Hello All,

Great class on Tuesday. We went over the “the terms to know “ words and phrases that the class will be formally tested on next Tuesday the 20th. I was going to administer the test this Friday but was convinced by the students that they needed more time to study. We will see how that goes ! Each student should have the terms in their planners as we did them in class and for homework and they were advised to keep them for future reference.

If your child does not have the complete list he or she will need to look them up again. They may choose to borrow the “We the People” book to do so. The list of words is below.

On Wednesday, I also handed back their homework assignments.

The majority of the class on Tuesday was spent on students reporting out on the additional articles they chose to read in the UpFront magazine for homework. We finished them on Wednesday (We had three classes this week). One article that several students chose to read was, “ The Rise of China”. It was focused on education, the economy and more. There was some startling facts and information that you may want to read about yourself. It is in the September 5th issue.

Today, Friday , next Tuesday and the first class after we return from vacation we will be viewing scenes from the Ken Burns film, “Prohibition”. The viewing will include time for comments and discussion. This is a very complex subject for 7th graders. Ken will be talking with us and the 6th and 8th grade about a variety of topics interwoven in his latest film.

Homework is to study for the “terms to know’ for next Tuesday’s test. The students asked me to list them below and so you will find them at the end of this note. The test will be a matching test (terms and definitions will be listed) and the test will be on 20 or 25 of the 28 “terms to know.

Ken Burns will be with us on the 6th of January at 8:30 am in the theater, so please feel free to join us .

Wishing you all a very happy holiday. Thank you for having your child(ren) here at TGS. As I have said before, this is a very special class.

Best,
‘
Steve

PS Junior Iron Chef. We talked about this for a while and went to the Junior Iron Chef, Vermont Website. We will need to know how many children are interested and create teams before we break for the holiday, next Wednesday, so we can send in our application and fees. If parents and children can’t decide by then, we will just have to see if there are still openings available in January. There has been talk of getting professional chefs to help us with the teams as they practice e for the event which will be at the end of March. Participation is not mandatory and we will practice for the contest as an after school event. I think the practices will be just as much fun as the contest itself.




Terms to Know:

separation of powers
checks and balances
legislative branch
judicial branch
executive branch
abridging
petition
redress of grievances
freedom of expression
faction
political parties
Federalist Party
Republican Party
filibuster
super majority
gerrymandering
moderate
Tea Party
constitution
constitutional government
autocratic or dictatorial government
higher law
private domain
natural rights
government
absolute power
state of nature
consent
social compact or social contract

Hello All,

Great class today. Good discussions on the freedom of expression. Thanks to you parents that had time to discuss the homework assignment (especially you elementary principals). I am looking forward to reading them (some of the student shared them orally today).

By the way my policy for late homework is you get one day to turn it in, with a reminder from me, unless you were absent. If it is turned in after one day you get the minimum grade a check (max is check and two plusses). If you are later then a day, you get no credit and I notify your parents. Thus far no parental notices have been sent !

On another note the students have asked me the breakdown my grading scheme for the semester. I close grades on December 21st. Homework is 40%, class participation is 20%, the U.S. Citizenship Test was 20%, (the kids knew this) and the "terms to know" quiz yet to be administered will be 20%. I shared this with them today.

Homework: Choose one article from the one of the four UpFront magazines. Read or re-read it and be prepared to discuss why you chose to read it and to summarize the article. No writing involved. You might want to check which one they chose to read and have a discussion with your child before Tuesday ! I get the sense many of you students are enjoying your parent(s) interaction.

Have a great weekend.

Steve

Dear Students and Parents,

Good job everyone on the first part of your citizenship test. Please remember that you can raise your grade by correcting any of the questions you missed and have them to me by this Friday.

I enjoyed sitting in on some of your small group discussions on, "How does the Constitution protect freedom of expression" as it related to the Hazelwood School District v. Kuhlmeier (1988). On Friday we will share your small group work with the larger group and delve a little deeper into the First Amendment.

Homework due on Friday:

Define these terms:
abridging
petition
"redress of grievance"
freedom of expression

Also give your opinion on the following question:

Under what conditions do you think a public school principal(s) should have the right to censor (restrict) school sponsored newspapers? Explain your answer please.

