Hello. I hope everyone is doing fine. This is it! This is CRCT week. The reading CRCT will be on Tuesday. Each day this week, please be sure your child gets plenty of rest, a wonderful breakfast, and is always relaxed - no undue stress please (you may insert laugh here if you wish). Have a great week.
Take Care,
Mrs. Frederick
Hello! I hope everyone had a great spring break! This is the last week before the CRCT's. There will still be tutoring before and after school this week. My hope is that the students feel confident at this point and do their best. I think that the most important thing is that they take their time! Many students have said that when they see others closing their booklets, they begin to rush and feel pressured to wrap it up. Please stress with your child that he/she should take full advantage of the full amount allowed! Have a great week!
Take Care,
Mrs. Frederick
The Simpson Shuffle Run/Walk and Health Fair will be held on Friday, March 27, 4:30-6:30 PM. Registration forms for the run/walk can be found at the front office and on the Simpson web site www.cobbk12.org/~simpson. Proceeds will support the American Cancer Society's Relay for Life which raises funds to fight cancer. Please join us! Together we can make a difference.
Hello! I hope everyone is doing well. We are in the race to practice for the CRCT's! You will be seeing a number of independent reading grades this quarter which are strictly based on CRCT passages and questions. I hope the students use all the strategies we used in class to do their best on these practices. These are not the be all and end all of reading tests, but it should give us a basic picture of where your child is in reading.
We will be reading more of our novel study The Weirdo and applying all of the reading skills and strategies covered this year. This book has a number of themes including self-esteem, parental conflicts, ecologiy, humanity, and more. We have had a number of great discussions in class and hope to have many more.
Take Care,
Mrs. Frederick
Hello. I hope everyone is doing well. Don't forget - tomorrow (3/3/09) is early release day. This story was about the impact of foster care and a child that has given up on being part of a family.
8th Grade Reading: We have just finished the short story "The Kid Nobody Could Handle". We worked on the strategy of Double Entry Diary and then Somebody/Wanted/But/So for characteri
6th, 7th, and 8th Grade Reading: We will begin our next novel study - The Weirdo by Theordore Taylor. We will begin with a Word Splash that hopefully ignites some interest in the story. Apparently the genre of choice for this group of students is mystery - so this is another mystery. It also has teenage self-esteem issues, parent conflict issues, ecological issues, murder mystery, and more!
Take Care,
Mrs. Frederick
Hello. I hope everyone is doing well.
High school meetings: Both high schools will have parent night on March 3 - Sprayberry begins at 6:30 and Lassiter begins at 7:00.
This week we will be working in the computer lab on reading passages. Each student will be working at their own pace through various levels of reading materials. This program allows a child to read the passage, answer the questions, and then if they miss an answer, they have a second chance to answer the question. They must call me over and discuss with me the question and answer choices the second time prior to choosing an answer. The questions cover the basic comprehension questions of main ideas, details, vocabulary, inferences, and drawing conclusions.
Take Care,
Mrs. Frederick
Hello. I hope everyone is doing well.
Eagle Readers and media center check out is Friday. Everyone should bring their books on Friday!
6th and 7th Grade Reading: We continue to work on fluency - please see the attached lists! We will be working on vocabulary in context too. We are finishing reading Maniac Magee by Jerry Spinelli and will be discussing the themes of friendship, racism, conquering your fears, and the importance of a "family".
8th Grade Reading: We continue to work on fluency - please see the attached lists! We will be working on vocabulary in context too. We will begin our next short story "Thank You Ma'm" by Langston Hughes tomorrow.
Take Care,
Mrs. Frederick
Hello. I hope everyone is doing well. Please do not forget the spaghetti dinner! I hope all of the students keep in mind the 25 book standard and are reading an independent reading book. We visited the media center on Friday, so I hope your child has two books to read! Every first and third Friday of the month we have a drawing for a prize for each grade level based on entries for books completed. I hope your child is participating!
