them practice at home. There is a math website attached to my blog listed under the links (www.freemathworksheets.net/decimals.php) that students can practice on and check their answers.
The problems that I see occurring have to do mostly with wrong placement of decimals (when the divisor becomes a whole number, the dividend also has to be multiplied by the same power of ten. Example 4.5 / 3.42 The dividend is the number on top of the fraction (numerator.) The divisor is the number on the bottom of the fraction (denominator.) 3.42 has to become 342 (must become a whole number), so 4.5 also has to be multiplied by a power of 100 to become 450. It becomes 450/342! The answer should = 1.315 It's much easier to see on the chalkboard.....so I encourage the students to LOOK and LISTEN to the examples that I show in class. They want to pretend that they "get it" so that they are not paying close enough attention. Also, if there are any negative signs in the problem, they cannot just be ignored like the kids are trying to do. Please remind them to heed the signs!

6-8 will have a lab tomorrow in science. We will boil broth or gelatin(or something like milk--kid's choice) in two glass containers, afterwards sealing off one and exposing the other to the air. We want to see if in fact life will come from the contaminants/bacteria in the air. At one time, scientists thought that life just spontaneously appeared (flies) from rotten meat or (worms) from the rain. The theory of Spontaneous generation was replaced by the Theory of Bio genesis--that all living things must come from other living things. Still.....I wonder about those fruit flies that just seem to appear out of nowhere when we have bananas on the counter! There has to be some eggs just waiting for the right "ripening" conditions to hatch and create that annoying hovering tactic they exhibit! The kids will have two weeks to see what appears in both the covered and uncovered containers. I sense a stench filling the "mysterious backroom" on the horizon!

Pictures are going to be taken on Oct. 2ND. Kids should hand their picture packet money to me as soon as possible. Also, magazine orders are due on Tuesday. Thank you for supporting our school in this important fundraiser!

Have a good rest of the weekend!
Mrs. Marita

Native American Liturgy

2008-09-24T14:34:00.003-06:00

Dear OLL family,

I'd like to extend a special thank you to Kristen, Vincent and Shane for being readers in our Native American Liturgy today. I would also like to thank Father Henry for the very nice homily in which we said a prayer to the four directions. Again, Shane and Vince participated in this homily, as well as Marie Eaton and one of the 4th graders.

We missed Jacob Berlin today, and hope he is back tomorrow. He was going to read our intentions. Thanks to Shane who took over for him. There is a lot of sickness going around--I hope the sick get healthy and the healthy stay healthy! Molly got sick at lunch today, and I'm not sure if it was flu symptoms or a combination of eating three (half) grilled cheese sandwiches and apples, and then running around at recess. I took her home for the afternoon and am appreciative of Ms. Shields and Mrs. Ellis who took the Jr. high under their wings. That is the beauty of having 3 teachers back in the junior high. We can be more flexible in face of emergencies. I am SO grateful.

Grades 6-8 had a science lab (Leaf Chromatography) on Monday. Ask your student(s) about pigments hidden behind the Chlorophyll in our Fall leaves. Now that the deciduous trees are "closing up shop" for the winter, we are seeing some of those pigments that have been hiding there all along. Trees must save their energy for enduring the harsh winter, so they can't put energy into keeping their leaves. Leaf color change and senescence is taking place, where the leaf petioles break free from the branch after the flow of nutrients has ceased. The leaves then drop off----thus the name.....FALL!

Science 7/8 Critter "dichotomous keys" are due on Friday. If students are putting great detail into the "critters," they should be bringing this home. Some have all 6 critters created, with scientific names and have already created their key. Others have two critters done out of six. These students are the ones who haven't been using class time appropriately. Two yellow slips went out today for being off task and distracting class/me during science. This is now their "homework"--no more class time for this project.

Math 7 students are dividing with decimals in the divisor and dividend. There are many petty mistakes being made. Students may always check work done with a calculator before we grade, but work must be shown on paper to get full credit.

Math 8 students are into creating and solving multi-step word problems. They must attach the right unit of measurements as well. Our assignment today was to create four good problems and two bonus problems, in which they integrate math problems with other subjects, such as history (cross- curricular problems).

