English Unit 2: Writing a Science Fiction Story

This was a continuation of the free writing unit. For the last week my son had an assignment to write 30 lines of a science fiction story and another 30 lines of a story with dialogue. On his own, he decided to combine those assignments (yippee for initiative!!!) into a story that then took on a life of its own. In fact, he was so proud of his story, he asked to keep working on it and, eventually, get it published.

US History Unit 3: The Late 1700’s

This unit included the Constitution as well as the first two presidents. We started with Crash Course US History videos #8 “The Constitution, the Articles, and Federalism” and #9 “Where US Politics Came From.” For the Constitution, we used a detailed worksheet (similar to those on thiswebsite) with questions about what powers and duties were assigned in the articles, the Bill of Rights and the evolution of the amendments. We also studied the differences between the Constitution and the Articles of Confederacy, and finished with a graphic organizer showing the separation of powers. This unit also included the first two President's Day studies for Washington and Adams.

Chemistry Unit 2: Matter—Solids, Liquids, and Gases and Unit 3: Changes of State

Both of these were taken straight from the ACS Middle School Chemistry curriculum.  Since I added an introduction unit, we’re off by one on the numbering – Unit 2 is Chapter 1 and Unit 3 is Chapter 2. Oh well.

Each chapter had several pages of student reading, so we started with those. Next, we went back to Brain Pop for vocabulary (Temperature, Measuring Matter, States of Matter, and Matter Changing State). After my son had a solid grasp of the fundamentals, we started into the individual lessons and labs. I like the emphases on what was happening at an atomic level. That continues through the whole program.

You don’t need elaborate equipment for the labs. Each day has a simple experiment and questions focused on one concept. Even though some of these seemed overly simple, my son learned advanced facts that are normally reserved for high school chemistry, such as the affect of pressure on the volume of a gas. There are also nice, short videos that can be used for the teacher demonstration part of the daily lessons. A favorite is the slow-mo water balloon.

 

US History Unit 2: The American Revolution

We spent a week on this topic just a few months ago in 7th grade, so this unit was focused on filling in a few remaining ideas about the government during the revolution.

My son started with two Crash Course US History videos: #6 “Taxes and Smuggling” and #7 “Who won the American Revolution?” The map activity was a simple map of the colonies. We studied the Declaration of Independence with short answer questions and the Articles of Confederation with a chart detailing limits of power compared to the current Constitution. Both of these assignments came from the textbook we’re using. The last day of the unit was spent watching the second chapter of America: The Story of US (Revolution). These were this unit’s test questions:

Unit Calendar: September

Click on the calendar for a larger and clearer image.

This page was generated from the calendar spreadsheet.

 

Chemistry Unit 1: Introduction

We’re spending the fall semester on chemistry. I’m aiming for a level above normal middle school, but still below an honors high school class. The first unit was an introduction to the basic terms, periodic table, and the atom:

English Unit 1: Free Writing

English is divided into three parts each day: reading, writing and grammar. Reading is just for pleasure for 30 minutes at the start of every day. We are working our way through several workbooks for grammar, so that’s pretty straight forward. Writing is the real sticking point for English. Usually. But this year has been different.

 

My son has informational and analytical writing assignments integrated into every other subject. That means the writing portion of English can focus on narrative writing. The first four weeks of school were spent on increasing his writing fluency – the speed and ease that he gets his thoughts into sentences and onto paper. He’s always struggled with that. The goal for this unit was for him to get words on paper. I didn’t care how well he wrote or how long it took. Here were his assignments for those first weeks: