Ms. Brown has been working with us while Ms. Abbot has been on a temporary assignment in the office while Mr. Appel on leave.  A huge THANK YOU to Ms. Brown for jumping in and teaching us Math, French, PE and coaching Badminton!

Students have been active in:

• Beginning Band – regular classes and participted in a Beginning Band Day at Pitt River Middle with Mr. Balser
• Advanced Band – regular classes and attended Kiwanis Festival and earned Silver
• Choirs – regular practices and attended Kiwanis Festival and earned Gold
• Track and Field team – regular practices before school and at lunch and participated in the District Track Meet at City Centre
• Badminton – we’ve had grade 6 intramurals, grade 6/7 intramurals and grade 7 teams, students participated in the District Finals this week for Grade 7s
• Rugby – practices and tournaments continue and the season is close to wrapping for 2015
• Dueling Duos – a pared down reading competion this year for the novels: “The Crazy Man,” “The Garbage King,” “Island of the Blue Dolphins,” “The Zen and the Art of Faking it”;  Semi-finals went this week and finals will happen next week
• Chess Club – has been running on rainy days in the cafeteria
• Magic the Gathering – a dedicate group of gamers has expanded into the cafeteria and now several students from across the school play on a daily basis

We all had the opportunity to head over to Charles Best and watch “The Drowsy Chaperone.”  The show received “2 thumbs up!” from all who attended.

The incoming grade 5’s came to visit and had a tour of the school.  Many of us know incoming students and we look forward to working with them next year.

We participated in the Bear Aware session offered by the City of Coquitlam . There is a cub and sow living in Mundy Park. We learned to be respectful of the bears and ways to help project them.

We also participated in GEERing Up workshops.  The workshops were awesome and we loved the hands-on activities. Summer Camps are available and more information can be found here.

For the past two weeks HUB has been at Hillcrest. We have learned about road safety, bike maintenance and participated in a skill builder and neighbourhood ride.

After our Travel Smart assembly, we were geared up and ready for Walk n’ Roll. Last Wednesday morning students who walked, wheeled, carpooled or bused, received a cup of lemonade and had the chance to enter for some amazing prizes.

This week, the grade 6’s have kicked off our Model UN.  We are learning about the countries we are respresenting and starting to learn about energy sources.  Our Model UN is for the UNDP and the topic is “Sustainable Energy for ALL.”

We have also started our VEX IQ robotics unit in Math/Science.  We set up our kits and are working on building our first robots!

 

March was split with a two week Spring Break this year, so we’ve had a week on either side.  Ms. Abbot is helping Miss Tambellini in the office, while Mr. Appel is on leave.  We welcome back Ms. Brown to Yellow Team to cover some of Ms. Abbot’s and Mr. Appel’s teaching load.

1. The Grade 6/7’s continued to learn about the Earth’s crust and demonstrated their learning through a variety of edible and colourful means.

2. The grade 6’s finished up the unit on non-fiction text features and reading strategies by designing a textbook page on Rome or Greece, using the 6 Historical Thinking Concepts.

A&C_TrojanWar

Allison_GodsAndGoddessesOfGreece

Colby&Zach_Rome

Drew&Trey_textbook

E_T-textbook page

Eric&Ryan_Rome

GodsAndGoddessesOfGreece

Hannah_textbook

Katina&Kailey_textbook

Kazul_textbook

Keita_RomanInventions

MrMath_Rome

Rick&David_JuliusCaesar

Shubham_Greece

Yang_JuliusCaesar

Yoonha&Evan_RomanInventions

Yunmin_Greece

3. We finished off Table Tennis with a recreational and competitive tournament. And we have continued raquet sports and started badminton this week.  Students also had the chance to do sessions with iCycle through Cycling BC prior to Spring Break.

4. In Math 6, students have finished the unit on Fractions, Percent and Ratios.  Students are moving on to the next unit with Ms. Brown and have started a “Dinner Party” Math Project today.

