Dear Parents and Supporters:
We wrap up the year on high notes noted below. Thanks so
much for all your support in 2014! I’m fortunate to work with such great
students, teachers, and families. Here’s a snapshot of what our AIG groups have
been up to. Happy Holidays!
Advanced Subject
Group in Reading
4: Fourth grade
completed our work with the Junior Great Books (JGB) introduction to shared
inquiry or seminar learning by kicking off a ‘book club.’ This group read Coraline by Neil Gaiman. We are still in
the process of wrapping up this work as we complete Letters about Literature –
a national contest sponsored by the Library of Congress. Students have begun
writing letters to the authors of books that changed their lives. We’ll wrap
those up in January as the deadline for entry is 1/14. Look out for permission
slips, if you’ve not already seen them.
5: Fifth grade
readers continued with fluency activities including a reader’s theatre about
Benjamin Franklin. We’ll wrap this up in the New Year - as well as the same letter writing contest
as fourth grade. Fifth are further along in the process. It has led to very interesting discussions about our
favorite books.
A list of books chosen by 4/5 ASGR students has been
included on the blog.
Advance Subject Group
in Math
Both fourth and fifth grade math groups have focused on
perseverance in attending challenging math work. To this end, both groups have
worked on a variety of math puzzles including
Magic Squares (where rows, columns, and diagonals have the same
sums)
Problems with Operations (incomplete equations where the
operations (+,-,/,x) must be added)
24 (manipulating random numbers to solve for a specified
sum)
In addition, fifth grade also worked with Gang of 15 – where
they had to track a mysterious organization all over the world – discovering
and converting international currencies all the while! Fifth grade is also
currently working with the Fibonacci sequence – one of the most famous
mathematical concepts.
Fourth grade wrapped up the year with an introduction to
expressions and equations which will inform our work with Hands On Equations
(more later but think algebra!) in January.
Comprehensive Study
Group
4: Fourth graders
reflected on multiple intelligences and what their prominent intelligence might
be. They then completed an online survey to determine which they may most
reflect. This work is based on research by Harvard’s Howard Gardner. Students
then integrated this knowledge into personal profile Google presentations which
we will record for inclusion on the blog. Only a couple are complete at this
point, so look forward to seeing more in the New Year!
5: Fifth grade CSG
students took part in a brief simulation where they ranked the value of items
to be used in a crash landing on the moon. Their individual and group responses
were compared to NASA’s ranking – which led to great conversations. Students
then wrote short stories about their journey. These are still in the works, and
we’re looking to publish in January!
Enrichment Study
Group
4: Our simulation
work with The Great Solar System Rescue continues. As of this, these students
have located and saved the first of four lost space probes. To do this, they
have had to understand a specific science through reading, process a ton of
information from video transmissions and more reading, and, most importantly,
share and work with each other to form consensus decisions. There are three
teams overall, so we’ll see how they rate at the end of our work in the New
Year!
5: These students
completed an interest inventory to help drive independent projects. Everyone is
engaged in this work which varies from computer and sports research to original
works of fiction. Although drafts are certainly in the process, we won’t be
sharing out until the spring.
Happy Holidays!!
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