The goal of the class assignment was to demonstrate basic financial literacy with regards to savings and checking accounts.  The comparison tables and persuasive essay must reflect a thorough understanding of the decision making process.

"This student’s table provided excellent details about the accounts he was considering, his essay demonstrated his understanding of the decision making process.  He was able to present logical reasons, backed up with details regarding which accounts he determined was best for him and why."

In Jamison’s independent study, he is learning the principles of home design.  This project has students incorporate all aspects of home design into a “dream home’ of their own design.

"Jamison decided to design a non-traditional home.  This presented him with unique challenges that required superior design skills and problem solving.  His design reflects both requirements being fulfilled."

The stained glass window project reflects the culmination of studying the properties of quadrilaterals and triangles.  The student’s design requires geometric accuracy in the shapes, in a symmetrical presentation which has artistic qualities and visual appeal.  The student’s work product integrates the world of mathematics with the world of art.  In this work product, Molly adds another dimension by integrating story telling into the art and the math aspects.

"Molly Hoekman’s work product is an exemplar example of this project.  Using the project guidelines as the starting point, Molly stretches the parameters to fit into her “tale of puppy love”.  Everyone who experiences Molly’s project walks away with a smile on their face."

Students were asked to create an advertisement (in Spanish) for a new gym utilizing the vocabulary and grammar from Chapter 3 of their textbook.

"Melanie’s project was selected because it was well planned, creative and attractive (eye catching.)"

The students have been working with contour line drawings.  This lesson took it a step further using wire to create a contour line drawing.  They created animals with wire, trying to make it look like one continuous line.

"Casey’s work was selected because of his focus and commitment to the project.  He gave 110% and really wanted to create a beautiful piece."

During our unit on genetics, students were required to “Create a Person” by drawing a male or female’s face based on traits that were randomly determined by the flipping of pennies.  The two pennies represented the pairs of genes that a real person receives, one from each parent.  The heads of the pennies acted as dominant genes and the tails were the recessive genes.   The students flipped the two pennies at a time and the paired outcomes of the tosses determined specific traits (which were on a handout) that would be used to create the person.  After drawing and adding colors to their new person, the students finished off the project by including a short story describing their person’s life.

"Colleen’s project was outstanding.  She created “Lyla Emberbane”, a college student in Boston studying both digital and traditional art and who enjoys eating maple sugar candy and playing lacrosse.  Colleen put a lot of time and care into her person.  “Lyla” is very well drawn and extremely lifelike."

In seventh grade science, students were asked to design a complex machine based on the work of Rube Goldberg.  

"Jacob Sifodaskalakis designed a machine called "A Simple Window Opener" which includes 22 steps to accomplish that task.   In the design, Jacob used all six simple machines including the lever, pulley, wheel and axle, inclined plane, wedge, and screw.  He did an excellent job explaining the function of each step and the simple machines involved."

The students worked on writing advice poems to a person of their choosing. The inspiration for this project came from a poem by Langston Hughes entitled, “Mother to Son”. In the poem, a mother is giving her son advice about life, but she uses a metaphor for life. In this case it was a staircase. Students were asked to choose their own metaphor for life and then give examples of hardships and obstacles they might encounter based on their metaphor.

"Jennifer was a standout for this project. It was obvious that she worked very hard on her poem content and the picture to go along with it. She has a passion for riding horses and I learned a great deal about her through this one assignment".

As a class, we read Bud, Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Kurtis.  The novel is set in the 1930’s and the main character Bud, is an orphan on the “lam”, the run. Students were asked to write an expository essay about if they were on the “lam”.   The essay was to include: whom they would bring, where they would go, and what three items they would bring along their journey and their reasoning.  Students engaged in the planning process using a power outline and then began drafting their essays.  During the drafting process, we reviewed writing skills we have been working on all year such as: elaboration, effective word choice, use of transitions and sentence fluency.  Students participated in peer conferences as well as a teacher conference and revised their drafts.  The students then edited and published their work and will be sharing the finished product with the class.  

"Danielle’s work was chosen because of her eminent ability to apply what we have learned and reviewed in class to her own writing.  In addition, Danielle worked diligently through the steps of the writing process to obtain a creative and unique finished product."

The students read fiction stories of their choice.  To share the book with the class  the students created their own mobiles.  The mobile included the book title, author, main character, setting, new or interesting words, rating of the book and an important object in the book.  Matthew shared his mobile with the class.

"Matthew’s work was selected based on his effort to create a mobile that would help other students learn about his book and hopefully want to read the book. When Matthew shared his mobile with the class, he was very enthusiastic and demonstrated a good understanding of the book. Many students seemed very interested in getting the book and reading it. "

We are engaged in a unit on poetry.  The students are learning the different types of poetry as well as writing their own.

"Jordan’s interest and awareness has grown since we began this unit.  This poem is one example of the thoughts and ideas she has about what it “happening” and /or what “should happen” in our world.  She expresses them well."

The students learned about the art of suspense through books, riddles, and music.  They learned how to write a paragraph giving small hints as to what would happen without revealing too much.

"After listening to suspenseful riddles, Charles brought in a small stuffed animal to write a riddle.  He used a sentence starte, visualized what his mammal would look like and used outstanding verbs to write a suspense riddle."

Students created stories imagining themselves as kites.  The stories support the students emerging writing skills.  As they learn more about letters, sounds and words, the student’s writing and spelling skills show growth.  The goal of this project is to help strengthen the students’ letter/sound knowledge.

"Jesse did a great job!  His “If I Were a Kite” story demonstrates his knowledge of letters and their sounds.  He made sure he had an exciting beginning, an interesting middle and a strong ending to his story.  Jess presented his kite story with confidence.  We enjoyed soaring over the clouds with him!"

Students were read the book “A Color of His Own” by Leo Lionni, an artist who created chameleon illustrations using rainbow color order found on the color wheel.

"Lila’s Lizard was large and cheerful, correctly using rainbow color order and showing the correct use of a horizon line.  (The Line where the sky and grass meet.)"