6th Grade News: 12/17/21

Humanities: 

As you know, sixth graders proudly presented several humanities projects around the theme of Heroism at our Heroes Convention on Tuesday. Thank you for attending to join us in celebration of their hard work, and thank you for supporting your children at home in the weeks beforehand as they read their chosen biographies, wrote responses, and created engaging posters. After the event, I congratulated the students on managing their time as they prepared a few different long-term projects, and we discussed how learning to plan out and execute multi-step projects like these will help them succeed in middle school, high school, and beyond. Aside from these student skills, the 6th graders learned valuable lessons from the people in their biography books and from our discussions about heroism. Moving forward, I’m hopeful that they’ll feel inspired to act as heroes — even in small ways — in their daily lives, and create positive change in their communities.

See photos from the Heroes Convention here:

Our conversations about heroism have continued this week as students write five-paragraph literary essays in response to The Odyssey. They are learning to incorporate textual evidence (specific events and quotes from the book) to argue whether or not Odysseus or Penelope are heroes. I’ve been impressed with their ability to find creative evidence to support their claims, and I look forward to reading their first drafts in full.

In Social Studies, we are wrapping up our study of ancient Greece with a multi-day role-playing activity: The Peloponnesian Summit. We have “gone back in time” in our classroom to the year 415 BCE, when Athens and Sparta are in the midst of fighting against each other in the Peloponnesian War. The 6th graders are acting as ancient Greek representatives from both city-states who have come together for a peace conference. During the first part of the conference, students are presenting research they did on different aspects of Athens and Sparta, including their education systems, military, government, and social structures. Next, we will hold an organized discussion as we imagine and create a new, peaceful city-state together, inspired by policies and systems from both places. The students have taken their role-playing parts seriously, and they’re excited to debate how we should run our made-up city-state. Ask your child about their pretend Greek name, whether they are “Spartan” or “Athenian,” and what topic they researched. Read more about the Peloponnesian Summit here.

Shabbat shalom,

Naomi

Math: 

The 6th grade has been focusing on positive and negative numbers. We have been talking about absolute value and that distance cannot be negative. We are taking what we learned about positive and negative numbers and applying it to the coordinate place – following directions and solving riddles. Coming up after break will be a short chapter on ratios and rates that will be project based. Some examples of what students can look forward to are: buying a car, planning a vacation,  and creating/changing recipes. 

Judaics: 

We had a great time diving into rabbinic text for Hanukkah. We explored a mishnah that went into laws of damages. It wasn’t specifically about Hanukkah, but it mentioned that if the damage was caused by a menorah then the ruling would be different. This led into our studies of where the menorah should be placed and why. We discovered that the Rabbis really wanted to set up a time where Jews didn’t have any barriers from sharing their pride and could focus on celebrating miracles in their lives. We took on roles in a few mock court cases to see how modern situations would be handled by the rabbis. Students really did a great job seeing the intentions of the rules and sharing how it makes them feel to be in a society where we can safely and proudly display our menorahs.

We are now back into our Chumash text. We are still studying from Shemot, chapter 1. Right now Pharaoh is trying to place even harsher rulings on the Israelites. We meet the Hebrew midwives, Moshe and his family and Pharaoh’s daughter in this part of our text. We will be continuing Naomi’s unit about heros as we begin to focus on these classic and hidden heros and heroines in the Torah. I look forward to sharing their learning and projects with you soon!

We will begin learning about tefillin and chanting trope after break!

Shabbat Shalom,

Laura

Hebrew with Yuliya

We continue to learn about the special school in Israel. 6th graders read and listened to articles and conversation about the differences and common things in these schools and described our school. Then they wrote their conversations with the principles of science, art, sport and jewish school and presented it to their classmates. This month in Hebrew class was in the spirit of Hanukkah. As most of you know, Hanukkah is the Jewish holiday of miracle, heroism and belief. Then we learned the story of Hanukkah and the necessary vocabulary to describe it. Students played games, they competed with their peers about the traditions of this holiday and history. They even wrote songs about Hanukkah! While they played they studied new words, grammar and how to use  verbs correctly according to the time. Our new topic is Negev. Negev is an Israeli desert. We are going on a journey to Israel, learning about the places next to Negev, about the bedouins who live there and their traditions. Students mastered their knowledge of how to conjugate verbs belonging to the 5main groups of the verb in the present tense, and use several common verbs from each of the groups in speech and writing. We practiced how to correctly use  infinitive verbs in Hebrew and expressions with them. This is a miracle to see my students are growing up in Hebrew and be part of this.

שבת שלום! חופשה נעימה!

יוליה

Hebrew Heritage:

להורים שלום,

לאחר עבודה משוקעת התלמידים סיימו בהצלחה את הפרויקט ״המדריך למטייל״, שכלל חיפוש והקלדה במחשב בעברית. התלמידים הציגו את עבודותיהם בפני חבריהם לכיתה והסבירו מדוע בחרו ביעד הזה (אולי, רעיון לטיול הבא שלכם).בסוף היחידה התקיימה בחינה שכללה טקסט, הבנת הנקרא ושימוש נכון בפעלים ובמילים מתוך היחידה.

השבוע התחלנו לעבוד על מקבץ קצר של סיפורים העוסק ברגשות שלנו כלפי האחר וכיצד אנחנו מתמודדים איתם.

מאחלת לכם חופשה נעימה,

אילנה

Science

Students during the last month discovered how genetic and DNA works by the passing down of traits. Students were given the opportunity to create their own DNA necklaces using cheek cells. They conducted an experiment that allowed them to extract DNA from their own cells in order to visually see the DNA. We later conducted a “Genetic with a Smile” activity that allowed students to create unique smiley faces using 12 genetic traits. Students flip a coin to discover which traits would be recessive or dominant. This allowed the entire grade to create a community of genetic faces. We continued the unit of genetics using simulation software to figure out the traits of mouse fur as they breed hundreds of mice. This allowed students to figure the combination of parents that can produce the different color fur offspring. As we wrap up this DNA and the genetic unit we cannot wait to start exploring the human body system next semester.  

Mike Noll