Jacksonvi l le Middle School

What a great start to the new school year at Jacksonville Mid-dle School. JMS welcomed back its 8th grade “veterans” to campus while also welcoming a very enthusiastic new group of 7th grade students. We look forward to a great school year full of fun and learning.

We have made a few chang-es and introduced some new exciting things for this school year.

Each Wednesday, students are being exposed to character education lessons in their sec-ond period classes. We are basing the lessons on the Six Pillars of Character from the Character Counts program. Extra time has been built in to second period in order to facili-tate these lessons and an-nouncements. The early results of the lessons have been excel-lent. Students have been post-ing their work all over the cam-pus.

Students who exhibit good citizenship in and out of the classroom have received the privilege of going outside to the courtyard after they finish their lunches in order to hang out and

socialize with their friends. Students really seem to enjoy the extra time with their friends. Those who continue to behave and keep current on their class-work will continue to enjoy this privilege.

Continue to look for new

and exciting things throughout the year!!!

—Mrs. Searcy, Mrs. Whitaker,

Mr. Ricketts, Mrs. Holman, Mrs. Sanders, Mrs. West-brook, Mrs. Farquharson, Mr. Best, Mrs. Juarez, and Mrs. Gould,

1s t S ix Weeks

U P DA T E F R O M T H E F R O N T O F F I C E

October 2014

Special points of inter-

est:

• Check and sign your child’s agenda each week

• Volleyball Home Games– October 6, 13, and 20

• 7th and 8th Home Football games– October 9

• 8th Grade Home Football game-October 14

• 7th grade Home Football game-October 20

• Volleyball Pep Rally— October 20

• 8th grade Home Football game-October 28

• JMS 8th grade Home Foot-ball game– November 9

• Red Ribbon Week– Octo-ber 27-31

I N S I D E T H I S I S S U E :

Language Arts 2

Math 3

Science 3

History 2

Art 4

Athletics 4

BRAVE BANNER

F A L L B A C K I N T O R E A D I N G

Mrs. Lucky reports that the

JMS library has been a very

busy place during the first six

weeks. She reports that over

4,000 books have been

placed in circulation since

the beginning of school. The

most popular titles so far

have been Diary of a Wimpy

Kid: Hard Luck and Diver-

gent.

Mrs. Lucky would also like

to thank Dr. Rosemary

Chance for donating over

250 new books to the JMS

library. Our students love

being the first to check out

one of these brand new

books!

Keep reading and we’ll

see you AT THE LIBRARY!!!

Jacksonville Middle School Office Staff

Find us on Facebook at:

JACKSONVILLE MIDDLE

7th Grade—7th grade Reading stu-dents are start-ing the year off

right! We began our reading jour-

ney by learning the genres of Liter-ature. Students are reading library

books from every genre. We are excited to see them pass their bi-

weekly A.R. Tests.

Students are also adding to their

vocabulary by learning 15 new vo-cabulary words every two weeks. It is

a treat to hear them use these vocab-ulary words in every day conversa-tion.

The 7th grade Reading teachers

are excited about this new group of students. We look forward to seeing how much our students grow over the

remainder of the year.

7th Grade Writing—Seventh Grade writing classes are focusing on the basics of grammar, mechanics, and

usage. We have reviewed capitaliza-tion rules, the four functions of a sen-

tences and the appropriate end punc-tuation marks, sentence structure,

compound, and complex sentences. We’ve also begun teaching the Shur-

ley Method. This helps students to sharpen their editing skills by iden-tifying and correcting a variety of

errors, including spelling. After reviewing some of the basics during

the 1st Six Weeks, we will ease our students into the complete writing

process during the 2nd Six Weeks,

which includes Personal Narratives and Expository Compositions. The

writing teachers , Mrs. Evans, Mrs. Pierce, and Mrs. Welch, are busy steer-

ing and motivating our students to obtain advanced performance on the STAAR Writing test in March. We are

not settling for anything less than the best from our students every day.!

