Mrs. Ahearn

and

Mrs. Berry

are our Social Studies Teachers

6th graders wrapped up their study of India, and traveled east to learn about ancient China. Students learned about China's varied physical features and how that topography shaped its cultural variety. 6th graders learned about the early dynasties, and experienced a memorable lesson, "The Three Chinese Philosophies." 

Our new unit will focus on Ancient Greece, which is an all-time favorite.

7th Grade - The China unit will conclude with a visit from Marco Polo, viewing the Kellogg China trunk items, and a Chinese food festival. The next unit of study is Japan. Students will study the influence of neighboring cultures on the development of Feudal Japan, Japan's Golden Age, and Samurai culture. 

8th Grade - Westward Ho! This was the encouraging advice given to countless pioneers in the 19th century, and many heeded that call. What was happening within the borders of the United States as the country was growing from sea to shining sea? That is the question that eighth-graders will answer as they look within the borders of the United States during the 19th century. Topics include: An Era of Reform, The North and South, and Life for African Americans during this time period.

BAND

March 15th the Middle School Band students will be competing in the Indiana State Music Association Band Contest at Elkhart High School. Here bands are required to play three varying selections of music: a march, an overture, and a lyrical piece. Three judges comment on the bands' ways to improve as an ensemble. They will also award us a gold, silver, or bronze rating. Hours of hard work have gone into preparing the music for this formal performance. When participating in such an event our goal is musical growth as a band and advancement in balance, blend, and technique.

ISSMA Band Contest

March 15, 2024

Intermediate Band 5:30 p.m.

Advanced Band 7:05 p.m.

Penn High School

MUSIC

6th Grade music classes will soon begin working on their next composition. We have been working hard on reading rhythms notation in 6/8 time fluidly and improvising rhythms using the rhythms we have learned. Students are exploring melodies and rhythms in 6/8 time on xylophones, drums and small percussion instruments.

7th Grade music classes are building their listening skills by learning melodies on instruments by rote while continuing their rhythm composition and improvisation skills. They are exploring the differences in musical form through listening and performing.

8th Grade music classes are reading and performing simple melodies and harmonies from standard notation. They have moved from singing melodies to playing melodies on xylophones. Students are also exploring musical styles, instruments and composers from the Medieval and Renaissance Eras. 

In March, Eighth grade students will complete a Holocaust Literature Circle Unit. Each student chose a book from seven options and will work with groups of three-four students to discuss the novel. Students are expected to complete the novels and the literature packets before spring break. Students will also explore the historical context of the Holocaust, why it is still important to study, and what we can learn from the Holocaust. My hope is that by reading these novels and learning about the Holocaust, students will be able to be better prepared to experience the National Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington D.C.

Seventh grade just wrapped up a short grammar unit that focused on parts of speech. There will be an opportunity for students who did not perform well on the first test to retake the test. All retakes must be completed before spring break. I will accept the better of the two scores. Below are some links to grammar games to help student's practice their parts of speech skills:

Grammar Gorillas

Chomp Chomp Grammar 

We will also be reading The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton this month. There will be a reading assignment every night and questions will need to be answered in Actively Learn. Look for a movie permission slip form in the next few weeks. The seventh graders will have an “dress like a soc or greaser” day and watch the movie when we return from spring break. Please complete this form giving your student permission to watch the movie. (It is rated PG13.)

Sixth grade readers are currently captivated by Alan Gratz's novel, Refugee, and are learning so much about three significant 20th century events-through the experiences of three narrators. 

In writing class, students are wrapping up the writing of their descriptive essays.

This week the Sixth graders had a tower building contest in class. Then we read the Tower of Babel together and discussed the reading closely and what we can learn from it. We started reading the story of Abraham. We focus on three parts of Abraham's life: his call by God and his journey to a new land, the three visitors and Rublev's Holy Trinity Icon, and the sacrifice of Isaac. As with all our discussions it will center on how we read these stories through the lens of Christianity.



Monday, March 18th we will take our field trip to Hope Ministries. 