6th and 7th Grade: We are working on entry assignments each day that are practice CRCT's. After that, we are working on phonetics and fluency - including prefixes and suffixes. We are using non-words - ask your child! We are almost finished reading Maniac Magee and should finish this week or early next week. The themes are friendship, stereotypes, racial prejudices, and survival. This book is loaded with figurative language devices such as similes, metaphors, onomatopoeias, hyperboles, alliterations, and personifications. Ask your child to explain all of these!
8th Grade: Along with the CRCT practice entry assignments and the phonetics and fluency in cluding prefixes and suffixes, we are continuing with some short stories. We are wrapping up folktales tomorrow, and will begin some realistic fiction. One thing this group of students do well is make personal connections to all the stories. Making that personal connection goes a long way in understanding a story and the characters.
Take Care,
Mrs. Frederick
Hello! I hope everyone is doing well.
1. Please do not forget that this week is conference week which means early release. I hope your conferences go well!
2. Please do not forget that Simpson Middle School Spaghetti Dinner: SIMPSON FAMILIES, Mark your Calendar for February 20th, 6:30 You are invited to our 3rd Annual Spaghetti Dinner & Raffle Action Simpson teachers will be serving dinner and there will be lots of great auction items available. Thanks for supporting the Simpson Eagles Education Foundation.
3. Please read this if your child is going to Lassiter High School next year: Thursday, January 29th at 7:00 – Lassiter Theater – The Realities of Rigor: 9th Grade Honors Courses. There will be a round robin of discussion groups about what the 9th grade honors courses are really like. All parents and students are welcome to attend. Further information for Lassiter 8th grade parents can be found at www.cobbk12.org/~lassiter
4. Tuesday, March 3rd at 7:00 - Lassiter Gym - 8th grade parent and student evening - designed as a final informational evening for parents and students to ask questions about courses and activities avaliable at Lassiter. Further information for Lassiter 8th grade parents can be found at www.cobbk12.org/~lassiter
Reading Updates:
Monday will be designated as makeup day. There are a number of students who have not finished work or who did not do as well as expected due to not following directions. If the student does not finish makeup work during class time, it needs to be finished at home.
For the rest of the week in 8th grade, we will be reading a variety of short stories and applying the GPS's such as fluency, figurative language, plot, theme, author's pupose, genre discussion, characterization, and more.
In 6th and 7th grade, we will continue to read the novel Maniac Magee and apply the GPS's to the novel study.
The independent reading project was due this past Friday. If your child did not turn it in, I will be accepting it all week. There will be no points off, but the students who turned it in on time will receive bonus points.
Take Care,
Mrs. Frederick
Hello! I hope everyone is doing well.
The new strategy we are working on is a SocioGram. Please ask your child about it! This strategy makes sure they understand the characters (including traits, emotions, and motivations) of all the characters in the text and all of the interactions. It is a graphic organizer of the characters with the protagonist in the middle and using symbolism to show an understanding of the plot.
We are working on phonetics and fluency at all times.
8th grade: We have finished with Act II of Dracula the play and will be beginning Act III soon. The students have done a nice job of readings and seem to be enjoying the play.
6th and 7th grade: We have finished part I of Maniac Magee and will be beginning part II soon.
Take Care,
Mrs. Frederick
Dear Parents and Students,
SIMPSON FAMILIES, Mark your Calendar for February 20th, 6:30
You are invited to our 3rd Annual Spaghetti Dinner & Raffle Action
Simpson teachers will be serving dinner and there will be lots of great auction items available.
Thanks for supporting the Simpson Eagles Education Foundation.
Hello everyone. Here is the last blog for 2008! I hope everyone has a great, safe, and wonderful winter break!
6th and 7th Grade Reading: We will continue reading Maniac Magee and working on the strategy of summarizing.
8th Grade Reading: We will continue reading the play "Dracula" and working on fluency and vocabulary in context.
After the winter break, we will pick up where we left off!
Take Care,
Mrs. Frederick
