Bill Ivey's Blog
	Notice the Sweetness, an early Thanksgiving blog. An Act of Hospitality, a reflection on a quote about teaching as an act of hospitality. The What and the How of Teaching (reflections on Parker Palmer, part I) The Why and the Who of Teaching (reflections on Parker Palmer, part II)

	Humanities 7
	The Humanities 7 class is wrapping up their unit on "How does power affect the targets, types and results of prejudice?" Unit projects, ranging from short stories to research papers to essays, are due on Monday, Dec. 6. In class, students have studied prejudice from the perspective of neuroscience, looking both at the evolutionary background of fear and at the connection of fear to prejudice. The roots of prejudice, unfortunately, may be programmed in to us, but the studies also hint at positive ways to handle our instincts; these concepts will be reinforced through a further reading. Meanwhile, students have continued reading To Kill a Mockingbird. In one activity, they created and presented original interior monologues of Atticus, Bob Ewell, Mayella Ewell, Judge Taylor, Dill and Mr. Dolphus Raymond as each character awaited the jury's verdict; listeners were asked to guess who the character was. Finally, we have finished our morning reading of Rabbit-Proof Fence, which stimulated discussion not just about prejudice itself but also about power, paternalism, colonialism, and other attitudes behind the forced location of the three aboriginal sisters which led to their epic escape and journey back home. The students voted to watch the classic movie, "To Kill a Mockingbird" rather than "Rabbit-Proof Fence," and this will transition nicely to the Theatre unit which begins next week. In this unit,  students will view and analyze theatrical productions. They will also divide into three groups and write short one-act plays with a common theme; these will be produced this spring by the Theatre 7 class.

	Algebra 1
	The Algebra class hit the ground running in the new trimester. We are working on writing and solving equations from complex word problems. The students are using charts and formulas to help organize the information and put it into an accurate equation. In class, they are working both as a class and in small groups to complete the problems. They are building their collaborative and communication skills through the activities. As we complete this topic, we will begin working with exponents and polynomials for the rest of December and beyond.

	Art and Identity (8th grade)
	In Art and Identity, students will be using themselves as the source of subject matter for all of the art projects.The first class was spent discussing various aspects of identity and how it is shaped. For the first unit of the term, students are looking at a bit of Ancient Egyptian art from tombs and funerary temples and contemplating hierarchy of scale, symbolism of rebirth in the afterlife, and the conventions and proportions used in the depiction of the human form. Each student will be designing and creating a relief that shows herself in an enjoyable activity from everyday life that she would like to do for eternity.

	Foundations of Language and Culture
	The FLC class has wrapped up their study of French with a strong performance on a quiz involving foods, drinks, and numbers. One of the more enjoyable activities to practice for this quiz involved having a light French-style lunch in class one day - a variety of sandwiches, cookies, and beverages. Students also enjoyed role-playing servers and filling orders, and rose to the challenge of identifying and completing mathematical sequences in French. Their research and writing for the section of the textbook on "Origins of Language" is progressing well. Students with the shorter questions have supplemented their original topics by working to answer various background questions that take their thinking deeper. Questions such as "How do you know a language is dead?" and "How do you classify languages?" are turning out to be far from simple. Meanwhile, the class is gearing up for short mini-units on German, Latin and Yiddish. The students are very excited to have the chance to learn more about whichever language they chose.

	Instrumental Music
	The Middle School instrumental class made good progress this fall. Toward the end of the term, we combined the beginner and advanced classes into one class to give the students a feel for how the larger ensemble would sound. For the winter term, we will start out a little differently. We will again divide the class into beginner and advanced groups, but we will hold sectionals once a week for the beginner class. For instance, this week I will lead the advanced class and Bill Ivey will give all the guitarists a class on their instruments. This will provide more concentrated instruction and is intended to enable students to progress more quickly. In addition to this, our weekly schedule has changed to accomodate our new vocal teacher who is filling in for Cyndee Meese while she is on leave. Instrumental class will now meet Mondays and Thursdays during F period. I look forward to working with the students this term and hearing their progress. Happy Holidays! - Greg

	Humanities 8
	Humanities 8, in the midst of the "Arabian Nights" unit, has been particularly focused on connecting the tales to current events. Often, discussions and attention from the students are drifting towards what is going on now in many of the Middle Eastern countries. This has become a very organic way to read the newspaper and think about issues today. While this unit is drawing to a close, themes recently covered, such as racial profiling and social class, will carry over to our next unit: the Antebellum South. I am looking forward to reading the tales that each of the students create.

