It's more important now than

ever to stay connected and in-

volved in your child’s education.

Even though middle schoolers

may push parents away as they

struggle with a desire for inde-

pendence, we all know they still

need a strong support system to

see them through.

To the right is a list of 10 ways in

which you can support your

middle school student in finding

success. Some of these are

about gathering information.

Others are suggestions for or-

ganization. And finally, several

are about developing the habit of

talking with your student about

school: classes, friends, social

challenges, and organization.

I hope you will implement at

least one of these strategies to

help your student find success.

The full article can be read at

www.m.kidshealth.org.

I’m eager to see you all at our

conferences next week.

10 Ways to Support Your Middle Schooler

I N S I D E

T H I S I S S U E :

6th Grade

News

2

7th Grade

News

3

AVID

News

3

8th Grade

News

4

Assessment

& Library

News

5

Math

Information

6

AVID Impact 7

Book Fair 8

Calendar of

Events

8

W I C H I T A P U B L I C

S C H O O L S

Stucky Storm Watch S E P T E M B E R 2 0 , 2 0 1 7 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 1 7

The

Leslianne Craft, Principal

Monday September 25th

Wednesday September 27th

4:00 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.

Parent

Teacher

Conferences

- - -

Sept. 25 & 27

4:00 - 7:30

P A G E 2

Aubrey Steele, Anyia

Grant, and Cecil Hol-

lis using team work

and problem solving

skills to build a bal-

loon tower in math

class.

6th Grade News Mathematics

We started off the year in

math with lots of fun introduc-

tory and team building activi-

ties. The second week of

school, we dived right into our

new math curriculum and

began our unit on factors and

area. Students learned all

about the distributive proper-

ty, finding the area of parallelo-

grams, triangles, trapezoids,

and then applied that

knowledge to finding the areas

of kites and other composite

shapes (shapes that are made

of several other shapes put

together). We took a brief

break from Carnegie Learning

to take our math benchmark

assessments and we will finish

out this unit by learning how

to find the greatest common

factor (GCF) and the least

common multiple (LCM) and

applying that knowledge to

solving word problems. After

our first middle school math

test, we will jump right in to

our next unit and learn all

about identifying rational num-

bers and multiplying/dividing

fractions. If you have a com-

puter or tablet with internet

access at home, a great re-

source is Mathia— the online

practice that comes with our

new math curriculum. Feel

free to encourage your stu-

dent to log on and work on

some math clicking on the

Single Sign On application

(bit.ly/USD17SSO). We rec-

ommend you bookmark this

for easily returning to the

Carnegie Math site called Ma-

thia. Students should know or

know where to look for their

logon and password.

English Language Arts

English Language Arts began

the school year with a Parts of

Speech review mini-unit. We

are now in our Relationships

Unit and we will be reading

short stories, non-fiction text,

and poems that explore vari-

ous examples of relationships,

including “The Story of my

Life” by Helen Keller.

Science

Mrs. Medlam’s Science class

has researched a scientist and

created a lab environment in a

shoebox using a potato as the

scientist. It is amazing to see

the creativity of the students.

Currently, 6th graders are

learning about metric meas-

urement and using the tools of

measurement.

In Mrs. Overstake’s science

class students collaborated to

save Fred . This STEAM pro-

ject involved saving a gummy

worm named Fred, which had

tipped over its boat, a jar.

Students had to get the life

preserver out from under the

boat and get Fred back into it.

They were only allowed to use

2 paper clips as tools and

could not touch anything ex-

cept the paper clips.

S T U C K Y S T O R M W A T C H

Students collaborate

to save Fred .

Top photo l. to r.:

TreJohn Bell and Natalie

Lujano

Bottom photo l. to r.:

Thomas Gracy and

Blake Scott

Above from l. to r.:

Cayla Johnson, Jennifer

Balderas, Mia Ackerman,

and Morice Ayers.

