Ms. McClure’s 2006-2007 Sixth Grade Students

1. Ms. McClure’s 2006-2007Sixth Grade Students Created by ALL ROOM 10 STUDENTS Artistic design by Maddie Logan, Ashley Moffett, and Anthony Petraglia With help from Joe Henry Bennett Wenz Pat Murphy Amanda George Quotes chosen by Daniella Petri Special thanks to Ms. Logan for technical support and advice

2. Ms. McClure’s Sixth Grade Students 2006 - 2007

3. “Sixth grade is a spectacular grade.” ~ Grant Young

4. “This was a year to remember!” ~ Jessica Azevedo

5. Science in Sixth Grade

6. Archeological Dig Pictures

7. More Science This year in science, we studiedvolcanoes. We read and answered questions about volcanoes, we saw videos of real volcanoes erupting, and we went to the Lawrence Hall of Science, where we tested our own volcanoes and made different types of volcanic eruptions. We will learnmore aboutfamily lifethis year, learning about the changes that occur during puberty, as well as about how to keep ourselves safe, and thathuman babies don’t come from storksand thatour moms didn’t buy us at Babies R Us, either.Additionally, we learned aboutarchaeologyand had an archaeological dig. In our Early Humansstudies, we learned about different ancient tribes and made PowerPoint presentations to teach each other. D.A.R.E.was also part of our science curriculum this year.

8. D.A.R.E.

10. Aaron Of all of the activities we did this year in sixth grade science, two of my very favorite things were the archaeological dig and learning about volcanoes. I liked doing the dig because I liked seeing what archaeologists have to do to get artifacts out of the ground. Learning about volcanoes was cool because I got to see different volcanoes that had erupted and whether their eruptions were mostly ash and gasses or were mostly lava.

11. Maddie In science, I liked studying about Early Humans the best because it was cool to see the difference between the different groups of Early Humans and humans today. I also enjoyed learning how Early Humans lived with nothing. The best part, though, was putting our research into PowerPoint slideshow to teach the class about our Early Human group. I got to also teach groups about some PowerPoint techniques, which was really fun.

12. Kayla My favorite science activity in sixth grade was the field trip to the Lawrence Hall of Science. I already knew most of the volcano facts from the class, but I really liked pouring the ingredients into the model volcanoes and making different kinds of eruptions. The best eruptions were the shield/dome volcano eruptions where lava flowed out. The other kind of eruption was just a pop and steam and ash came out. Strata volcanoes have that kind of eruption.

13. “We learned all about the human body, even the gross stuff!” ~ Bennett Wenz

14. Joe My favorite thing in science this year was the archaeological dig because we got to learn the different steps that archaeologists take to find artifacts. I also liked this project because it was fun to dig in our middens and find different objects and try to decide what they might have been used for in the past. Going to the Lawrence Hall of Science was also fun and interesting because we could see all of the cool science exhibits.

15. Amanda My favorite thing I did in science this year was going to the Lawrence Hall of Science with the class. The workshop we participated in there had lots of hands- on activities to do with the volcanoes. I really enjoyed the volcano class we took there because the volcanoes actually exploded. I also enjoyed doing the volcano packets in class. I found learning about volcanoes and earthquakes very interesting because I have always found geology very engaging.

16. Social Studies in Sixth Grade

17. American Revolution!

18. More SocialStudies This year in social studies, we learned about the American Revolution and about the ancient civilizations of Mesopotamia, Egypt, Greece, and Rome. We learned about American Revolution through reading, participating in the Walk Through the American Revolution, and by learning about American Revolution artifacts. To learn about ancient civilizations, we did a variety of things, including watching PowerPoint presentations and taking notes, performing in plays and skits, reading information, handling ancient artifacts from some of these cultures, and doing art projects in the style of some of the civilizations. The best part of social studies was all of the “hands-on” activities.

19. Bennett This year in social studies, I learned many different things about ancient Greece. One of the most interesting things to me is how they did their art. I also liked learning about the ancient Romans and how the legionnaires trained, set up camp, and fought the battles. It was cool to see the ancient Roman artifacts and to practice being a Roman legionnaire. I also liked the American Revolution artifacts presentation. My favorite part was being able to handle an old bayonet blade.

20. Brandon Even though this was also sort of science, I really enjoyed doing the archaeological dig because it was a fun way to learn about what archaeologists do and to chart the artifacts we found. This helped me to understand how we are able to know about history. I also really liked hearing about the Roman soldiers and how they had to carry such heavy packs and march such long distances before they set up a camp.

