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Welcome to our Summit Explorers
October 1, 2008
Dear Middle School Parents;
Each of you have received your student's mid-Trimester progress report. Please feel free to contact Mrs. Reynolds or any of our middle school staff if you would like to schedule a conference to discuss results.
We've four weeks remaining until end of the First Trimester and we're expecting a strong finish, further supported by one of our Summit benchmarks for instruction:
Integrated Learning strips away the isolation of individual subjects by covering similar topics through various approaches and methods. This only further encourages critical thinking skills as students learn to connect the conceptual dots of how everything relates as part of a bigger picture.
Our team works closely together to plan monthly lessons and activities that reinforce other subjects while accomplishing objectives at-hand. It's an on-going review for students; something that encourages a broad scope of sequence and fosters a community of learners as students and staff explore and grow side-by-side.
Getting Ready for Fall;
Your Middle School Teaching Team
In our spirit of fun and Integrated Learning, here's a brief preview of things planned for the month of October:
Gone With The Wind; Then and Now: Not only will this classic and other related titles wrap-up our Reading, Sharecropping and the Reconstruction legacy define our American Experience of the late 1800’s. The Guilded Age gave birth to business tycoons, after surviving the Panic of 1873. Continuing with our Stock Market “games”, students are more than aware of surviving the Panic of 2008 through discussions on our Spanish message boards as History repeats itself.
 Facts + Figures = Fiction The on-going 6+1 traits for effective Writing towards publishing pieces, and grammar equations for Spanish, aren’t the only formulas students will continue mastering. Geometry class will study proofs and deductive reasoning while PreAlgebra and Algebra will begin Excel workshops – all the better prepared for storing and measuring data as Science classes select projects and begin independent research for Science Fair.
Commanders-in-Chief – Getting past the great Indian tribes and chiefs in taming the West was a sideshow for presidents Andrew Johnson and Ulysses S. Grant while maiming the South. We’ll take a closer look at our Presidential elections, including the process and Electoral College, and apply principles to our own upcoming campaigns and elections for Student Senate.
 Aminal Quackers – Students will get to watch our very own dancing turkey, A.J. Reynolds, when going to see the production of Honk Jr. Social implications will receive further discussion from the 8th grade while reading Animal Farm. French class will be learning zoo animals and Spanish will be gearing-up to take more than just a bilingual walk on the Wild Side.
We're having a blast 'Inspiring the Joy of Learning' and our students seem to be having an even better time as one-sixth of the school year has already flown by!
The "large amount of Field Trips in so little time" ranks at top of the Favorites List, but here's some other things our Explorers had to said about the year so far...
"I like having our new block schedule because we get to mix with other classes." Sarah G. 7th grade
"My favorite things this year are science and math." Andrew W. 6th grade
"There hasn't been very much homework, but as the year goes on I think that will change." Matt J. 7th grade
"I enjoyed riding the train in Branson, because we got to experience history through the real world instead of just reading about it. I also had a lot of fun wandering through the Branson Landing afterwards. The fact that we were allowed to go without teacher supervision says that the students at The Summit can be trusted to act right where ever they are." Lydia S. 8th grade
"My highlight for this year so far is Spanish because I like learning new lanquage and it is exciting." Poojah P. 6th grade; new student
"My highlight of the year so far was coming to this school and having teachers that actually like me and want me to succeed." Nick D. 7th grade; new student
 OCTOBER EVENTS SCHEDULE
10/10 – Explorers Hayride; 7pm
10/14 – Honk Jr., Little Theatre; 10:30am
10/16 – Lady Eagles Volleyball – Home; 6pm
10/20-24 – Summit Scholastic Book Fair
10/21 – Student Senate Elections
Lady Eagles Volleyball – Away; 6pm
3rd Tuesday, Chili Cook-off; 6pm
* Explorers to help with clean-up
10/22 – Zoo Field Trip – en español
10/31 – End of Trimester; 1:30pm dismissal
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