Best,

Steve

Hello All,

I just read to the class my last posting on this page and noticed I had some typos, sorry about that, a bit embarrassing.

Briefly, your superstar children finished the first 40 questions of their citizenship tests in 30 minutes. We then talked about my bonus question for the test. You may want to ask them about their answers to this question: Do you study and read in school simply to get good grades or do you study and read to learn? Why ?

There will be no homework for our next class.

Have a great weekend everybody !

Steve

Dear 7th Grade Parents and Students,

Homework Reminder: Your homework was to study for the U.S. Citizenship Test to be administered tomorrow morning at 8:30 am during our regular class time. Tomorrows class will be 15 minutes longer.

*If anyone needs more time to complete the test we can arrange that for sometime on Friday or another day.

On Tuesday we had terrific discussions about about the articles we read in regards to the use of corporal punishment in schools and the severe limitation of woman’s rights in Saudi Arabia.

Looking Ahead:

*We will be going back to our “We the People” book to read and learn about , how the Constitution protects our basic rights. This unit will take about 4 weeks-6 weeks with some time in between to watch portions of Ken Burn’s latest film on Prohibition. Ken will be visiting with us on January 6th ot discuss the film and the many ramifications this Amendment to the Constitution had, as the only amendment to take away a citizens rights.

*This will be followed in mid January by reading and discussing the book “Facing the Lion”, which is about growing up as a Maasai warrior.

*Then a return to a new unit in “We the People” to read and learn what are our responsibilities as citizens. I am hoping during this time Governor Shumlin will be visiting with us to talk about not only our responsibilities as citizens but how we as citizens can participate in government and public service, and how our actions can make a difference.

Any questions, suggestions for speakers, or concerns, please let me know !

Best,
Steve

Dear 7th Grade Students and Parents,

What a great class we had with Ken Burns last Friday. Today we talked about his visit and wrote about and shared some of the salient points of his time with us. What may have caught our attention, stood out as important moment or idea he may have shared with us. Ken will be back sometime after the new year.

Today I handed out the ever popular UpFront Magazine. I assigned two readings and then encouraged the class to read other articles and discuss them with you. This issue contains some great articles parents will be interested in.

Looking Ahead - Homework

Read two articles for Tuesday: pps. 10-12 Freedom Riders and pps. 14-15 Corporal Punishment in Schools

Friday: Our first Test. Students will be taking the U.S. Citizenship Test themselves - Questions 1-40. I hope they study and do as wll as most of you did. They should have all the answers to the questions in there binders.

Hoping you all have a great holiday.

Best,

Steve

Hello Seventh Grade American Studies Parents and Students,

Todays class was fantastic as students shared their homework and thoughts on the second amendment. We could talk for another two or three classes but move on we must. What a bright and informed class of young people. They really showed me today their level of maturity and responsibility as I got hung up in a special meeting and was late for class. Although Madame Jo and William Chambers were downstairs these students took it upon themselves to call over to my office and then actually send messengers to find me. Without too much of a wrinkle we had a fine class.

Assignments for Thursday class.

Please have a question ready for Ken Burns about his work, his take on history, his study of the constitution and the amendments or any thing you want to know about what he does and why he does it.

Assignment for Friday class.

Students should have watched all or a part (segment) of one of Ken Burns films. Many children took copies of one of his films home from my collection and others said they had his films at home already.

Best,

Steve

Dear 7th Grade Parents and Students,

Today in class we briefly discussed Veterans Day and the idea of service to ones community and to ones country and the many forms that service takes: whether it be public service, community service, social service or military service. Students shared that many of them had friends, neighbors and relatives that were or had been in the military service. I asked each of them to communicate with a veteran this weekend and to tell the Vet thank you for their service. Many of the students said they had relatives who had served (my mother was in the Navy). They were a bit hazy on details so I suggested that they may want to find out what those medals in the closet were about or what it was like to be a doctor, or radio man, or an interpreter, or on the front lines, etc....