Seventh graders have finished their study of Theology of the Body and are now focused on Prayer. We began our studies with a question: Has God spoken to humanity or not?

As Christians, we believe that he has spoken to us through his Word made flesh – Christ. Christ is the form of the formless, the discourse of the sublime - God’s expression of love for humanity. He is God’s proclamation which causes us to stop… gaze…listen… and ponder. Christ is the one obsession that we are in search of, not “possession” in order to obtain, but rather, the obsession that requires a surrender of sort – surrender our time and attention to God. Christian prayer and contemplation is the proper response to Jesus Christ. After all, if God has spoken to us, shouldn’t we stop everything and listen (in silence) … and then give a response like “thank you,” “you are awesome,” “I love you.” We are learning and practicing doing that. Ask you seventh grader to lead your family in prayer.

Eighth graders are fully engaged in their Confirmation preparation. They have studies various saints and have selected their Confirmation saint. Their selected saint is now praying for your son or daughter… Many of us are praying for your son or daughter. Include your eighth grader’s Confirmation saint in your family prayer.

We do not receive “something” from a sacrament, we receive someone - the mystery is Christ. The Sacrament of Confirmation will give your son or daughter God’s Holy Spirit, the third person of the Trinity - God. He is the breath of the Father. Through his breath and word - the cause of all creation. He prepared the way for the Messiah, revealed Christ to those who follow him, and the gift of Christ after his Resurrection and Ascension. It is by way of the Holy Spirit, that we are able to love as God loves and live a life of love aligned with God’s holy will.

All Service Opportunities can be found HERE 

Happy Pi Day! The 14th of March comes at a perfect time for the 6th grade Prealgebra students, who are in the middle of their Geometry unit. The students measured the circumference of different objects (including their circular snacks) and divided by the objects’ diameters. Lo and behold….3.14159… We will finish this unit and then begin our review for the ILearn exam in April.

6th Grade Course 1: The 6th graders are in the middle of their study of geometry. We have been working with two dimensions focusing on area and perimeter. Next up, we will look at 3D shapes and measuring volume and surface area. 

The 7th grade Course 3 students have also been studying geometry but focusing more on surface area and volume of shapes and composite shapes. They have been drawing nets and solving real-life problems involving these concepts.

What do cannon balls, skateboarding down a half-pipe, a basketball shot, and a football field goal have in common with one another?? They all follow the shape of a parabola. The 7th and 8th grade Algebra students have finished their unit on factoring and are now working on graphing, analyzing, and describing graphs of quadratic relationships.

Why do you rarely find mathematicians spending time at the beach? Because they have sine and cosine to get a tan and don’t need the sun!  And….now our 8th grade Geometry students can understand this joke! We have been solving for angles and sides of right triangles using trigonometric functions. We even went outside to find the heights of objects using clinometers.  

8th Grade Course 3: The 8th graders finished up their unit on linear functions, most recently graphing lines of best fit onto a scatter plot. Up next, we will look at square and cube roots along with the Pythagorean Theorem. 

Eighth graders finished the unit on reflexive verbs and presented their Mi Rutina Diaria (My Daily Routine) posters to each other in class. We began Unit 23, El Camino de Santiago. We continue to incorporate some pop-up grammar lessons in preparation for Spanish 1 placement tests. This week we took some time to enjoy the nice weather by playing Spanish games outside.

Seventh grade is reading the novel, Brandon Brown Dice la Verdad. Students are exposed to several high frequency verbs in the present and past tense as well as recycled vocabulary. I’m impressed with how well the follow-up discussion activities are going and how much Spanish the students can produce!

Sixth grade is working on Unit 4, La Universidad. We are exploring the topics of professions and classes one would need for that profession. Our classes are filled with stories and games. We read biographies of teachers from Spanish-speaking countries and played “Running Dictation”, a favorite story retelling game.

Our 6th graders have been hard at work on their next project, titled ... One Animal, 4 Views. The students were able to pick an animal they would like to draw. Then, we cropped and enlarged and decided on the features that would be the most interesting to draw. They received 4 white 4 inch x 4 inch papers to draw their animal features on. Before they were able to start on good paper, we sketched in our sketchbooks and also did a tutorial on using colored pencils the right way. They also learned some new techniques that should really help them in bringing their animals to life! Ask your kiddo to demonstrate a circular motion and maybe even what flickering and cross hatching is when it involves colored pencils!