5. Grade 6’s have continued to work on mastering verb conjugation and learned the verb rap this week.

6. Grade 7/8’s continue to work together in Humanities. Students are currently participating in the Fuedal Games.  The students were assigned a role/status within the Game and have been learning how the social hierachy influenced the events of history.  Students have also been working on their “iPorts” – autobiographies about their role and character in the Fuedal Games.

7. Grade 6’s have been learning about self-regulation this week and completed a survey about the types of activities that they need to help them regulate at school and at home.

8. Students have 4 weeks left in their current exploration class.  The grade 6/7’s are in Express Yourself and DraMus and the grade 8’s are in Tech Ed, Home Ec or Art.

9. Students brought home a permission form for our next field trip.  Parents please sign and return as soon as possible.

10.  Have a great and safe weekend!

 

 

Groundhog Day gave us hope that Spring is coming and we have enjoyed the mild weather over the past two weeks – outside for DPA, walks to the pool and ice rink, and lots of foursquare at nut break and lunch.

1. Ms. Trieu and Div 9 joined the grade 6’s for PE/DPA this week and learned a new game, Skittles.  It was a highly competitive game.  We are looking forward to next week and either a new game or a re-match.

2. The grade 6’s joined Green Team for an Activity Afternoon and walked to the Poirier Ice Rink for an afternoon of skating.  Over the last 4 weeks, students not participating in the Ski and Snowboard Club have had the opportunity to swim, to skate and to bowl.  We’ve had an amazing time!  “I liked being able to go
swimming and skating with my friends,” Alex said.  “Swimming was great because I was swimming with my friends and diving board was open.  Plus I got to talk with
my friends as we walked to the pool,” Yoonha said.  “Skating was fun because it is easy for me. I got to see a lot of my friends from Green team and that was
good,” said Ryan.

3. We have finished the Percent, Ratio and Fractions unit in Math 6 and are continuing to learn about decimal fractions and place value.  Supplemental review materials have  been posted on edmodo.com.

4. The grade 6/7’s are working on an earth’s crust unit in science.  They did a rock classification and identification lab and played a game, “A Rock is Born” that had them go through the rock cycle.

5. In French 6, we are learning our verbs – er, -re, -avoir and -etre.  This week we played verb tic-tac-toe.  Also very competitive and may lead to a championship game later in the term.  Students still need to work on memorizing the verb conjugations.

6. The grade 6’s are working with Ms. Abbot and Ms. Trieu in the library on non-fiction reading strategies.  We focused on zooming in on text features and non-ficition text features.  Students examined foreign language newspapers to find effective text features.  They applied these strategies while researching their earth’s crusts projects.  We will be continuing to work on inference and questioning strategies in the coming weeks.

7. Science 8 students are working on human body systems and are creating models of each system.  Check out their works in progress….

 

8. The grade 6/7s ended the week with a trip to Zone Bowling and two energetic games of 10 pin bowling.  Thank you to Zone Bowling in Coquitlam for an excellent field trip!

9. The grade 8’s visited their catchment secondary schools.  Ms. Ruhr came back very excited about the different courses offered to the students.  We had students visiting Charles Best, Port Moody and Centennial.

10.  Happy Family Day long weekend!  Enjoy!

Welcome back!  We have started the new year with a busy week.  Students are back in class and busily working on new assignments, projects and content.

1. Grade 6’s completed a formative assessment on the upcoming Math units.  Ms. Abbot has been able to personalize their math programs to better meet their learning needs.  Students are working on a variety of learning outcomes for Percent, Fractions and Ratios.  Some students are working on more advanced concepts, after showing mastery of the required curriculum and other students are learning the concepts.  Additional resources have been posted in the edmodo group for Math 6 for challenge and review.