Thanks for assisting your student with his or her homework assignment. I am very proud of you parents that took part two of the U.S. Citizenship test. Your scores, as they were reported to me, were very good. You have set a high standard for your child when they take the first half of the test themselves after Thanksgiving Break.

Finally, in class today we read the first Ten Amendments of the Constitution, The Bill of Rights and then began some very spirited discussions (we ran out of time) about the first and second amendments. To be continued.

*Homework fo Tuesday:
*Say thank you to a Veteran.
*Write a paragraph or more about the Second Amendment (The Right to Bear Arms) and how you feel about the amendment and the controversy that seems to surround it in todays world. I suggested that they might use current events, talk to you about it, or do some research to help form their opinions.

*Homework is due on Tuesday at which time we will continue our discussion of this and some of the other amendments of The Bill of Rights.

Have a good weekend.

Best,

Steve

PS Amazing presentation by DR. Steven Kiruswa from Tanzania, ask your child about it.

Thursday, November 10, 2011

*Homework for Friday----Administer the second part of the U.S. Citizenship Test to your parents. Bring results to class on Friday.
The class took the test, in teams, on Tuesday and what we knew and did not know was very interesting and revealing in terms of our individual knowledge base.

*The class will be administered the U.S. Citizenship test as part of this semesters mid term grade. There was a gasp from the class when I announced this and some disbelief on their part.

*This Friday, during class time, we will begin reading and discussing the 27 Amendments to the U.S. Constitution. I am hoping this will create some great discussions about individual and states rights.

*This Friday, tomorrow - 11:00am- 12:00noon- Grades 5-8 will meet with Dr. Steven Kiruswa (in the auditorium) for a presentation about the Maasai culture, growing up in Leyeyo's village and his work as a wildlife conservationist. Please feel free to join us.

*Next Friday, the 18th, Ken Burns will be with us from 8:30am-9:30 am to discuss his study of history, the U.S. Constitution and more.
Feel free to join us in the 7th grade homeroom.

Best,

Steve

Dear 7th Grade Students and Parents,

Homework Reminder on All Hallows Eve

On this past Friday I assigned the following terms to be defined using page 11 in the most recent Upfront Magazine. You may copy verbatim or paraphrase: filibuster, supermajority, gerrymandering, moderate, Tea Party.

On Tuesday, November 1(tomorrow) I have agreed to give up our American Studies time for a presentation that relates to your current studies in English. Please find this note from Laurie Fichter.

Neil Taylor, a former resident of Westminster is coming tomorrow from (11-noon) to talk with both 7th & 8th about going blind at 29 and living independently three years later. 7th grade is reading The MIracle Worker right now, and the 8th graders read it last year. The 7th graders have just completed a 30 minute experiment of blindfolding themselves and trying to change clothes or brush their teeth. Neil lives this everyday and manages to cook, clean, and work! He is motivational and honest. 
 
We will meet in the assembly hall. 
Laurie

Finally, on this Friday, the 4th we will finish reviewing the lesson we read on this past Friday from our book We the People entitled "How did political parties develop?" We will compare and contrast this reading to the article in the Upfront Magazine about Washington's current governmental gridlock!

Best, Steve

PS - On last Friday we had a very spirited whole group discussion about the article in Upfront "Hey, Who Shrunk My Doritos?'.
Ask your child about the discussion and where their opinion fell ! You might want to ask your student to bring the magazine home, read the article first and have a discussion with your child as well. Some very interesting opinions form the students.

Dear Seventh Grade Parents and Students,

*Homework for this Friday is to read articles in the new Upfront Magazine on pages 8-11 and pages 16-17.

Upfront Magazine
As I told the students this magazine is for them to read whenever and whatever articles they want to. We will not have time to cover  the entire magazine in class, so your child and you should enjoy the articles together and discuss them together.

Last Class
This past Tuesday we continued our marathon reading of the Constitution. When we have finished we will then read the 27 Amendments. The language of these documents is beautiful but very challenging. I feel that if we are going to study the founding and framing of this document we needed to read it at least once (as challenging as it is). We will be referring back to it periodically.