8th Grade—8th grade reading stu-dents are off and running! With this

new group of students, teachers are enthusiastically designing lessons that

are memorable and interesting.

Reading is where it’s at in language

arts class! Students are challenged to read a book per week and we use our

books to help us understand new con-cepts. Students are asked to read at

least 30 minutes each day to help stay current on reading requirements.

We’re also taking vocabulary to the nest level with Reader’s Vocabulary

and Academic Vocabulary. Reader’s Vocabulary deals with prefixes, suffix-

es, and root words while Academic Vocabulary helps us get ready for academic challenges we will face this

year and through college.

We are VERY excited about our students’ accomplishments thus far this

year and look forward to continued

greatness from the 8th Grade!!!

Page 2

H I S T O R Y H A P P E N I N G S

L I N K T O L A N G UA G E A R T S

about European Colonization

and how different nationalities

of people for various reasons

came to live in America. They

will now be learning about peo-

ple and events that led to the

American Revolution. They will

be able to relate how taxation

without representation in the

colonies and debt in Great Brit-

ain helped fuel the desire for

independence in the Colonies.

They will learn how social, polit-

ical, and economic issues all

worked together to create ten-

sion. They will study through

the Boston Massacre and the

7th Grade—The

first six-weeks has

been a huge suc-

cess in Texas Histo-

ry classes. Students have

learned so much about the land-

scape of Texas and about the

explorers that helped populate

the North American continent.

During the second six-weeks,

we will continue to focus on

Spanish exploration and how

the Spanish culture has

shaped Texas.

8th Grade—The 8th grade U.S.

History classed have learned

What’s

up JMS??

1st Six Weeks

Boston Tea Party to the “shot

heard around the world.” Stu-

dents will then embrace the

American Revolution along with

the battles and heroes of that

time.

There’s big happenings in

American History!!!

JMS School Nurses would like

parents to know the following:

7th Grade Vision and

Hearing screenings will

take place on Tuesday,

October 21st.

It’s flu season. Please

make sure to get every-

one in the family a flu

shot. As a convenience,

flu shots will be offered

at JMS on Monday, Octo-

ber 27th from 3:30-5:30.

Cost is not known yet,

but look for more infor-

mation to be sent home

with your student.

If your child is running a

fever, please do not send

him/her to school. We

want to make sure to

limit the number of chil-

dren exposed at school.

Clinic News

Brave banner

7th Grade—The new

school year has started smooth-

ly and successfully. Students

have been learning basic con-

cepts that they will be using

throughout the year in addition

to reviewing material from last

year. The 7th grade curriculum

starts with the addition, sub-

traction, multiplication, and

division of decimals , fractions,

and mixed numbers. Convert-

ing between decimals, frac-

tions, and percentages was also

covered this six weeks. These

skills are the foundation of the

lessons in the future.

Please share with your child

how you use math in your job

and daily activities. Support

them by checking their home-

work and making sure they

have their supplies each day.

Contact their teacher with any

questions or concerns.

8th Grade—It’s been an exciting

start in 8th grade math this year.

Students began by learning to

use problem-solving strategies to

help when working real-world

problems. Our focus has been on

the Real Number System: classi-

fying, converting, and ordering

real numbers. Scientific Notation,

learning how scientists convert

very large and very small num-

bers to make them workable, was

a very exciting lesson.

Dilations was our next mission.

We learned to use scale factors

to enlarge or to reduce an image

or object. Using Shadow reckon-

ing shows us a real-world use of

using proportions and gives real

meaning to similarity. Active en-

gagement with note-booking and

journaling has been a big success

in our math classes.

Next up for 8th grade math is

Proportional Relationships and

Slope.

Algebra—Algebra students have

been working on using the distribu-

tive property to simplify algebraic

expressions, as well as solving

multi-step equations.

Mrs. Snyder would like to give a

shout out to the following leaders

in her Math classes:

Shiloh Canady

Maribel Chaparro

Brandon Garcia

Anealya Horn

Arianna Richardson

Jose Suarez

Way to go ladies and gentlemen!!!