Left, Above:

Orville & Wilbur Wright

Inventors

Left, Below.:

Dorothy Vaughn, NASA

Mathematician

7th Grade News

P A G E 3 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 1 7

8th grade level. In the spring AVID

will be recruiting for a total of four

AVID classrooms in the fall of 2018

-2019.

AVID chooses students in the mid-

dle who, with the right support,

could achieve well in more rigor-

ous courses in an effort to be col-

lege ready. AVID has a 35-year

track record of developing college

ready students. In Wichita alone

the numbers are remarkable. For

The new 7th grade class, shown in

the picture to the right and above,

are already learning skills in collab-

oration and inquiry that will pro-

vide a lifelong advantage. We

know that AVID provides this ad-

vantage so the AVID site team is

looking for even more students

who could benefit from the addi-

tional rigor and support the AVID

program has to offer. Currently

there are three AVID classes, one

at the 7th grade level and two at the

example, of the 172 AVID Seniors

who graduated in May of 2017 52% of

them were taking dual credit courses;

79% of them were enrolled in Ad-

vanced Placement or International

Baccalaureate classes; 74% of them

had parents who had not graduated

from college; and 87% of them had

been accepted into a four year college

or university. For more details on the

advantage AVID students gain, see

page 7 and the AVID website at

www.avid.org/avid-impact.ashx

English Language Arts

English Language Arts classes are

working on a relationship unit.

Students are responding to ques-

tions such as what defines a rela-

tionship, how they are developed,

as well as how relationships impact

life experiences. Students are also

beginning a review of basic gram-

mar skills.

Social Studies

Following our first week in Social

Studies, Ms. Parnacott and Mr.

Tyner are navigating a new direc-

tion. Students are learning skills

such as using a compass rose, find-

ing latitude and longitude, and read-

ing maps. In the future, if you’re

lost in the forest with only a map

and a compass, our 7th graders

should be able to lead you to safe-

ty. (Take a GPS and a fully-charged

cell phone, just in case!)

AVID Students Gain A Lifelong Advantage

Mr. Sobonya’s 7th

Grade AVID

students are

learning how to

conduct tutorials

to deepen their

learning.

Seventh graders

Jonathan Patton,

Asher Blevins,

Christian Canales,

Jaden York, and

Gabriel Hulsopple

practice

identifying their

U.S. states in Mr.

Butler Geography

class.

At left, 8th Graders: Canyenn McAllaster, Alaura Fowler, Jaylen

Hardwell, Christopher Johnson and Malachi Reed, 8th graders,

examine artifacts from other parts of the world including a Rus-

sian military hat, chop sticks from Japan, an artwork from Colom-

bia, in Mr. Butler’s 8th grade social studies class.

P A G E 4

8th Grade News Mathematics

In Math we have enjoyed get-

ting ourselves familiar with our

new curriculum, Carnegie

Learning. The students have

seemed to enjoy the online

component, Mathia. If you

have a computer or tablet with

internet access at home, a

great resource is Mathia— the

online practice that comes

with our new math curricu-

lum. Feel free to encourage

your student to log on and

work on some math clicking

on the Single Sign On applica-

tion (bit.ly/USD17SSO). We

recommend you bookmark

this for easily returning to the

Carnegie Math site called Ma-

thia. Students should know or

know where to look for their

logon and password.

Our first Module is called

Transforming Geometric Ob-

jects. We have been busy

translating, rotating, and re-

flecting objects with patty

paper and on the coordinate

plane.

In Algebra students have also

been enjoying their new text-

book! We’ve started with a

basic overview of every func-

tion and its graph that they will

see throughout the year. We

will start diving in further to

learn more about functions

every day!

Social Studies

Can you survive, on your own,

in a new place, in an unknown

land with strangers always

watching your every move?

That is what our students are

learning about the early English

settlement including lost colo-

nies, mysterious disappearanc-

es, disease and famine. This is

exactly what the settlers en-

dured as they escaped reli-

gious persecution to start a

new life in a new place! Also,

September 17th was Constitu-

tion Day. History classes

learned about the Bill of Rights

and how it specifically applies

to students in middle school.