In Religion, we are done hosting three consecutive Liturgies. Many thanks to the participants, and especially to Mrs. Betzold for always being our pianist. Thanks to Mr. Bell for playing a zippy version of one of our songs for us too! We are blessed to have such talent in our school!
During our religion time, we also have taken time to discuss the problems associated with harassment as well as unchristian behavior in cliques and gangs. Kids have been reminded that if they are excluding people or spending their time with their friends making fun of other people, they are probably in a "clique." We spent some time brainstorming examples of positive group involvement and behavior (sports teams, girl or boy scouts, student council, band, choir, etc.) versus negative group (gangs and cliques) behavior. We decided as a group that we want to spend our time encouraging and achieving goals set instead of tearing people down. Thanks be to God! Please be the reminder, parents, if you hear of your student participating in a negative (bashing somebody) conversation or action. With your help, we can make these students' energy and focus be positive!

Many thanks for your help,
Mrs. Marita

What a great week!

2008-09-19T16:09:00.006-06:00

Dear Parents,

Thank you so much for taking the time to sign your student's assignment notebooks.
On Thursday morning, I had a signature from every parent! I am thankful for that.

In Science, 7th graders are drawing critters that they will name (Scientifically) and make a dichotomous key of. Students made a dichot key of their class today. It will take awhile for some to "get it." We'll do more examples next week. This key goes along with the idea of using scientific classification (Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus, species) categories you (parents) may have learned about in school.

In Science 6/8, students are learning about rates, speed, and making measurements of distance and time to calculate and average speeds. They will be graphing constant speeds versus a deceleration and acceleration, and knowing what those graphs look like.

In Math 8, we have been solving word problems by constructing equations out of the information. The 8th graders are getting better at weeding out unnecessary information within the problems, and using key words to understand which operation to use.

In Math 7, students have had quite a bit of experience so far with knowing our place values, and writing out big values in expanded and word form. Ex: 5, 621.03= 5,000+600+20+1+.03
or five thousand, six hundred, twenty-one and three one-hundredths.
The kids have also had to identify which place value the underlined/bold digit was in. (ex: 20,398.65 -- the five is in the hundredth place.) Multiplication and Subtraction/Addition of decimal practice is also being practiced right now. They need to remember that adding/subtracting requires lining up decimals, but not when they multiply. Negative signs are a factor in these practice problems right now too-odd number of negative signs equals negative when multiplying/dividing....even number of negative signs equal positive! It's hard for some to keep all these rules straight!

In Art, the kids have made mosaics and leaf rubbings that are very lovely! Come up to the room and see your student's work when you get a chance! I have a student who is wonderful at designing his own art projects....he has made a couple of stringed puppets so far! Very impressive! I also have a master cartoonist....his cartoons make me laugh! Can you tell me who these two kids are?

In Religion, students were introduced more to the Heifer International Organization.
Please check out their website--www.Heifer.org ! Students are becoming aware of how much they have and how little other countries have. Please help encourage them to give their time and talents to people in our community with little.

Many thanks,
Mrs. Marita

Heaven on Earth at Little Girl's Point, MI

2008-09-18T15:34:00.005-06:00

Thanks be to God, parent volunteers, and good weather for this AWESOME experience!
At Our Lady of the Lake Catholic School, we have the opportunities for growth and adventure!

Another good week!

2008-09-12T09:21:00.005-06:00

Dear Parents and students,

Please remember to come to the Jr. High open house on Monday, at 6:30!
There will be treats, visiting, touring of the building changes, and time for you to ask something you've be "itching" to know!

This week has been a good one. I really feel positive about the learning that is occurring. I'm proud of the leaders in our room, and also proud of the more quiet ones, when they step out of their comfort zone and volunteer thoughts as well as ask for help!

In Religion, we've been doing activities/discussing the importance of living out the Gospels in our daily lives. I have shared a lot of my personal experiences with them, hoping to open their hearts and minds towards differences in people. I hope to encourage them to share their experiences and to start thinking outside of themselves. I think that we have an opportunity to develop some of the most compassionate and service orientated teens in the country, right here at OLL.
Ask your student about reaching "out of the boat" to help someone. We all want to feel secure and not put ourselves in danger of embarrassment/scrutiny.....but Jesus is asking us to reach out of our comfort zone. He will save us when the "waves" get big!

In Math, 7th graders are working with decimals and place values. Today they wrote out the words for numbers such as 78.076 (seventy-eight and seventy-six thousandths). We reviewed place values. We are also learning to round/estimate digits to these different place values.

