AIG News January/February 2024
Margaret B. Pollard Middle School
Important Dates
Upcoming Events Calendar:
- February 19, 2024 ~ Teacher Workday/No School for Students
- March 5, 2024 ~ Teacher workday/No School for Students
- March 28, 2024 ~ Early Release/Last Day of 3rd Quarter
- March 29, 2024-April 8, 2024 ~ Spring Break/No School
- April 29, 2024 ~ Teacher Workday/No School for Students
- May 27, 2024 ~ Memorial Day/No School
- June 7, 2024 ~ Last Day of School
National Junior Honor Society Information
- Students who are eligible for membership into the National Junior Honor Society will be sent formal invitations and information about the process via their emails in mid-April after their 3rd quarter grades have been finalized.
- Unfortunately, teachers and parents are not able to nominate students for membership. There are specific criteria that must be met. Please review the following link from the National Junior Honor Society website for more information: LINK
Meet the Pollard AIG Teachers
Mrs. Liner
Mrs. Stone
AIG Classes/What's Happening in Our AIG Classes
AIG/6th Grade Reading ~ The students completed a project highlighting the persuasive techniques of writing; Ethos, Pathos, and Logos. They chose a non-profit organization, conducted research, and created a billboard illustrating all three persuasive techniques. Our current unit, researching the Titanic, has included conducting research on the historical aspects of the Titanic, beginning with the construction and ending with the sinking. They have practiced summarizing and paraphrasing material to avoid plagiarism and they have tracked their research using source note cards. The unit will conclude with a project in which the students will create a goole slides or Canvas presentation.
AIG/7th Grade Reading ~ The students completed their True Crime research papers in January and began their Identity/Literary Elements analysis assignments. They answered Identity questions about the selections and created mini projects to accompany a series of short stories, poems, and musical lyrics. The next unit we will begin in mid-late February is centered around the science fiction story, "A Sound of Thunder," by, Ray Bradbury. Students will complete a series of reading comprehension and text connection activities. The culminating activity will be a choice menu assignment that will support the 7th grade standards.
AIG/8th Grade Reading ~ Students finished the, A Christmas Carol, unit and took the final book test toward the end of January. They have recently been working on a collaborative group project using a small collection of short stories with plot twist endings in conjunction with these reading skills: figurative language, symbolism, and internal/external conflicts of the protagonists/main characters. The stories are: "The Last Leaf," by, O. Henry, "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge," by, Ambrose Bierce, and "The Necklace," by, Guy deMaupassant. Students are working on "Petal Maps," which are graphic organizers that resemble the petals of a flower, to compare two of the three stories that they read and answering a series of 6 questions to target the skills listed above with their groups.
AIG/6th Grade Math ~The students concluded their unit on long division with decimals, fractions, and percents. After modeling the task, students participated in a scavenger hunt calculating long division of whole numbers and decimals. Percentages were incorporated with the Cactus Grill activity where the students practiced calculating food orders with BOGO free or 20% off the special of the day. Additionally, they had to calculate the tax and tip. It was an engaging and challenging activity. We are currently working with integers, positive and negative, and absolute value. To illustrate the real world connection to this unit, the students practiced finding both positive and negative integers using a sea level chart as the number line with sea level being 0. They enjoyed calculating both addition and subtraction problems using the sea level chart.
AIG/7th Grade Math ~Students have been working on solving one-step inequalities and the rules surrounding whether to "flip" the inequality sign if they multiply/divide both sides of the inequality by a negative number. We have completed task cards, how to set up and solve inequalities using the information in a word problem, a series of practice notes to take back to class and utilize as a study guide, as well as a couple of in class games: "Trashketball" and "Zonk!" to help support the math work they have been completing in the classroom.AIG/8th Grade Math ~ The 8th graders have been working on the following math skills to support the math standards in their classes: equations (two-step), functions/function tables, and scatterplots (just practicing).
Margaret B. Pollard Middle School
Website: https://sites.google.com/a/chatham.k12.nc.us/ms-bell-s-class/home
Location: 185 Granite Mill Boulevard, Chapel Hill, NC, USA
Phone: (919) 969-0070