I had the awesome responsibility and pleasure of teaching Elementary and Middle School music this past term and was so blessed!In Middle School students created a project which asked them to analyze critically 4 pieces of music (2 classical and 2 contemporary), describing the music in detail: composer, key, style, etc. Additionally, they were asked to compose their own piece of music. We have some really outstanding composers in our midst. All in all, we had a blast and I really believe God was blessed.
The eight graders went through their work at a very steady pace. They had to prepare for the Spanish proficiency test. We had our good days and our not so good days. The days they practiced their conversations they were very nervous. The day they had to speak for the test they did well past my expectations. After the examination was over we could really say: “the Lord has helped us, thus far”.
Seventh grade presented itself with a lot of challenges. We moved from everyday social language into studying the language itself. The verbs are difficult, the nouns have rules, adjective have to agree with the nouns, our pet “bee” Sparky, flew out the window, twice; the list goes on. We worked at it, a lot, and we made it. We had fun in the process and learned new things and new games. We are ready for whatever the eight grade brings.
Dance Elective is so much fun. The students get a chance to really work out and it’s a learning experience. Many students came and found out that they had gifts that they didn’t know about before. The students learned how to express their emotions in a different style of dance and they learned how to worship in Spirit and in Truth
The Middle School Dance Elective did their Christmas Program to the song “I Praise You In the Sanctuary” and “Lord You’re Holy”. I had a wonderful time with them. They were very respectful and listened well and really worked well together.
This year has been very exciting in Art. Students have learned a lot this year from Art History to the culture of others’ art work. Here are a few highlights of the year:
· Sixth grade made a patchwork quilt where each square represented themselves as individuals. They then put it together on the bulletin board as their class project.
· Seventh grade learned about Tessellations. It was very hard for them but once they got it they did an awesome job.
· Eighth grade: 8C created beautiful landscape paintings using watercolor techniques and applied this to their “Hnadscape” pictures. 8R created sculptures out of saran-wrap and packaging tape. The tape held the sculptures together and to give it a solid look.
This school year has been a tremendous blessing. Students were exposed to fun ways of writing poetry, the explorations of different genres of literature and drafting for classroom publications. We were definitely able to travel through different time periods in literature. We went from the Holocaust to the Reconstruction Era to the world of C.S. Lewis’s fantasy. If you come to our room, you can read limericks – short fun poems that reveal some silly things about us.
What an awesome year in Bible! As a class, we have learned about our weaknesses, our strengths and our struggles. We are so happy to have a Savior that fights on our behalf. We learned how God has gifted each and every one of us. We prayed and encouraged each other in the Word. As I lectured, I even shared stories of many young people who stood up for Christ. Some students decided to give extra credit presentations for a last chance to share an encouragement with their classmates. May our Lord guide and protect our students as they move on to high school.
During the spring semester of 2008, Miss Stahler and her middle school class began to learn how to take a good photograph. First, we studied a slide show to find the most common mistakes photographers make (i.e. over and under exposure, blurry action pictures, etc.) Second, we learned 6 main categories to think about when taking a picture. They are:
7. Composition – use of lines, focus, zoon, rule of two-thirds.
8. Light – light source, temperature, flash, time of day.
9. Color – use of color, light, emotion, black and white.
10. Landscape – composition, framing, zoom, perspective, foreground, proportions.
11. People – light, lens, portrait, children, flash.
12. Being ready – motor drive, vantage point, shutter lag, preparation.
Each week the students would bring in their digital camera and we would learn a new part of the outline and then practice taking a picture using the topic of the day. Here are some pictures from our end of the year slide show. Enjoy.
Our Math classes transitioned using visual mathematics along with math computation and word problems from textbooks. This was to prepare the students for SATs and Finals. 6th & 7th – Math curriculum consisted of Visual Mathematics I. Students were introduced to the art of questioning. This is to produce thinking.
8th – Math Curriculum consisted of Visual mathematics II. This was challenging. The students were using high levels of critical thinking. Middle School students were challenged to make observation and work with manipulatives to prove their theories and thought process. Students worked in groups and in pairs. Later in the year, middle school math transitioned to Math Computation. Visual Math helped prepare them for computation from the perspective of understanding mathematical concepts and not just traditional rote memory of computations. The highlight of 7th grade was in one class I had a piece of chocolate cake and I spoon fed each student. God demonstrated math for us that day in how you can divide one item into a number of parts. All of middle school created their own math games.