In Math 8, they are working with algebraic expressions on both sides of the equal sign (3a * 6= 6a - 3) solving the equation for the letter value.
I have to say that they are doing very well at it. Especially Vince--he even honestly thinks that it's fun! That-a-boy, Vince!

In Science 7 & 8, we are learning about the 5 Kingdoms of Living things and the requirements to be considered a living thing. Students are making cardstock dice to play a game where they will roll both dice, one with kingdoms, one with requirements, and they will have to go find out, for example, how an animal maintains homeostatis. Or, if one dice says fungus and the other says reproduction, they have to find out how fungus reproduce! When all dice are finished, our class will play the game and they can use text books/encyclopedias to find the answers.

Science 6 & 8 are learning about speed, momentum and frames of reference. I'm very proud of the 6th graders for presenting their demonstrations of frames of reference. They brought props to demonstrate the concept and excelled at this task! What a fun, smart group!

Yellow Honor Slips have been issued for inappropriate language, dress, and mostly the lack of having assignment notebooks here and signed by parents. Please encourage organizational skills/preparation at home.

Thanks for checking up on your student!
Mrs. Marita

Thank God for kids to make life so worth while!

2008-09-11T21:17:00.002-06:00

Father Henry showing us the history of the Sacred Heart Franciscan Province

2008-09-09T19:14:00.001-06:00

Father Henry Teaching Jr. High about Franciscan Jubilee

2008-09-09T19:11:00.000-06:00

Jr. High Band Lessons--Required for all band students

2008-09-09T13:34:00.002-06:00

Band Lesson Schedule:
During Recess (11:30)

Monday- Drums
Tuesday- Clarinet/Flute
Wednesday-Saxophone
Thursday-Trombone
Friday- Trumpet

Thank You

2008-09-08T19:58:00.003-06:00

Dear parents and students,

Thank you for the good start so far. Students are working hard already, and learning to "get organized!" Thanks for taking the time to sign assignment notebooks--but please remember to talk to your student and ask questions about their day too. Some of the students need to take more time to write better details in their notebook, so we can make this school/home connection more beneficial.

Thanks much to the drivers/chaperones that volunteered to join us for Big Top last Thursday. I love the Big Top band. I wish that more students could appreciate how hard it is to be THAT GOOD at playing an instrument! That reminds me-- band students have mandatory lessons (sectionals according to what instrument they play) during recess. Today was the drum section, tomorrow it might be trumpets/trombones...I can't remember right now. The lessons started this week. I will post that weekly lesson schedule tomorrow on this site.

We have an open junior high night coming up on Monday the 15th. To start it off, we are inviting parents to come tour the junior high, led by one of our "building face lift" team members.
I believe that the open house will last about an hour, from 6:30 to 7:30. We will have desserts & coffee, as well as discussing some of our learning goals and service activities for the junior high this year. This event will be an informal way for all junior high parents and teachers to get to know each other and an open forum to ask questions. This will not be "conference orientated." We will not be discussing the academic/social success of each student with parents at this time. We want to keep this get together informational but fun.

Please DO call me if you have questions about the assignment notebook or any expectations/yellow slips. I would love to help clear up misunderstandings if there are any.

Nancy Marita

Good First Day

2008-09-02T17:32:00.007-06:00

Dear Parents and Students,
Thank you for making today a good day. Thank you for sending your children with all their supplies, parents! I appreciate the kleenex and copy paper BIG TIME! Thank you for getting your kids off to school this morning-they came in using good manners and had cheery greetings for the teachers in the junior high. Many thanks for all you do.

Please check the assignment notebook and sign it. Please make a habit of doing it EVERY school night. This is a life long skill of organization we are trying to build. Thanks for the time you are allowing them to share their little stories/experiences each day with you.

Students should have brought home: Parent letter/expectations from Mrs. Marita and Mrs. Ellis (I don't know about Ms. Shields--I didn't get a chance to find out.) Please read the letters. Mrs. Ellis has a place on hers to sign and return. As for my letter, I'd like you to keep the letter for future reference, then sign their assignment notebook tonight to let me know you have read it.

Students should have also brought home a permission slip for Big Top Chatauqua.
Once you write down the medical info on this first one, we'll keep it for the following trips. Sorry about having to rewrite that info in the past. We leave on Thursday around 9:00. I think that Mrs. Klemek, Mr. Pufall, and Mrs. Grubisic will be driving for sure for the 7th grade. I also plan on driving. Students need a sack lunch, please.