21. Jaime In social studies, I enjoyed learning about the different ancient civilizations a lot. It was really fun. I especially liked having extra credit questions to answer because I learned more, and I could share that information with the class. I also liked handling the ancient Roman artifacts and learning about the Greek and Roman gods. I didn’t know that there were so many gods and that there were even more for every household. Working on the Greek myth and legend plays has also been fun. Drawing the Greek gods with our partners was also really fun.

22. “Have you ever read Greek myths? Well, you should. They are fun to read, even though in most of the myths, everything is the woman’s fault! All the girls in our class were complaining about that.” ~ Emily Reclite

23. Pat My favorite part of social studies this year was learning about ancient Greece. I really liked learning about all of those crazy gods and goddesses. I also liked learning about ancient Rome. It is pretty funny how they just worshipped the Greek gods and then changed their names. I thought learning about the Roman baths and seeing pictures of the ruins from Bath was pretty interesting, too. I also loved seeing the Roman mosaics on the computer and then trying to make my own.

24. Mandi My favorite part of social studies this year was learning about the mythology of the Greeks. I liked this because I like mythology and stories that try to explain stuff, and the Top Ten Greek Myths and Legends was a funny book. I liked learning about all of the different gods, reading so many different myths, and working to do the plays of the Greek myths and legends, too.

25. Language Arts in Sixth Grade Stargirlby Jerry Spinelli....In this story about both the perils of popularity and nonconformity, a new student named Stargirl changes Mica High forever. The Watsons Go to Birmingham – 1963 by Christopher Paul Curtis A comic, yet deeply moving novel that blends the fictional account of an African American family with the factual events of the violent summer of 1963.

26. More Language Arts:Reading During our long, but short year, our class has read many books. Three of our favorites are The Watsons Go to Birmingham – 1963 by Christopher Paul Curtis, Things Not Seen by Andrew Clements, and Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli. We also really enjoyed reading in small Literature Study Groups of four to six students, where we had some choice about the novels we read. We’ve read books such as Pish Posh, Zach’s Lie, The Wish, So B. It, various Greek and Roman myths, and many more!

27. Reading! More...

28. Reading Stargirl!

29. Still More Language Arts:Writing Bam! In a flash, sixth grade is gone. How sad! How exciting!We hope that this is an example of an engaging beginning that makes you want to read more. Our class has written many different pieces this year in many different genres. Overall, our favorite genres werepoetry, personal narratives, fictional narratives, and researchreports(but only when we get to choose our own topics). We also enjoyed working in groups to write and publish group essays on topics of our choice. Working in partners to write creation myths was also a highlight of our writing career. We also studied lots of grammar and writing strategies so that we could become stronger writers.

30. Even More Language Arts:Spelling: This year in spelling, we actuallylearned how to spell words better.We did this each week by learning spelling strategies, by having fewer words to study each week, by working with pattern words and root words, and by having personal words from our own writing. Some of the spelling games that we had for homework, such as hangman and capture, were pretty fun, so that encouraged us to study our words. Doing the word sorts helped us with spelling patterns and writing the spelling stories helped us to learn the definitions of the words. As a group, we agree that this year we are paying more attention to spelling words correctly in our writing instead of just memorizing words for the weekly test and then immediately forgetting how to spell the words.

31. “I think I am a better person after being in Ms. McClure’s sixth grade class because there were so many things to follow to give us structure and different approaches at how to do our personal best.” ~ Kayla Nelson

32. Emily G. In reading, I really liked reading both Stargirl and Things Not Seen. I like Stargirl because it is about real life, and I liked Things Not Seen because it was a very mysterious story, so I always wanted to know what happened next. Spelling was also great this year because the level was just right, which made doing the homework fun. I think I improved in both my reading and my spelling this year. I can spell harder words now, and I know what most of them mean because of learning about roots. I am now reading more challenging books and reading more often instead of getting bored and giving up.

33. Andrew My favorite part of language arts is reading. I love to read books. I liked working in Literature Study Groups the best because it is fun to share ideas about the books with other people in the group. Some of the books we had to choose from were pretty good, too. Zach’s Lie was a good book about this kid who had to change his identity because his family had to go in the witness protection program when his dad was caught smuggling drugs and agreed to testify against Alonzo Azar.

