Humanities- Social Studies 11/17-11/21

Hello Parents,

The end of Trimester 1 is this Friday.  The mini-reports that were due this past Friday will be the last assessment used for this report card.  There are many students who did not meet the deadline.......please check with your son/daughter.  I will probably have grades for the report posted by early next week.

This week we will focus on immigration, but from the problems immigrants faced in the U.S., their contributions to society, and a look at the port of entry (Ellis Island) for many.  Below are the online links I am using Monday-Wednesday (students have the worksheets and it is also posted on Edmodo).  On Thursday and Friday, we will watch the movie "God Grew Tired of Us", which is a documentary on the Lost Boys of the Sudan.

Homework this week:  completed the worksheets that go with our online resources by end of class Wednesday.

1. Segment 5: Know-Nothing People http://www.pbs.org/wnet/historyofus/web08/segment5.html

2. Segment 7: The Promise Land http://www.pbs.org/wnet/historyofus/web08/segment7.html

3. The History of Ellis Island https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8X4CypTaOQs

Have a great week!

Mr. Burton

Humanities-Social Studies 11/10-11/14

Hello Parents,

This week we will continue to work on our "mini-reports" focusing on why some people leave Central American countries to go to the U.S.  Deadlines for this week are as follows:

Due Tuesday - outline (students worked on it in Monday's class)
Due Wednesday - rough draft of written piece (students will work on this in Tuesday's class going from the outline)
Due at end of class Friday - final draft which will include two graphs, one map and edited written piece.

I posted the assignment in Edmodo (www.edmodo.com).  If you have not joined, remember to have your son/daughter sign in to their page.  On the left hand side is the "parent code".  Use this at the log in page signing in from the parent tab.  Let me know if you have any questions.

I handed back the vocabulary quiz today.  Awesome scores!  I will update PowerSchool this week with the grades.

Have a great week.

Mr. Burton

This week in Humanities - Social Studies (11/3-11/7)

Hello Parents,

I hope everyone had a good weekend.  I am looking forward to the student led conferences that begin this week (Weds, Thurs, and next Tuesday).  For me, students had to complete their final drafts of their "porfolio reflections" this past Friday.  Checking today, there were still several students who had not completed them.  Please check with your son or daughter or you can email me if you have questions.

We have a special treat to build on our immigration unit.  Joe Smith arranged to have guests speakers who will visit our classrooms tomorrow.  These speakers were refugees who have settled in the Burlington area.  Today we have been preparing with background information on their countries of origin and creating appropriate questions to ask.

We will continue with the immigration unit through the week.  Students have been investigating potential "push factors", or reasons why people leave their countries.  We are using CIA World Factbook for our data gathering.  The focus is on Mexico and other Central American countries.  This coincides with the book they are reading in Mr. Badeau's class, Crossing the Wire.

Homework this week:
Monday - finish the Data sheet for the Guest Speaker presentations
Tuesday - finish the Data Sheet "Exploring Potential Push Factors"
Friday - QUIZ Vocabulary from "Immigration, part II" worksheet

Lastly......I had one parent email me to say she could not see the grades with PowerSchool.  Are there other parents that cannot view them?  Let me know as we are trying to figure out why they are not showing.  Thanks.

Have a great week.

Mr. Burton

Upcoming Events:

Friday, Oct. 31- 

Please remember this is a regular school day.  Leave the costumes and masks at home please!  

Tuesday, Nov. 4-  

Milton Middle School will be hosting Refugee Guest Speakers from Winooski as part of our Humanities unit on immigration.  Two children/teens and one adult will be speaking in each classroom, sharing their experience.  Students will work with Humanities teachers beforehand to develop thoughtful questions to ask.  

Wednesday Nov 5

Thursday, Nov 6

Tuesday, Nov 11

Student-Led Portfolio Conferences!

Thursday, Nov 13-

We will get to see a presentation from Sam Drezdin about our Summer VT Reads book Wonder.  

Update for Humanities - Social Studies

Hello Parents,

Sorry for the delay.........I am finally getting around to sending an update on what we are doing in Humanities - Social Studies.  We began the year with a short unit on Geography skills.  These skills will be useful through the year when we are looking at different parts of the world.  We are now in our unit Immigration (From Many, One).  We began with a historical look at immigration focusing the "first immigrants" (Native Americans), early Native American encounters with Europeans, and then living in a multicultural community (contributions of immigrant groups).  Next, we are moving into a look at more modern immigration.  We will be working closely with the information presented in Mr. Badeau's class, especially when we get to a culminating project.

All grades in my class have now been posted in PowerSchool.  There will be a few more miscellaneous assignments that will be added soon.

Homework this week is finishing their "Portfolio Reflections".  These will be used in the upcoming student led conferences.  The final drafts are due on Friday.

Lastly, I invite all of you to join our classroom "Edmodo" group.  All students have an account through www.edmodo.com.  On the student page, on the left hand side of the screen there is a parent code.  You can use this when prompted when signing in as a "parent" on the log in page.  We use Edmodo to communicate with one another, post assignments, and for students to electronically store material.  I send general parent group messages at times with updates.

Please contact me anytime you have any questions or concerns (tburton@mtsd-vt.org).

Mr. Burton

How time flies! We are already halfway through the first trimester and it is time for Student-Led Portfolio Conferences! Educational research tells us that children benefit greatly from having meaningful conversations about their learning with important adults in their lives. To that end, we hope that you can attend a Portfolio Conference where your child will present to you artifacts of his or her learning – work from each class that he or she has thoughtfully selected to demonstrate learning and growth.

In addition to presenting artifacts of academic growth, your child will also discuss their progress with the Habits of Mind we have been working on this year:  Citizenship, Persistence, Precision, Preparedness, and Flexible Thinking.

During the conference, House D teachers will be present to meet with you and answer questions.

For your convenience, we are scheduling conferences on the evenings of Wednesday November 5, Thursday November 6, and Tuesday November 11.  Anyone is welcome – parents, siblings, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, neighbors. Your child will be bringing home a form for you to fill out to request a time.

We look forward to seeing you!

Interested in why we hold Student-Led Conferences? Read here:

http://www.educationworld.com/a_admin/admin/admin112.shtml

http://www.pbs.org/parents/education/going-to-school/parent-involvement/student-led-conferences/

On Thursday, October 9th we will have our first 

House D Celebration of the year!

We are asking two students from each advisory to volunteer to bring in snacks to share.  We will have shortened classes (40 minutes) to allow for celebration time at the end of the day.  The celebration will include August/September birthday recognition, achievement recognition, announcements, and a whole house game (outside if nice weather).