There are also some packets of information from the office that were sent out today. Please ask your student for it. Also, expect a magazine on connecting with your children and incorporating their (Catholic) religion into daily lives/routines.

Please let me know if you have questions that arise.

Thanks for everything!
Mrs. Marita

Enjoy your last week of summer! Assignment notebooks please!

2008-08-25T20:42:00.006-06:00

Hi all! I'm looking forward to seeing all of my OLL students a week from tomorrow.

I wanted to ask you to please make sure you have a little notebook to use for a planner/homework assignment tracker. I don't remember if the school supply list had one on it.
Mr. Bell, our new principal, has suggested that EVERY STUDENT have an assignment notebook that will be signed by teacher and parents each day. This is so we can communicate our (teacher and parent) expectations/information and teachers can provide you with some insight on the learning that is occurring each day.

I will be checking student's notebooks right away each morning to see if parents have read them and signed. The last 15 minutes of school each day, I will check to see if students have written all assignments down--even if they have finished them!
This process will help you to have things to talk about with your student, when you ask how their day went and they just say "fine"--or tell you that they did absolutely nothing in school. It will also help you to see how productive your student is in class, by the amount of homework they are taking home each night.
I will communicate successes and concerns in this notebook--praises and weaknesses too.

Please do your best to take the time to read your student's assignment notebook, and sign it.
Make a routine of sitting down together after supper and discussing the day's events. Tell them about your day too! These kids really need your attention to communicate their fears, frustrations and progress!

Many thanks!
Mrs. Marita

Practice Math during August!

2008-08-06T07:44:00.002-06:00

Dear OLL jr. high parents,

Please use the following sites to help refresh your student's skills! Since most of the students enjoy being on the computer anyway, 10-20 minutes a day on an educational website will help get minds ready for September! (And these sites are fun too!)

Math websites for summer practice

www.Aplusmath.com/games

www.cte.jhu.edu/techacademy/web/2000/heal/mathsites.html

www.doe.virginia.gov/Div/winchester/jhhs/math/puzzles

www.edweb.tusd.k12.az.us/ekowalccz/math/index.html

www.math.com/school/subject1/lessons/

www.mathathon.com

www.edhelper.com

Congratulations!

2008-06-07T08:32:00.002-06:00

We did it, parents and students! We made it through quite a year!
I'm SO thankful for all of the parental guidance and communication between parent-teacher-student!

6th and 7th grade parents and students:
Thank you for all the wonderful help you gave for the 8th grade graduation! I had the chance to enjoy the dinner and participate in the presentation afterwards because of your hard work and generosity! Many many thanks for your hours of service that night!

Thank you also for the lovely gifts and cards that you have given me over the whole school year.
You keep me motivated with your signs of appreciation!

Have a fun, blessed and safe summer! E-mail me when you get time to chat! I'd love to hear how your summer is going!

Love and gratitude,
Mrs. Marita

Bring back your books, kids!

2008-06-02T16:04:00.003-06:00

Thank you Mrs. Thannum, Mr. Grubisic, Mr. Hart, and Mrs. Skingel for driving to Hayward today! We had fun with mini-golf and gokarts! We also had fun shopping around and eating lunch out at McDonalds or Subway. Thanks to the parents who provided their kids with money. I sure hope your kid says thank you and does some chores for you without complaining!

Students: bring back text books and library books!

I am having students go through books tomorrow and remove marks from them. Lockers and desks will be emptied out and washed down too. We'll be in cleaning mode tomorrow. Mr. Mattes said that he will have someone he works with (GLIFWIC) bring in some lamprey for us to look at, learn about and dissect tomorrow afternoon. GROSS AND COOL!

Wednesday afternoon I will have a group of kids help set up tables for graduation dinner. (Be upstairs in church at 5:45 p.m.) I have some other projects for the kids to work on to get ready for the summer over the next few days.

Thursday we can go bring our fishing poles down to the fishing dock by Kreher park. Again, no swimming/wading in the water. I told a few kids that wanted to bring in some video games that they could only for Thursday afternoon. That is only if it is okay with their parents too.

We can swap year books to sign and play video games/play on the computer for awhile on Thursday afternoon. Kids can bring treats if they would like.

Friday morning we have church at 9:00 and a reception for Brother Tom and Mr. Eaton as well right afterwards. Please join us. Kids may leave with parents right after the reception.

Lunch is being offered at 11:30 and buses will be picking kids up at noon.

