This week in our middle school morning meeting, we focused on the topic of advocacy. We began by talking about self-advocacy, which I believe is especially important as students transition into their teen years and beyond. Learning to find their voice and stand up for themselves is a skill that will serve them well throughout life. We also revisited the Peace Wheel, a tool we use at The Cooper School to help students navigate and resolve conflicts with their peers.
Next, we shifted our focus to advocating for others and standing up for what they believe in. I continued the conversation later in the day, asking students to take three minutes to reflect on what they’re passionate about and the problems they see in the world that they’d like to help solve. Their ideas truly wowed me—everything from organizing a sports equipment drive to support under-resourced schools, to building a community Blessing Box that we could help maintain. I can’t wait to see these thoughtful projects come to life. Big shine on our middle schoolers!!
-RO
ELA- This week, 6th grade moved into our personal narrative writing unit. We explored the many ways one can brainstorm in the pre-writing process for true stories – from “mapping” memory-filled places to listing important people in one’s life who are attached to remarkable recollections. Authors test-wrote through many ideas and chose the most dramatic, vivid story to focus on for the remainder of the unit!
Next week, 6th graders will flesh out their chosen personal story with sensory details and careful structuring. They will take a vocab test on Thursday 9/25, which they began preparing for this week!
Science- In science this week, 6th grade explored density of fluids by completing a density challenge to layer different solutions. Students then connected density in water to density in our atmosphere by exploring a convection chamber. Next week we will build on our knowledge of weather by exploring the difference between climate and weather.
Social Studies- Sixth grade is working hard on the new aspects of Mesopotamia we are going over, which are the more complicated aspects of civilization (writing, math, laws etc.) This part of the unit allows students to dive into some deeper thinking while also using primary sources to see how advanced we have become from the basic learnings of that time. We will continue next week with the first laws of people and the introduction of religions to humanity.
Math- This week in math, sixth graders transferred their knowledge of ratios and ratio equivalency to unit price and unit speed – find the “price per one” or “_____ per _______” – a skill we know to be very helpful in the real world! They had a mid-unit assessment on Wednesday to check in before we keep chugging along!
Next week, we’ll explore part-part-whole ratios along with converting units to help us find equivalent ratios that are more easily comparable to others.