2. Grade 6’s have also started their first online Literature Circle.  They have three assignments due over the next month.  They were able to select a plot assignment, a character/setting assignment, and a final project from a list of choices.  Students are also required to submit a weekly written response on their novel by Monday.  The novels this month are: “Flush,” “Hoot,” and “Scat,” by Carl Haissen, “Moon Over Manifest” by Clare Vanderpool, and “Island of the Unknowns” by Benedict Carey.  Students have the choice to complete the assignments and responses on one book or multiple books.  Assignment details and due dates have been posted to edmodo.

3. ‘Tis the season … to dance!  Grade 6’s have started a dance unit in PE.  So far, we have learned: the chicken dance, the Electric Slide, the Patty Cake Polka, and the Tennesse Wig Walk.  The grade 7/8 class continues to focus on fitness and have started basketball.

4.  The grade 6/7’s are currently in Art & Dramus explorations.  In Art, students are making mitts with zen doodles that are catching snowflakes.  In Dramus, students are working on preparing speeches.  They will be presenting a story about themselves or something they are knowledgeable about.  Dramus students are also learning drums and guitar.

5. In the exploration enrichment block this term, a group of students are working with Mr. Purych and are learning computer programming using SCRATCH.

6. The grade 6’s have been working on #onelittleword in HCE this week.  This was a challenge we saw on twitter http://oneword365.com/.

“One word that you can focus on EVERYDAY, all year long! One word that sums up who you want to be or how you want to live for 2015 and beyond. It will take intentionality and commitment, but if you let it, your one word will shape not only your year, but also you. It will become the compass that directs your decisions and guide your steps. Discover the BIG impact one word can make”  ~ #oneword365 website

The Langley School District had a challenge out to all the teachers and classes so we thought we would join in too.  Here are some of our #onelittlewords

7. The grade 7/8’s are continuing to work together on Social Studies this year.  They are currently working on projects on World Religions.  Each of the grade 7’s are working in a group to present about a Christian denomination and the grade 8’s are currently learning about Hinduism and Buddism.

8.  Ski and Snowboard Club starts today and will run for several weeks.  Students will be leaving Hillcrest at 11:30am and will spend the afternoon in a lesson and then on the local mountain.  There will be activity afternoons happening while Ski and Snowboard Club happens for the grade 6’s.  Permission forms have gone home for swimming and skating.  And a permission form for bowling will be going home shortly.

9. It is also the time of year when our grade 8’s begin to explore the different options for secondary school.  There are many specialized programs within the school district that may meet your child’s learning needs.  Please watch for information about open houses and program information nights.  At the same time, we have also presented to students wishing to apply to attend MACC next year.  Thank you to Natalie, our student speaker this year, for such an articulate explanation of her MACC experience.  If you are applying to MACC for the 2015-16 school year, please see the SD43 Gifted site for application forms and more details.

10. There are many extra curricular happening at Hillcrest right now.  Basketball and Wrestling seasons are underway.  Dr. Who Club meets weekly.  Ski and Snowboard Club is starting.  Spirit Squad and Me to We Club continues.  What are you participating in this month?

 

We are sitting in the library and the students are busily brainstorming and planning their passion projects.  I hear excitement about learning about photography, computer programming, cooking, and writing graphics novels.

We have continued to read “Wonder” by RJ Palacio and created visual representations for one of the main characters.

 

We have continued the units in Math.  Grade 6’s are working on pattern rules and learned about variables this week.  They also learned about 4 quadrants and ordered pairs.  Grade 7’s continued to work on “Mastering the Basics”.  In french, Grade 7’s are learning about time and Grade 6’s are learning about le pizza.  Grade 6’s interviewed a partner about what toppings they liked on their pizza and then introduced them to the rest of the class. Grade 7’s are designing an island that has symbols that represent our positive traits.  Grade 6’s are continuing to build their learner profile and worked through an executive skills survey this week.

I am grateful for the curious and engaged students that make my job so much fun.