Page 3

W E I R D S C I E N C E

M A T H M A N I A

which includes the periodic table and the atomic struc-ture. This is one of the toughest units, so instruction will continue into the second 6-weeks. Parents, all stu-dents have textbooks with tear out pages designed to be written on. They are keeping folders in the classroom that contains any “loose” paper work. Additionally, all stu-dents are keeping an interac-tive notebook that contains notes, diagrams, charts, and foldable work that they create in class. Since 8th grade is a “tested” year in Science, our department highly encour-ages parents to help stu-dents review and study the material they are learning. This will help reinforce the concepts so they can be suc-cessful on the STAAR test in the Spring. Thank you for helping your student succeed.

Seventh grade science students began the first six weeks build-ing on their prior

knowledge of the scientific inquiry methods and how to apply them. They conducted many different measurement labs that included volume, density, and mass.

In the second six weeks seventh graders will tackle photosynthesis. Students will work with hands-on activities to understand how photosyn-thesis effects their everyday life and what would happen without it.

In the very near future, 7th grade science students will create a Super Hero project of their choice to represent a part of the cell.

Eighth Grade—The 8th grade Science department began the year studying chemistry,

This year’s cheerleaders

want everyone to know

they had an awesome time

performing at the first Pep

Rally. They also need your

support at the football and

volleyball games. Come

out and chant along with

them as the Braves and

Maidens fight hard for vic-

tories.

JMS IS THE BEST!!!

The next Pep Rally will

be a volleyball pep rally on

Oct. 20th. Bring your spirit.

Cheer “The words you speak

today should be soft and

tender...for tomorrow

you may have to eat

them."

—Unknown

They are also being taught to accept respon-sibility in all things they do. We also expect our athletes to lead coura-geously, which means acting with integrity at all times. Please make an effort to come support our 7th and 8th grade ath-letes at all upcoming games.

GO BRAVES!!!

The JMS Braves have been working hard in football this 1st six-weeks. Each team is geared up and focused on district competition which is beginning very soon. In addition to teaching football, the Braves have been learn-ing what it means to be Jacksonville men. They are being taught to reject passivity, which requires active participation in all school requirements.

B O Y S A T H L E T I C S

Action in Art Mrs. Mann’s 8th Grade Art students are learning excellent character traits and social skills on top of Art skills. Ask your student about the balloon activity in Mrs. Mann’s class. It was a huge success. Students have been working on value and line through drawing, creating “monstrous” bookmarks and have also com-pleted “tessellations,” arranging their own designs using geometric squares (which stu-dents alter) through rotations, translations, and reflections. This will help them when STAAR Math comes around, and the artwork looks fantastic in the hallways!

Mrs. Murphy’s 7th Grade Art students are continuing the unit on color which is one of the 7 elements of art that are explored in 7th Grade. We have color wheels to draw and watercolor, small “warm and cool” crayon pieces with initials and triangles painted with acrylic tints and shades. We’ve had some excellent “loose” drawings, too, based on the book The Dot. This was a character lesson taught to second period that fo-cused on positive character traits. Students were able to illustrate the thoughts they had about the message of the book and included their own positive statements with their illustrations. Soon, 7th grade will begin the construction portion of their “Elements of Art Mobiles!” This will take patience and teamwork, so check with your students on the progress often.

Thanks to all parents and guardians who came to open house. We look forward to working with you all.

We’re on the web!

www.jacksonvilleisd.org

Spirit Day Don’t forget Friday’s are Spirit Day at JMS! Stu-dents may wear jeans and their favorite Jacksonville ISD school shirt.

Let’s show the community how proud we are to be members of JISD and JMS!

Girls Athletics The Fightin’ Maidens volleyball teams are representing well this season. In fact, both 7th and 8th grade are in 3rd place currently in the district. Both teams have their eye on a district championship when the district tournament begins on October 25th in Lufkin. We are very proud of how much they have learned about the game and how they are taking care of business in the classroom.. They are committed to being champions and have learned to play as a team and family. Thank you for all of your

support of JMS!!! Go Tribe!!!