English Language Arts

English Language Arts has been

working on learning about

relationship with the people

closest to us. Our focus this

week and for the remainder of

September will be about how

we interact with our siblings

and adults that care for us. It’s

been interesting talking about

how much of an impact close

relationships have on our

lives.

Honors students have been

working on the pitfalls of social

media and what role it can play

in bullying. We’ve looked at

several media examples and, in

small groups, students have

talked about the role social

media plays in their lives. We

are working on broadening

our thoughts about using so-

cial media as a tool instead of

as a toy.

In addition to all those things,

English Language Arts classes

are diving deeper into using

technology in the class-

room. Students are learning

to use computers to turn in

and pick up work from teach-

ers. They are also able to use

their phones outside of the

school day to download work

and pick up missing assign-

ments.

Science

As we got comfortable with

the new school year and class-

room operations, we have

spent time understanding how

to measure the physical

world. We will next turn our

attention to the concept of

energy: its conservation, vari-

ous forms, and transfer be-

tween objects. We will dis-

cuss heat and heat transfer

focusing on conduction, con-

vection, and radia-

tion. Students will construct a

solar cooker to harness the

Sun’s energy to cook food!

S T U C K Y S T O R M W A T C H

Assessment News

P A G E 5 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 1 7

FastBridge is our district’s new

screening test replacing AIMSweb.

Students will complete the Fast-

Bridge screening tests in reading

and math on computers. The

screeners will be given in the fall,

winter, and spring to help teachers

see which students are likely to

meet the end-of-year learning

goals, and which students need

more help. Since they are on the

computers, students will need earbuds

or headphones. We request that

they have a pair in their locker or

pencil pouch all year.

If your child has a low score on a

screening test and other infor-

mation shows that the student

needs extra help in reading or

math, extra instruction will be giv-

en automatically during the daily

school schedule. All of the stu-

dents who participate in extra in-

struction also take regular and brief

progress monitoring tests to see if

their skills are improving. These

tests are given weekly, biweekly, or

monthly, depending on the stu-

dent’s learning needs.

Both screening and progress moni-

toring score reports will be shared

with you by his/her teacher during

parent-teacher conferences or at

other times during the school year.

These reports help the teacher,

student, and parents know if each

student is likely to meet this year’s

learning goals.

If you have questions about your

child’s school performance, screen-ing scores, or progress monitoring

results, please contact your child’s teacher. For more information

about these tests go to the Fast-Bridge Learning website at http://

www.fastbridge.org/assessments/.

Hello from the Library. My name is

Mary Sumner and you may contact

me at (316) 973-8409 or

msumner@usd259.net. I am here

to support your child develop a

passion for learning through read-

ing and support their interest in

reading. I welcome your sugges-

tions on how I can nurture that for

your child. At any time you are

welcome to come to the Library to

view the books and material that

we offer.

Barnes & Noble Book Fair - December 3rd Join us on Sunday, December 3rd,

from 1:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. for our

annual Barnes and Noble Book

Fair. This is a fundraiser for the

library and other student organiza-

tions. Just mention Stucky at

checkout, either in the store or

online, to help us earn a percentage

of the Barnes and Noble’s profits

during this time period.

Library News Hello from the Library. My name is

Mary Sumner and you may contact

me at (316) 973-8409 or

msumner@usd259.net. I am here

to support your child develop a

passion for learning through read-

ing and support their interest in

reading. I welcome your sugges-

tions on how I can nurture that for

your child. At any time you are

welcome to come to the Library to

view the books and material that

we offer.

How to support the new math

curriculum (Carnegie Learning) at home.

Official Calendar of Events

Click Here or on the calen-

dar below to see the most

current calendar of events.

Click Here to Like

Check out the fun on FB. See pictures of your teachers, friends,

sports events and much more!

Monday September 25th

Wednesday September 27th

4:00 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.

The first Book Fair will be held during

Parent/Teacher Conferences. Please stop

by and enter your child in a drawing to

win $10 from the book fair on display.