34. Emily R. This year in language arts, I liked writing the best because I think that my writing really improved. My ideas flowed more easily, so I didn’t just sit at my desk trying to think of what to write. Research reports and essay writing were my two favorite genres because I thought the organization part was easier for these genres. In reading, I really enjoyed reading the Greek and Roman myths. They were cool because they were super interesting and quickly caught my attention.

35. Jenna In writing, I liked writing the fictional narrative the best because you got to use your imagination and make up the story line and the characters. I also liked writing the personal narratives because I got to write about my puppy. It was fun to hear other people read their writing, and that helped me to get ideas and strategies to make my own writing better.

36. Zach My favorite part of language arts this year was reading the whole class novels and reading with Literature Study Groups. I like to read books a lot, and I also liked to discuss the books with everyone in the class. The discussions help me understand the books more and give me better insights into the story. The books I liked best this year were The Watsons Go to Birmingham and Zach’s Lie. I liked these books best because they are about kids my age and there was suspense and action in both books, too.

37. Jaclynn I liked doing the Literature Study Groups this year in reading because it helped me to read a book and actually think about what was happening. It helped me improve my reading because I had to sit down and read for a set period of time without having any distractions. I also enjoyed hearing what my group thought about the book and getting their opinions. That sometimes changed my thoughts about the book. Reading the LSG books also helped me to improve my vocabulary because we had to find interesting or challenging vocabulary words to discuss.

38. Heather Z. My favorite sixth grade writing project was the research report because I got to choose my own topic, and so I researched Montana, the state where my great grandmother lived. I also liked creating my three-dimensional project, which was a topographical map of Montana that include things like the state animal, state flower, and more. I think I got better at writing this year. Poetry really helped me to express my thoughts.

39. Jessica I liked spelling this year because we had fewer spelling words to learn each week. This made it so I could really learn the words instead of just memorizing them and then forgetting them after the test. The spelling activities made it fun to learn the words and easier to memorize the spelling, as well as making homework fun instead of torturous. I think that this year’s spelling helped me to spell correctly when I write, and I learned how to make new, more vivid words from root words.

40. “If I didn’t have a mouth, Ms. M. wouldn’t have anyone to quiet down during class time!” ~ Daniella Petri

41. Math in Sixth Grade Scale... Drawings!

44. More Math Whenever math time came, you could always hear moans and groans, so we did some fun things to keep us all going.We all enjoyed working in partners to create a scale drawing of a monster. Each partnership designed and drew its own monster. Another fun activity was finding out the mean, median, mode, and range using the colors or M&Ms in individual packages. At last, when we finished the Saxon math textbook, we were all extremely excited because we no longer had to do such challenging problem sets. Instead, we did review and other fun math projects, such as the geometric animal project and the upcoming roller coaster speed research. Overall, this has been a great math year for all of us!

45. Emily W. The math this year was quite challenging because we were learning so many new concepts. My very favorite math activity was doing the scale drawings we got to work in partners and have fun applying a math concept to drawings. Finishing learning all of the new math concepts and finishing the Saxon textbook was great because then we got to review some of the challenging concepts before we had the State testing. Another math project I really enjoyed was the geometric animal math project.

46. Matthew Sixth grade math was fairly challenging because so much new algebra and geometry was introduced this year. Of all of our math, I found the scale drawings the most entertaining. I enjoyed this project because it combined drawing and math and allowed us to apply a mathematical principal. For the same reason, I also enjoyed the geometric animal project, where we worked in partners to make a geometric animal that included required solids, angles, and polygons.

47. Robin Math this year was really fun. This is partly because math comes easily to me and partly because the sixth grade math was challenging at times. I really liked learning about the Pythagorean Theorem because I think that this will help me a lot in my future math classes. I also liked learning about compound interest. I did a good job calculating compound interest. Other people had trouble with accuracy, so I helped them with that since it was fun for me.

48. “Wow! I can’t believe that I am graduating and moving to seventh grade!” ~ Jesus Macias

49. Kevin In math this year, I really liked doing the scale drawings because it made math fun. Much of the math was challenging and somewhat tedious, so having a math project that combined math and art was fun. I also liked doing the math review packets because they were a lot easier, and I could tell that I really knew the math.

50. Grant In math, I really liked doing the geometric animal project because you can make animals out of different solids, polygons, and angles, such as triangular prisms, rectangular prisms, and hexagons. This was a fun way to practice and review our geometry. I also really liked finishing the math book because it really helped me with the Kenilworth pre-algebra test. I felt like I was really prepared because of how much math I knew.