Next Class

We will finish the reading of the Constitution and discuss the articles assigned.

Coming Up

*The students have indicated a desire to continue taking the U.S. Citizenship test, so be prepared for another quiz.

*We will be having a visit on Friday, November 11th at 8:30am from Steven Kiruswa, a Tanzanian and a member of the Maasai tribe.
More to come on this.

*We will be having a visit from Ken Burns on Friday, November 18th at 8:30am. More to come on this.

*After the November Break we will begin reading, "Facing the Lion". I will send along a synopsis.

*See this weeks Wednesday Notice for information about our Global Education Study for the next 5- 6 weeks.

Any questions or concerns please let me know.

Best,

Steve

Dear Parents and Students,

I am sorry I missed class on Tuesday as I was at a "Celebration of Life" service for Edmund Brelsford, Rory and Luke Cuerdon and Willa Dana's grandfather, and a long time supporter of TGS. All five of his children attended school here.

I will be seeing you all on Friday.

The homework assignment was to define these terms as they pertain to the U.S. Government

*separation of powers
*checks and balances
*legislative branch
*executive branch
*judicial branch

In class on Friday we will finish up any loose ends and begin our marathon reading of the U.S. Constitution and the 27 Amendments to it .

Then a break from homework for the Faire weekend. Thanks very much to parents and students for the donation of your time for this event !

Steve

October 7, 2011

Today Mary Heller Osgood was my substitute, as I was at a meeting with other Heads of School from Putney talking about community service. Mary had been the 7th grade teacher a few years ago and had a great day. She finished up with small groups reporting out on Supreme Court Cases and then started the lesson on "What is a constitutional government".

We will finish the lesson on Tuesday and then take a detour for a week or two and begin our study of the continent of Africa, in particularly the Maasai culture. This years school wide Global Education Theme will be about Tanzania and Kenya. As you know, in general, the continent is struggling politically, economically and climatically. This weeks homework assignment in the Upfront magazine points out some rays of hope for some of the countries on this continent.

We will compare how these countries are fairing compared to Tanzania, Leyeyo's place of birth. Paul and Sarah and Leyeyo will be doing an all school presentation on October 18 (more details to come), and we will be starting to read the book, "Facing the Lion".

In between we will continue our American Studies continuing to focus on the "constitution" and current events anx awaiting a date for our first class with Ken Burns.

The homework is to read pages 8-11 for Tuesday!

Hello All,

My teachers page is up thanks to Mary Heller Osgood. Straightforward and nothing fancy but hopefully informative.

10-4-11

Thanks for subjecting yourself to the first page of the U.S. Citizenship Test. Your children were excited about administering it and I am happy to say they reported back that most of you did very well. I used this with them as a pretest of sorts and they took the test in small teams in a gameshow format. They were allowed to use their books as a resource and three teams answered 16 of the 19 questions correctly and one team was able to answer 13 of the 19. Believe it or not the test has 100 questions, so be prepared to see more questions in the future.

Today students worked in small groups discussing the 5 Supreme Court cases the students were assigned for homework in the Upfront magazine. Each group reread/reviewed the case and decided if they agreed with the courts decision and the impact the decision may or may not have had on them now or in the future.

As a class we will not get to read each article in every issue as I am picking the ones relevant to our studies, so I urge you to read and discuss some of these timely stories with your son or daughter.

Next class we will finish discussing the other Supreme Court decisions we did not get to today and then start lesson number three in our text book We The People. This lesson will focus on "What is constitutional government?". We will also review and share the homework assignments.

HOMEWORK FOR FRIDAY

This assignment is to " Pick one of the 10 Supreme Court decisions we have read about, in both the first and current Upfront Magazine, that is of the most interest to you. Reread the summary of the decision and then delve deeper by researching the details of the case using any research tool at your disposal. (please site your source). Then write in one,  two paragraphs or more any interesting details you may have uncovered, then write how this decision has or will effect you now or in the future. Sometimes reading the "dissenting opinions" of the supreme court judges who did not agree with the majority vote opinions can yield some interesting side notes.

Good Luck,

See you Friday!