We've been working a lot on reviewing important skills from last year, brushing up on them after a long summer! The kids are doing great, and I'm excited that we finally started our first official unit on Tuesday! ...Only to have it interrupted today by a presentation by Growing Strong...
Hopefully your student came home yesterday with a head full of new (or refined) knowledge about World War II! Our first novel is set during WWII, and past experience shows me that we need to front load some details about WWII before we jump into a fictional account of it. Soon we'll be learning a new nonfiction reading strategy to help us understand and comprehend nonfiction better, and we'll be writing about how our novel is based on authentic events...with some fictional additions to spice things up. (This is state standard RL7.9 - How authors use and alter history to create their fiction; comparing a fictional portrayal to that of a NF account.)
In the meantime, be asking your 7th grader about World War II, female spies, and the crazy gadgets that the government produced! Yesterday students read and researched about one particular topic, and by the middle of next week they will be perfecting and presenting Google Slides so everyone can gather the information needed to fully understand and enjoy our first novel, The Darkest Hour by Caroline Tung-Richmond. If you'd like to have a listen, the videos of me reading the book are lined to the left under the book title! But warning: once you start listening, you might not be able to stop. It's a fast paced, attention grabbing novel!!
Please encourage your student to read nightly. We are assigned 20 minutes of nightly reading each day (except for over the weekend..but I'm hoping they will want to read over the weekend anyway!), and it is important for your student to read the book they selected from the library. We had a great conversation about the challenges we face when reading - from being interrupted by siblings or chores to having to pee or becoming very thirsty - there were some interesting (and relatable!) challenges. Reading nightly builds reading stamina and flexes portions of our brains that need a work out! Research shows that students who read nightly have larger vocabularies! We read an article about how reading lowers your risk for Alzheimer's, reduces stress levels, and encourages empathy and self-esteem. (Ask your student about that article, too!) We started a reading log, which students keep in their ELA binder. Students are asked to record the number of pages they read each night, not as a grade or a "haha, I caught you not reading" thing - but as a way to help them monitor how they are progressing and to set a goal for book completion. We all know that the longer you leave a book lying around, the longer it takes you to finish!
As always, reach out to me with any questions or concerns!