Final Blog

This is my last blog for Scholastic. It has been an amazing year! I would like to thank Kathy Walsh for the opportunity. I thank Linda Southworth for all of her advice and hard work.  Linda is an amazing writer! I would like to thank my school, Greenway Middle School in Phoenix, Arizona, for their support throughout the year. I appreciate my principal, Jesse Acosta, for allowing me to take on this extra load this year. I especially want to thank two of my colleagues that have helped me SO much this year with my posted lesson plans and blogs: Ralph Carnesi and Bryan Smith. You have both been so kind, understanding, and professional-I thank you from the bottom of my heart!

I appreciate the hard work that the other teacher advisors put forth this year, as well. You are an amazing group of teachers and it's been a pleasure working with you this year. 

On a personal note, I have 2 exciting events coming up: first, I am waiting each day on the birth of my granddaughter in Arkansas. I am hoping my flight will get me there in time to witness her birth.  Secondly, my grandson in California is due August 4th. So I will spend my summer rocking babies! 

I hope all of you have a restful summer and enjoy some quality time with your families. I wish you all the best! 

Cinco De Mayo

 Cinco de Mayo (Spanish for 5th of May) is a regional holiday in Mexico. If you would like to discuss the history with your students, here are a few sites:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinco_de_Mayo

 

http://www.vivacincodemayo.org/history.htm

 

http://clnet.ucla.edu/cinco.html

 

http://www.inside-mexico.com/featurecinco.htm

http://www.mexonline.com/cinco-de-mayo.htm

 

Some activity sheets you can use, go to these sites:

http://homeschooling.about.com/od/holidays/ss/cincoprint.htm

http://homeschooling.about.com/od/holidays/ss/cincoprint_2.htm

 

http://homeschooling.about.com/od/holidays/ss/cincoprint_3.htm

http://homeschooling.about.com/od/holidays/ss/cincoprint_4.htm

 

Here are some suggestions:

1. Have your students research Cinco de Mayo and write 10 questions each. You could then choose at least 25 good questions and have the students in each of your classes answer all the questions by researching online. 

2. Allow your students to draw and color the Mexican flag. 

3. They could write if and how they are going to celebrate Cinco de Mayo.

4. They could make a collage of ads, pictures, etc. of Cinco de Mayo that they find in newspapers.

 

I hope your students enjoy celebrating Cinco de Mayo.

Earth Day

Wednesday, April 22, is Earth Day. To read about the history of Earth Day, go to this site:

http://www.history.com/states.do?action=detail&state=Earth+Day&contentType=State_Generic&contentId=58114&parentId=earth

These are some interesting websites for Earth Day activities:

http://www.earthday.net/earthday2009

 

http://www.earthday.gov/classroom.htm#teach

 

http://www.earthday.gov/

 

http://www.earthday.gov/classroom.htm#games

 

http://www.teachablemoment.org/middle/earthdayms.html

 

http://www.cacegypt.org/news/EarthDay.html

A good movie to watch:

Al Gore’s film An Inconvenient Truth, the 2007 Academy award winner for best documentary film. This film highlights the effects of global warming on our planet.

More websites:

http://www.woodrow.org/teachers/bi/1991/earthday.html

 

http://commtechlab.msu.edu/sites/letsnet/noframes/subjects/ss/b4u3.html

 

http://commtechlab.msu.edu/sites/letsnet/noframes/subjects/ss/b4u3l1.html

 

http://commtechlab.msu.edu/sites/letsnet/noframes/subjects/ss/b4u3l2.html

Websites to make puzzles:

 

http://www.vocabulary.com/VUearthday2002FITB.html

 

http://www.vocabulary.com/VUearthday2002MATCH.html

 

http://www.vocabulary.com/VUearthday2002TF.html

 

http://www.vocabulary.com/VUearthday2002CW.html

 

http://www.vocabulary.com/VUearthday2002WF.html

Scholastic websites for Earth Day:

http://www2.scholastic.com/browse/article.jsp?id=3751564

 A list of books you can use for Earth Day:

http://bookwizard.scholastic.com/tbw/viewBooklist.do?dp=%3D%3FUTF-8%3FB%3FYm9va2xpc3RJZD0xMDA1NDkxJnNoYXJlZD10cnVl%3F%3D

 

http://printables.scholastic.com/printables/detail/?id=24916&No=0&Ntt=earth+day+&query=earth+day+&Ntk=Printables_SI&N=1234+1235+1236+1204+1212+138+108+47&Nty=0&_N=fff

 Your kids can vote on Scholastic's Environmental Report Card:

http://teacher.scholastic.com/activities/explorations/kerc/?ESP=Teachers/ib/20090320/awa/sa_kerc_2009_Gr612_3_5_IC///thlp/tout////

I hope you enjoy sharing Earth Day activities with your students. If you have more interesting websites or ideas, please email me at sblair@pvschools.net and I will add them to this blog. Thanks!

 

An Exciting School Day

On Wednesday, March 4th, we had 2 exciting events at our school. First, we had an assembly at our school with the motivational group, City Conquest. They were great! Can you remember school assemblies when you were in middle school? I sure do. It seemed like we had them quite often. We had different choirs, historical films (days before tv's were in every classroom), and plays for our assemblies. But the only assemblies we have now are the honor roll assemblies. So having City Conquest was a real treat. A group of young people that can relate to our students. One point that was brought out yesterday was that it takes 5 positive comments to overcome 1 negative comment. Think about all the negative comments our middle schoolers receive on a daily basis and the negative comments they make to others: peers, teachers, and family. If you are interested in having them come to your school, this is their website:

http://www.cityconquest.com/

The second event was the March4Schools rally at the State Capital. Our state legislators cut over $350 million from public education. Arizona is facing a $3 billion dollar deficit for next year. We are facing the loss of teachers, classified personnel, and administrators in our district. Class sizes will increase. Arizona is last in the nation in per pupil education spending. So parents, students, and teachers all gathered at the capital to express our feelings on these issues. A lot of us rode buses and carried signs. The news media showed up. We were on the news on all the stations. I was disappointed that a picture was not on the front page of the Arizona Republic newspaper this morning, though. This was my first protest. It was really encouraging to be with my fellow colleagues and showing support for public education. Some of the legislators that support public education came out in support. Many did not! Here is a slideshow that one of my colleagues, Bryan Smith, sent out to our staff.

Download March 4th on the Capitol 

Election Time

Today I gave my students, in all 6 classes, the opportunity to vote for the President of the United States.