October 19, 2018
Quote(s) that resonated with us this week:
“No one cares how much you know until they know how much you care.” ~ Theodore Roosevelt
“No one ever injured their eyesight by looking on the bright side.”
“The best way to predict your future is to create it.”
“We can complain because rose bushes have thorns, or rejoice that thorn bushes have roses.”
“Don’t decrease the goal, increase the effort.”
Dear Saxe Family,
We have much to be grateful for at Saxe Middle School. Each week we are fortunate to be able to share a snapshot of what goes on during the school day and throughout the week. It is our hope that you get a sense of the pride that our teachers take in educating, our staff takes in supporting our mission, and most importantly, our students take in truly enjoying the “learning journey” they are on. This is a wonderful community to be part of and we thank you for taking the time to follow along with us. This week, enjoy a peek at Celebrate Saxe, the Grade 6 Red Team Mountain Workshop trip, Science, Social Studies, Physical Education, Saxe Gourmet Club, Dr. Marc Brackett, and more. Have a great weekend!
Dave Gusitsch
Principal, Saxe Middle School
Upcoming Noteworthy Dates:
10/22 Board of Education meeting
Want to check out the weekly from last week? Click, here.
Saxe Family
Thank you to Ms. Van de Graaf! After thirteen years of service at Saxe Middle School, Ms. Van de Graaf has retired from her position as Administrative Assistant in the Saxe Main Office. We thank her for her help in keeping our inventory flowing and office running smoothly over the years! Best wishes in your future ventures…
Celebrate Saxe
Thank you for participating in Celebrate Saxe! What a truly amazing couple of weeks of excitement, consideration, and fun. Enjoy this great video that shows our Saxe students (& some staff) having a blast during some of the CS activities…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0sNsGIot_4Q&feature=youtu.be
Please note: while the grade-level/team challenge is over, fear not, you are still able to donate if you wish to help raise the bar to new heights! Just visit the Saxe PTC website, here. When you visit the site, you will see the incredible total that the CS campaign has brought in over the past two weeks! Again, 100% of proceeds go directly back to our students in the Saxe community. Thanks again to all involved!
Saxe-News
Check out this extra, “Special Edition” Saxe TV news show that highlights the recent Grade 5 Fun Run (from “up above”). Thanks to Mr. Petrakopoulos and his team for putting this bonus-edition together! Enjoy…
Grade 6: Red Team
The 6th-grade Red Team participated in the Mountain Workshop on Tuesday, held at Calf Pasture Beach. Students split up into groups to participate in activities designed to promote teamwork, problem-solving, and positive shared experiences. The challenges were met head-on with great attitudes!
Grade 6: Social Studies
Our sixth-grade social studies students are culminating their Discovering Cultural Landscapes unit learning about the relationship between the physical landscapes of ancient Egypt. As a part of the unit, they examined a variety of sources and learned about the work of social scientists and the questions that they are still pursuing today. Students are now are taking on the role of historians creating a question of their own with which to research.
Here are a few of their questions:
- What daily life like for ancient Egyptian children?
- Why did the Egyptians use Hieroglyphics?
- What happened to King Tut?
- What did the ancient Egyptians do for fun/entertainment?
- Why did the Egyptians believe that the pharaoh was a god?
- What was the ancient Egyptian economy like?
- What were the crimes and punishments of ancient Egypt?
- What was the mummification process?
- How did the Egyptians stay healthy?
- How did ancient Egyptians communicate with each other?
- How did ancient Egyptian women have time to care for their children and work?
Be sure to ask your child what their question was and what they learned from their research!
Saxe Physical Education
Each PE teacher is focusing on a different unit with their class teaching the knowledge, skills, and confidence to empower students to enjoy a lifetime of healthful physical activity. Students have been learning and building their health-related fitness during physical education class. As students begin class they participate in a dynamic warm-up to prepare their bodies for a range of physical activities that will enhance their overall health and well-being. Some of the activities may include, spikeball, volleyball, team-building exercises, project adventure, ultimate frisbee, and more!
Grade 6 Connections
The newly rolled-out Grade 6 Connections program is a series of ten lessons that will work to foster support, idea sharing, learning from each other, developing goals and working towards them, growing in self-awareness, and thinking about current and future selves. The format is such that small groups of 6-8 students meet with an adult and work towards these goals. Below students work on creating and signing their group’s “working agreements” which outline important things to remember about how we want to treat each other.
Grade 7 Science
Students in 7th-grade science have been working on developing their final models this week to communicate their understanding of the Lava Lamp Phenomenon. Starting off this unit they developed a class consensus model and driving question board with a guiding question of “How does a lava lamp function?” For the past six weeks, students have been engaging in various science activities to uncover the science concepts that apply to the real world example of a lava lamp. They have learned about matter, physical properties, physical changes, thermal energy/temperature, density, phase of matter, and phase changes. Through the discovery of this information, students worked collaboratively to meet the Next Generation Science Standard: Matter and Its Interactions Performance Expectation: “Develop a model that predicts and describes changes in particle motion, temperature, and state of a pure substance when thermal energy is added or removed.” In addition, students viewed their classmates’ models and provided constructive feedback regarding additions, revisions, or questions about the work they were viewing.
Around Saxe:
We were fortunate to have Dr. Marc Brackett with us to continue our important work on emotional intelligence. Dr. Brackett is the Director of the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence (EI) and a world-renowned speaker/facilitator on the topic. The focus of his work and our presentation included EI in learning, decision making, relationship quality and mental health; the measurement of EI; how EI training enhances student and educator effectiveness and improves school climate. Thanks to our wonderful PFA/PTCs for sponsoring and supporting this meaningful work.
Saxe “Gourmet Club”
Did you know that Mr. Bedard can cook? He hosted the “Gourmet Club” and helped several students make some delicious pizzas from scratch. I “heard” they were delicious!
Saxe Campus
You may notice some of the new light pole banners being installed around Saxe. Thanks to our great PTC and our maintenance crew for always helping to spruce up our campus. We Are Saxe!
Saxe Alum:
Benjamin Clay attended Saxe Middle School and is now a sophomore at NCHS. He is a Boy Scout in New Canaan’s Troop 286 and is currently working on his Eagle Scout project. For his project, he has chosen to collect new and gently used winter outerwear, clothing, and boots for The Open Doors Shelter in Norwalk. The shelter needs items for ALL ages and ALL sizes before it gets too cold outside. He is hoping Saxe Middle School will support his project.
A large plastic bin has been placed inside the lobby to collect and hold donations. Items may also be picked up by calling 203-594-1253. For those who prefer to make a bulk purchase online, he has provided a link, here. All items collected will be donated to the Open Doors Shelter. More information can be found here
Have a great week!
Saxe Resources:
Website: https://www.ncps-k12.org/saxe
Twitter: @SaxeMS
Weekly: SaxeMS.com
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