	Rock Band
	The middle school rock band will be performing in the winter performing arts presentation. They will perform the Taylor Swift song "White Horse," sharing lead vocals between many different singers over a band including drums, bass, keyboard, cello and guitar. They sound wonderful, and are very excited for their first performance of the year!

	ESL Reading/Writing Workshop
	Students in ESL Workshop have begun doing completely individualized work. Each student is listening to a book being read aloud, either Number the Stars by Lois Lowry or The Year of Impossible Goodbyes by Sook Nyul Choi. Number the Stars is about Annmarie, a Danish girl, who helps her uncle smuggle her best friend Ellen and her parents, who are Jewish, out of the country during the Nazi occupation. The Year of Impossible Goodbyes is also set during World War II and follows the story of a family living in the northern part of Korea under first the Japanese occupation and later the Soviet occupation. Each student continues to read an independently-chosen book and to write about it in a blog. Each student also continues to work on independent writing projects, either short pieces or a longer work that is rapidly becoming a novella. The students bring energy, creativity, and hard work to the task of improving their English and are making progress.

	MOCA
	The following MOCA subcommittees have been meeting: dress code, 7th grade suffrage for Student Council President elections, new middle school traditions, and creating a brother school relationship. The traditions and brother school groups are ready to submit proposals for full group discussion and approval. The other two groups continue good work, wrestling with some contentious issues and uncovering deep down questions that have to be answered before final proposals can be agreed upon. With the change in term, it is time to elect new MOCA representatives to Student Council, one each from the 7th and 8th grades. Thanks to the two students who worked hard through the fall to be conduits between MOCA and StuCo, and represent opinions and discussions effectively.

	Winter Performance
	The Winter Solstice Presentation will take place this year at 7:00 P.M. on Thursday, Dec. 16 in the gym. Always enjoyable, the performance is free and open to the public and mandatory for students. Middle school students will be performing in five different groups: Advanced Dance, Beginning Dance, the Dance 7 class, Middle School Rock Band and Select Chorus. Students who are members of any of these groups will need to attend an evening tech. rehearsal Wednesday, Dec. 15, at 6:30 P.M. The rehearsal is expected to end by 8:30. We look forward to seeing everybody at the performance!

	Staffing Changes
	As your daughter may have told you, there have been some staffing changes this term in the middle school. As Cyndee Meese has decided to fulfill family obligations and help care for her parents in Colorado, she will be on leave the rest of this year. Tony Lechner will be taking her classes, including Vocal Music and Select Chorus. Eric Swartzentruber, with Leslie Brown and John Larson as back-ups,  will help cover her community service driving. We will miss her, and wish her well. Sam Mansfield has also joined us this winter and will be covering one section of French 1. He is also a skilled choral teacher and may be helping in that program as well. Finally, Jeremy Deason will be reprising his role as Health teacher so that Laura Lavallee may focus on her job in Admissions during the upcoming busy season. There will be biographies about our new staff members in next week's "Snapshot." If you have any questions, please email Bill.

	Rachel Simmons
	Thanks to those of you who have returned permission forms for your daughter to participate on Thursday, December 9 in a focus-group conversation with Rachel Simmons, a noted expert in girls' psychology. For those of you who haven't done so yet, please download the forms below and return them promptly to the school. If you are having difficulties with the downloads, you may also email your permissions to Bill. Thank you for your support for this wonderful opportunity! Letter from Rachel Simmons Permission Form

	Community Service
	Community service started back up on Wednesday, Dec. 1 with a mission to the Food Bank to do "meat rescue" (sorting frozen meats according to their safety for consumers) and a trip to the Dakin Pioneer Valley Humane Society to take care of cats and dogs. We will continue to work at Dakin three days a week, and at the after-school program at Federal Street Elementary School once each week. Groups volunteering at the Food Bank and at Poet's Seat Nursing Home will alternate Wednesdays. It is good to get back to these sites!