Have a great last week!
Mrs. M

Hayward

2008-06-01T19:36:00.004-06:00

Hi! We'll leave around 9:00 a.m. tomorrow. Mrs. Thannum, Mr. Grubisic,

Mr. Hart and I will be driving. I have also had an offer by two more parents to drive if we need them. We'll see how many students show up tomorrow! Kids will need money for goKarts and/or mini golfing and money for lunch. After the gokarts/mini golf we can go into town and eat, then tour the down town shops. Trembley's candy shop is always a hit with the kids! We'll be back by 3:00 p.m.

Wednesday for graduation Mass I expect kids to show up at church by quarter to six. All should be nicely dressed. Khaki pants and dress shirts for boys/dresses or skirts for girls. No clothes with holes, please. Parents who are willing to help out for the dinner can head downstairs during the Mass to find out what needs to be done yet for the dinner -around 7:00 p.m.

I'd like the students to stay to help clean up as well. It will make things go much faster and more pleasantly if we all work together!

Report cards will go out after the Friday Mass. We're having a reception for Mr. Eaton and Brother Tom, so if you can come join us, we'd love you to be there.

Thanks for checking here as often as you do.

Mrs. M

Thank You!

2008-05-29T16:42:00.004-06:00

Dear Parents,
Thank you for the hamburgers, hotdogs, buns, chips, pop, and treats that you provided for our picnic today! It was a good day down by the lake.

I have two drivers for Hayward besides myself so far-Mrs. Thannum and Mrs. Grubisic said that they would drive. If I can drive the school van, we won't need another driver. If not, I'll need to have one more volunteer. I'll find out for sure tomorrow with Sara.
I need all the permission slips all in by tomorrow since we are leaving early on Monday.
Please check with your son or daughter if you haven't signed one yet. The kids can bring the money with them. Thank you!

Ms. Lisa Jablonski came over today to talk about her summer reading program at the Vaughn Library. She played a Jeopardy game with our jr. high students, and each kid got a candy prize for playing. The kids also received a pamphlet on all the summer events and opportunities to win prizes just for reading! Lisa rocks! She has come up with some AWESOME projects/activities to make this summer one of the best! Please don't miss out! Ask to see your child's hand-out or stop by the library to check out the poster info!
Thanks, Lisa!!

Join in when opportunities present themselves!
Mrs. M

Picnic but no swimming

2008-05-28T16:11:00.003-06:00

Would it be possible for the 6th graders to bring an item for lunch tomorrow??
I'd like to have our class go to Kreher Park for a picnic since the 7/8 grade class will be gone to the Friar's cabin for the day.
It will be a REALLY long day for me with the 6th grade class if we can't do something different!

No gym tomorrow because Brother Tom will be out at the cabin. No computer classes or gym next week either. Basically we'll only have one more computer class on Friday, and then there will be no more classes with Brother Tom.

Ms. Karen Eaton wants to meet with her regular class tomorrow at 10:00 and then we can go to the park afterwards.

No swimming at the park. We have been told that none of us can go in the water. Sorry. Don't bother bringing towels, other beach items--I don't want any of you near the water.

Call or write with concerns.

Thanks,
Mrs. M

Memorial Day Gratitude

2008-05-26T09:57:00.003-06:00

Wishing you a peaceful and grateful Memorial Day.
Thank you, to all of you who have been in the armed forces to protect our freedom.
I wish I could convey to my jr. high students how blessed we are to be living in the United States of America. I pray that this understanding and gratitude comes with age.
Thanks be to God for our friends and relatives who have paid for our freedom with their lives.

Speaking of living in the land of the free.....I sent out a permission slip for our 6th grade FUN trip to Hayward on Monday, June 2nd. We will leave by 9:00 am and return for the buses at 3:00 pm. Students should bring at least $5.00 for the mini golf/goKarts and $money$ for lunch. We will all be together at the Amusement park, but then will split up for lunch. It is up to the chaperone where their group eats lunch. And as for chaperones, are there any parents available for the trip? If you are interested (or willing, I should say) please give me a call or e-mail.
Many thanks for considering helping us!

If there are any text books at home--I know that I have given out sets to parents/students to keep at home--please return them to the school. The books are expensive and we need them back.

Please keep in touch with questions/concerns. Don't forget about helping for 8th grade graduation. June 4th at 5:45 pm (student choir) and help afterward for serving the meal.

Mrs. Marita