Grade 6 and Who We Are

 The first UOI unit for this year was themed around Who We Are. The focus for Grade 6 was on beliefs and values. At the start of the unit they looked at their own beliefs and values, and how these differed from the beliefs and values of a friend in their class. They then looked at where beliefs and values come from (society, religion, media, etc.). The class researched various religions to look at the beliefs people get from following these religions and on the similarities between major religions. They then looked at beliefs and values that come from society and nation, and how these beliefs and values change over time even within the same country. Next, the class looked at politics and how politicians focus on beliefs and values to win elections. Finally, the class ran a political campaign for the Shadow President of Abroad. This campaign was run with candidates never showing their face, name, or voice. 

Portfolios

 Dear Parents,

The Grade 7 students have been working hard on their online learning portfolios and are excited to share their work. They will continue to update their portfolios regularly, so be sure to check them out!

Middle School Site

Thank you,

Ms. Stacy.

Coming soon...

Exciting news! The Grade 7 students are working hard to create something new. They are working on an online learning portfolio where they will share what they are learning. Each student will be publishing their own website and will be updating it with samples of their work. Think of it as a mix between the regular blog and Seesaw.

The students have been busy preparing this new platform in Design class. We will share it with you when they are ready. Watch this space!

Ms. Stacy.

Review of the Past Weeks

 

• Math

• Inequalities

• During math we are now studying how to solve inequalities. It was similar to equations which we did way back. We used graphs as well, solving real-life problems such as the costs of currency exchange. It started off with the bigger than or less than alligator which took my guard down but the questions were hard. We are still continuing our study for inequalities.

  
  
  

• Science

• Animal Cells

• Now during science, Fatma and I are recapping about cells and going more in-depth. We created a slide-show to present our learning to Mr. Ugur. We went into depth about the nucleus, mitochondria, lysosomes, ribosomes, endoplasmic reticulum, Golgi apparatus, and the cell membrane, wow a mouth full. These are considered to be the important parts of the cell. After presenting our slideshow, being evil (hahaha just kidding), Mr. Ugur got us to make a 3D model of a cell. We used paper mache for the outer layer and we bought materials that looked like the insides of the cell. I think the end product was pretty good, pictures below.

• Body systems

• After finishing the cell we have started learning about body systems. First off, we started off by researching the topic on our own, writing the things we already knew and new information we didn’t know before. We are going to start with learning about the nervous system, but I had more interest in the circulatory system but oh well, we’ll have to wait until then.  

• Design

• Website making

• With design, we mainly focus on computer-related subjects and one of them was trying out website creation. Mr Aidar found an easy way to create it, but it was still tedious and time-consuming. We went through a lot of trial and error but managed to finish it. Now I understand why programmers and web designers get paid well.

• Coding

• Another thing we did was coding. It was a simplified version, but it was easier to understand for novices. It has the same aspects as scratch (a website we use in school, we also used to have a scratch club). It also had somewhat of a vibe of a game, which for me made it more interesting and fun to learn. There were several levels where we would have to dodge enemies and collect items, but the catch was that we had to pre-program the character’s movements and give it commands. This was harder than it seemed and it took many tries until I got the hang of it, yet the levels increase in difficulty every time making the entire experience a challenge.

• English

In English, we read and discussed the classic novel, “Lord of the Flies”. Lord of the Flies is about English school boys left in the island with no one living during the war. We studied the book by making a poster. In the poster we wrote about characters, symbolism, themes, and more elements of the story. The story was hard to read but it was very interesting to read because I (we)  didn't read these kinds of books. I think the author William Golding is a genius. 

• Social Studies

We are learning about “Culture” in Social Studies. Learning about culture is very fun and hard at the same time. Fun part is that you are learning a new thing that you didn't know before, and the hard part is that you need to write, make something to show you understand the topic. We learned about the culture of some countries and business culture. I learned that all societies all have their unique culture. 

• Art 

In Art class we are now drawing modern art. Modern art is very enjoyable because you can draw what you want  and what color you want to use. Being free to express yourself is a very important thing for us people. If we didn't express ourselves we would be stressed.  In art we learn genres of art and how to express ourselves. 

