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22 Nov 2017
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Week 12: Monday, November 20th – Wednesday, November 22nd

Advisory:

This week in advisory we practiced the meditation technique of Body Scan. Next, we asked the students to reflect on various life situations. What do they think/ feel and how do they react?

Hebrew: 

This week students in HaKbatza Aleph continued to prepare their presentations on education systems in various countries around the world.

Students in HaKbatza Bet studied Compound Nouns. On Tuesday, the students will have a quiz on this topic.

I wish everyone a happy Thanksgiving with your families!

Andreea

Humanities: 

Literature and Writing: It was a short but busy week in Literature and Writing classes this week.  Students completed their last plot quiz for The Crucible and took their first vocabulary quiz of the year.  They also completed their outlines for their papers on Christopher Columbus.  Next week, students will draft their papers on Columbus and compare and contrast the play and movie version of The Crucible.  Also, students should be working on their Independent Book Project, which is due Monday, December 18th.

History: In History, students took their Unit 1 test.  Anyone who received a grade below a 80% are required to do test corrections and those corrections are due Monday, November 27th. Next week we will start our next unit on the American Revolution.

I hope everyone has a happy Thanksgiving,

Michael

Judaic Studies: 

Students completed gorgeous art projects based on favorite phrases from Sefer Devarim/the book of Deuteronomy.
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We began our next unit, which introduces students to traditional and academic ideas about the authorship and historicity of the Torah. We started by looking at Rashi and Ibn Ezra on the last few psukim of the Torah: how can it be true that Moshe wrote the Torah, if the text continues after his death? Students explored their own ideas about who wrote the Torah, and how we relate to it. Is it a divine text? The historical narrative of our people? A shared myth? Stories that teach moral lessons? Students are eager to discuss these challenging questions and to explore their own thinking about what Torah means to them. I encouraged them to bring this conversation home — it would be wonderful if you could share your answers to these questions with your 8th grader!
After Thanksgiving break, students will learn about the documentary hypothesis — the theory that the Torah is comprised of different source texts that were edited together sometime around the 4th century BCE. We will look at arguments for and against this theory, from thinkers from a variety of denominations. I’m looking forward to exploring this topic with your amazing children!
Have a wonderful Thanksgiving,
Jessica

Math: 

This week in 8th grade we are working on factoring quadratic equations and figuring out how to solve for x. They are working on understanding why we have to make the quadratic equal to zero and why there could be two possible answers. Next week, when we return from Thanksgiving, we will continue to work on Unit 4 and factoring out quadratic equations. I can not believe it soon will be December!

Hope everyone enjoys their Thanksgiving break!

Craig

Science:

This week in science students conducted an experiment to discover the difference between endothermic and exothermic reactions. They used handheld computers with an attached thermometer in order to produce graphs. This allowed students to see clearly if the reaction was endothermic to absorbed heat or exothermic to release heat. Students continue to use these hands on experiments and tools to process their understanding of science concepts. We will wrap up or chemical reactions and molecule unit next week.

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Mike Noll

 

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