Our 7th graders are just about done with their Koi Fish project and moving on to their art show pieces. This year, the theme of the art show is BIG yummy candy, snacks, and dreamy desserts!

The students will be able to choose their favorite candy bar, snack, or drink and replicate it, but making it quite a bit larger! They will use paint, stuffing, newspaper, etc to complete the bigger version of their favorite snack! I can’t wait to see these amazing yummy foods somewhere in the art show. Did someone say, scavenger hunt?? Stay tuned and join us on May 22nd for the art show!

The 8th graders have started their shoe drawing using the techniques they learned during our 8 Elements of Art unit. Our next project will be paper mache donuts to be part of the food theme in our art show this spring. 

As part of the 8th grade "Showcase" we will mount the students' artwork on panels. I am in search of parent volunteers who are interested in helping with this project. Please email tschmitt@stpius.net if you would like to help.

6th: This unit focuses on the role of light and sound waves in communication technology. Together we will be trying to work out how someone on the other side of the world can see and hear us. One context students will explore is how natural disasters, such as the volcanic eruption in Tonga in 2022, can cause disruptions to our phone and internet connections. You can read more about it here.

Students will learn about sound, color, light, and the electromagnetic spectrum. Throughout the unit, students will develop a model to demonstrate their understanding of the role of light and sound waves in global telecommunication.

I encourage you to discuss waves at home. Some questions you might ask are:

-How can we see and hear family and friends when video calling them?

-How does an image get captured on a device when you take a photo?

-Do sound and light travel from one place to another in the same way?

-What's the difference between analog and digital information?

7th: The last several body systems we are covering this year are the respiratory, excretory, and (my favorite) the nervous system. During the respiratory system, students built a model of a lung and then we measured our lung capacity. After the excretory system, we will dissect the perch. 

I encourage you to discuss this topic at home with your child. Here are some ways to connect the learning at school to home: 

- Get active! Discuss which body systems are most active when you exercise. 

- Take turns blowing up a balloon to see who has the largest lung capacity. 

- Cook a healthy meal together. 

8th: We wrapped up our last chemistry unit of the year with acids and bases. 8th grade began our Genetics and Heredity unit by identifying their traits and then going on a heredity hunt to figure out who their trait twin is. The driving question for this unit is “How can genes increase the risk of cancer?” We will explore how cells divide so that we can grow, repair, and reproduce. Our major assessment task will involve designing a poster to raise public awareness about a type of cancer. 

I encourage you to discuss this genetics topic at home. Here are some ways to connect the learning at school to home: 

- Compare who in your family has inherited these genetic traits. 

- Map your family tree together. Do you see any patterns of the different inherited characteristics? 

 Looking forward to unraveling the mysteries of DNA together!

6th Grade students are learning basic tennis terms, scoring, and skills for their Tennis Unit. Each class will spend 20 minutes playing modified gameplay

7th Grade students are applying their knowledge of pickleball rules and concepts into gameplay. Each class will end the unit with a doubles double-elimination tournament.

8th Grade students are practicing the skills of badminton and using gameplay to master their skills. Each class will end the unit with a doubles double-elimination tournament.

SPX student council members delivered collected donations to Saint Adalbert's in South Bend.

Winners of the 2nd Trimester Gospel Guide gift card drawing

Over the last two years, our middle school has integrated a Positive Behavior Plan aligned with our Gospel Values. Students earn signatures for demonstrating positive behaviors, such as tidying up a classroom, helping a classmate, engaging appropriately in class activities, and more. These signatures can be exchanged for items at the "Gospel Guide" store, where an impressive 6,000 signatures were redeemed during the first trimester! The store greatly appreciates any donations you can contribute. Click HERE to donate items and thank you for your support!

Please note the room change for the Spaghetti Dinner to the Multipurpose Room - enter through door 6.