• Japanese

In Japanese class we read a passage about how people misunderstand the actions of people and animals. We focused on how gorillas' actions were misunderstood by humans. For this topic we created a short comic (manga). It was our first time making a manga but we liked to do it. We also did calligraphy. Calligraphy, a staple in Japanese culture and the art we did during Japanese class a while back. I used to do calligraphy at my elementary school but it had been several years since I last tried making it a real challenge. I think the final product was pretty good but I hope you look at it with a light heart as calligraphy in general is a difficult art to perfect.

Blog #4, about last two weeks.

Dear parents,

     Recent weeks were so intensive. We had to events: Parent’s morning and Numeracy week. During Parent’s morning, parents had come to the math lesson, where we started to learn graph theory. One of the activities was a logical peg solitaire game when parents were helping their children to solve it. I think that they had fun to do it. Big thanks to all parents for visiting our school. And the last week was a numeracy week which had everyday activity. On Monday we played Gameshow slideshow game, where children tried to answer math tricky and logical questions.

     On Tuesday we had a chance to participate in Math photo contest, and on Wednesday we have been involved in math rotation activities as well. On Thursday for Math art, we did a project called “Sierpinski triangle”. 

And on the last day of the week, it was a shopping day, where students had an opportunity to spend all the “Abroad money” they had been earning not only by taking a part in the different school activities but doing all their best during classes as well.
     
     Additionally, here is the overview from the specialist teachers as well.

     This week, we continued to discuss ecosystems. Students drew a picture of an ecosystem of their choice. Also, this week we began discussing food chains. Students created their own food chains from paper cups.

     Ms. Kapra, a social studies teacher.

     We finished reading our dystopian novel titled The Giver and continue our analysis of themes and story elements.  We are comparing our society to the Community and how different our lives would be in the land of Sameness.
In celebration of Numeracy Week, we played a math card game in which teams had to use an order of operations to equal a sum of 10 using as many cards as possible.

     Ms. Katherine, English teacher.

Grade 8 students have read an informational text about "Bio-Logging". They are conducting research about different types of animals and how "Bio logging" is used for them. Grade 7 students have been working on making a speech using a memo.

     Ms. Chiya, Japanese teacher.

     And as a kind remind next week we will study until Wednesday (included), and on Thursday - Friday as you may know, school will be closed due to G-20 event in Osaka, Japan.

Blog #3, review.

Dear parents,

Between 20-24 may we had a literacy week and we joined a few activities with our students. One of them was READING BUDDIES and our class went to Pre-K A. Here are some highlights from that activity. On Friday students participated in a school Spelling Bee activity.

 

On design lessons, to strengthen coordination, academic, emotional and artistic skills we started doing embroidery. I think that the children liked this activity, and after these classes, they will be developing their eye-hand coordination, color theory, design, and planning skills also. This is the result of their work.

In the course of math lessons, we studied linear algebra and covered topics like solving linear equations, calculating the slope of a line and plotting graphs of those equations on the x and y planes.
Mr. Aidar
In science, we have been investigating the relationship between velocity, distance, time, and acceleration. Students made some remarkable connections and solved some tricky questions.

Mr. Ugur

During English classes in celebration of Literacy Week, we participated in a number of activities to promote reading. Each student read a book and prepared a video book report to promote it. Students selected a poem for Pocket Poem day and wrote their own poems as well. We took a walking field trip to the local library and spent some time looking at and reading books.

In addition, students have begun reading The Giver by Lois Lowry. We are analyzing the different elements of a story including plot, setting, characters, genre, and various aspects of a dystopian future. Students are developing a story map of the essential elements of the story and learning new vocabulary words.
Ms. Katherine

Review of the past weeks

Good day all!

Starting from the beginning of the term we started to learn digital design and programming on the basis of mbot robots. So, students tried to assemble and to program it. I think that they had lots of fun controlling the robot by their own instructions. There were some assignments such as robot should pass all the obstacles on his way. It was challenging for them but at least they could make simple codes to do it. Here are some highlights of doing it.

Here are a few pictures and  from the English classes by Ms. Katherine. We have been reading Night of the Living Dummy and learning lots of new vocabulary.  We have also written a letter about an invention describing how it has improved life and increased globalization.