Here are some things the students are grateful for this week:

• for friends who are always there when I need them
• my brother who helps me with my work
• the time I’m spending with my friends
• plumbing…. clean water…. and turkey
• sister buying me bubble tea
• mom’s cooking
• a place to live
• that I know how to tie my ballet shoes
• for 4 PE blocks this week
• the nice day we are having
• thankful for my family
• Thanksgiving …. seeing friends and family
• Thanksgiving dinner and yummy food
• parents… I was sick this week and they were able to help me get better
• family, friends, teachers…. people that care for me.

 

Welcome to the 2014-15 school year.  We cannot believe that we are already two weeks in…. it has been so busy.

1. We had our first assembly and met all the new staff at the school.  We also had the chance to watch the  LipDub 2014, which was made by the grade 8’s last year.

2. All of us made Identity Bags.  We shared them with Ms. Ruhr so she could get to know us better.  One identity bag had a piece of spaghetti because the student is Italian, a copy of the “Hunger Games” because it was the first book she was obessed with, and a picture of her lacrosse team.  Another students’ bag had 3 Lego Minifigures, a medal for a competition, a piano theory book and a souvenir from a summer trip.

3. Explorations started.  We are in Home Ec and Tech Ed.  In Home Ec, we made strawberry blender drinks, apple muffins, and crepes.  In Tech Ed, we are making a basketball hoop toy.  We’ve finished the base and started the backboard.

4. This year, we are reading “Wonder” by RJ Palacio.  It is a story of a boy entering middle school after being homeschooled.  The story is told from the boy’s perspective, his sister’s perspective and 2 of his friends perspectives.  We are also learning about precepts.  One of the one’s we discussed this week was “Our deeds are our monuments.”

5. Math classes are all underway.  Ms. Abbot is working with Math 6, Mr. Wiskar is working with Math 7 and Ms. Ruhr is working with Math 8+.  Grade 6’s are working on Patterns and Input/Output machines.  We learned about the Fibonacci sequence today.  Grade 7’s are working through “Mastering the Basics.”

6. Best thing so far about middle school according to our grade 6’s:

• level of math and participation in everything…
• lockers… lockers…. lockers…
• cooking in Home Ec, we loved the apple muffins…
• woodwork…
• extreme chaos in the hallways…
• ummmm….
• everything!
• I like everything, especially explorations.
• Explorations!
• and awesome teachers.

7.  French class has started and Mme. Ruhr is reviewing vocabulary and concepts from last year(s) with the grade 7 and 8’s.  Mme. Abbot’s grade 6 class is learning about la pizza.  Ask your grade 6 about their favourite pizza topping and they should be able to tell you en francais.

8. Grade 7/8 PE class today was “Sweatin’ to the Oldies”  … rocking Fitness Friday old school with Richard Simmons.  Grade 6’s have completed their first beep test and fitness circuit.  They are all really looking forward to starting volleyball next week.

9. Back in May, the then grade 5, 6, and 7’s worked together to brainstorm topics that they are interested in exploring this year.  From the topics, we synthesized the ideas into a theme for the year.  This years’ theme will be “Cycles & Systems”.  The first set of questions will focus on development.  Some of the questions the students asked were: what did our local community look like 100 years ago? how have demographics changed? what is urbanization? and how is urbanization impacting the Tri-Cities? how has society changed? what is the community plan for the next 10 years? next 20 years? how will we address issues such as homelessness? how have interactions with First Nations in the Tri-Cities shaped the community?  As we look at these questions, we are also going to investigate the environmental aspects of development in the Tri-Cities including the ecosystems of rivers and creeks.

10.  Our first set of trips to learn in the community will be to the Port Moody Museum to learning about “Industry and Burrard Inlet” and then we will be spending 3 days at the Noon’s Creek Hatchery learning about the life cycle of salmon and the environmental cycles in the immediate area.  Permission forms have been handed out, please check with your student to see the details.