Friday, January 23, 2015

Dynamic Dialogue 1/23/15

Good afternoon, Dynamic Team!

Upcoming Events:         Feb. 7th – Adult Trivia Night (see below)


Important Information:
   Hixson's Adult Trivia Night is coming up in February.  Click here for a link to all the details.  We are asking parents to contribute items for two baskets to be auctioned off per team.  Dynamic’s theme is “A Little Bit of Italy”.  Please send in items related to Italy.  Some examples would be pasta, pasta sauce, pizza pans, pizza cutters, salami, bread, music, olives, olive oil, or cookbooks.  Be as creative as you like.

Can't fill a table of 8? Click here to register and we'll try to get you connected with others to fill a table.


FYI: Many students are coming to school without fully charging their laptops the night before. Help with this would be appreciated.

English –


Susan Artkras – artkras.susan@wgmail.org

Math- Students have been learning about the 3-type of Percent problems (including solving word problems), and Percent of Increase/Decrease. Along with learning about percents, some geometry concepts (parallel/ perpendicular/skew lines) were included.  Students have been taking practice tests over these concepts and will take the unit assessments in about 2 weeks.


Wilma Slaughter – slaughter.wilma@wgmail.org

Science –
This week in Dynamic Science students have been working on Levels of Organization and Cells.  We have been watching a video, pausing the video and having class discussions, taking some notes, answering their questions, having brief class presentations/examples. Today as were reviewed Levels of Organization we drew a graphic organizer to help them see the pattern in the relationships between the levels. We also introduced the 6 characteristics of all organisms!

On Thursday this week the students began taking an online formative Quia quiz, www.quia.com/web, covering the levels of organization and cell function concepts. As a formative quiz they will take it about every 5 class periods. As a formative quiz it does not affect their semester grade. You should be seeing their scores improve as we go through the unit. Since the quiz covers all the major concepts of the unit some of their initial scores will be low. As they develop their understanding and make connections among the concepts their scores will improve. The formative quizzes help them see their progress and areas of which they need to focus and help me as well to see what concepts need more work. The students may take the quiz as many times as the like!

The learning goals, proficiency scale, and targets are listed below.

Goal 1:    Student will understand that living organisms are systems of interacting subsystems composed, on the most basic level, of cells.
4
Student demonstrates innovation, in depth inference(s), or advanced application(s) with the learning goal. In addition to level 3 the student will be able to:
  • predict the effect(s) on an organism if a specific cell does not function properly or does not exist.
3
Student will use both
  • cell theory
and
  • levels of organization
to show that an organism is living.
2
Student will use either
  • cell theory.
or
  • levels of organization
to show that an organism is living.
1
Student will recognize some components of
  • cell theory.
  • levels of organization.

Goal 2:  Student will develop and use a model to describe the function of a cell as a whole and ways parts of cells contribute to the function.
4
Student demonstrates innovation, in depth inference(s), or advanced application(s) with the learning goal. In addition to level 3 the student will be able to:
  • create an analogy between cell and non-cell.
3
Student will develop and use a model to
  • describe the function of a cell as a whole.
  • describe the function that each organelle contributes in the cell.  (cell wall, nucleus, chloroplast, mitochondria, cell membrane).  
2
Student will
  • distinguish the functions of the parts of the cell as they contribute to the function of the cell as a whole.
1
Student will
  • match parts of the cell with functions.
Targets
1.            I am able to describe how cells are the smallest unit of living organisms.
2.            I am able to describe each of the jobs of these organelles: cell membrane, cell wall, chloroplasts, chromosomes, cytoplasm, mitochondria, & nucleus.
3.            I am able to compare and contrast photosynthesis and cellular respiration.
4.            I am able to describe the levels of organization within complex organisms.
5.            I am able to compare and contrast plant cells and animal cells.
This semester you will see more assignments scores posted on the portal. “Summative assessment” scores are the only grades with are used to calculate the semester grade.
If you have any questions or comments please let me know.
Dynamic Systems Science – Coach Daniels

314-918-4603

Social Studies –

It’s project week here in the social studies room!  Students were given a choice menu on Tuesday.  They should have discussed their choice with you at some point this week and asked you to sign off on their paper.  They will have every day this week and Monday and Tuesday of next week in class to complete their projects.  You should also see some of the work coming home.  If you don’t see any Greek mythology related materials, you may want to ask them for an update.  The project is due on January 28th.

After school help is available in my room every Thursday until 4:00
 


Dynamic Social Studies Course Website:

Lisa Pettid – pettid.lisa@wgmail.org
314-918-4602

Please visit the following links for more information:




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