April 12, 2010

Dear Parents,



I think that we have come full circle! We started with “birds” at the beginning of the year as our theme for Walcamp was based on Matthew 6:25 – 26:

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food and the body more important than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or stow away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?”

Tomorrow we will begin caring for birds in our classroom. On Tuesday I will be picking up fertilized chicken eggs that will be kept in the incubator in our classroom. We are hoping to have baby chicks in 21 days! These eggs will help us in our study of embryology. This will be our science unit which follows our heart unit.

Our classroom is showing all types of signs of new life! This is a great reminder of the new life which is ours through Christ! Besides our incubating eggs and our worms, we also have lots of plants growing. Our tomato plants are looking great, our lettuce is quickly growing quickly, our pea seeds really took off over spring break, and our basil plants are beginning to show signs of healthy growth. We’ve also planted some flower seeds that are just beginning to germinate. We could use your help with our plant project. Our tomato plants are getting close to the time of needing to be transplanted into a larger container. It would be helpful if each 6th grader could bring 1 (or 2 since we each grew two different types of tomato plants) large potting container (approximately a gallon size) and if possible a tomato cage. That way, as our tomato plants get larger, they will have room to grow and also support from the cage. When it is warm enough, each 6th grade will be able to bring their tomato plants home with them. If they have the plants growing in a large container you wouldn’t have to transplant in into the soil unless you wanted to. Also, if anyone could bring in a bag of garden soil, that would be helpful. We are going to be adding some of the soil from our school compost bin in with the soil as a fertilizer.

Some of our 6th graders wanted to grow pea plants so we got some pea seeds. As I said earlier, they are really taking off. We transplanted our pea plants and added sticks we found outside to the containers for our plants to attach to – I’ve never grown pea plants inside before. If anyone has any ideas how to best care for these plants until we are able to take them outside, please let me know. Our plants will thank you!

Speaking of plants and seeds, our class has raised $686 for the “Giving Gardens” mission, our class mission, since the beginning of the school year. We are hoping to raise $1,000 because this would be amount necessary to provide two gardens to families in need of food. We are hoping to do one more fundraiser for our mission this year. If you have any ideas, please let me know. Thanks!

Chapel this week will be on Wednesday instead of Thursday.

A summary of our week includes the following:

Religion: We will complete our unit on our Lord’s Passion this week. We will take a test on this unit on Tuesday of next week. Your child has a study guide for this test.

Memory: Our memory quiz on the 5th Petition (all) will be this Wednesday. Our memory scores continue to improve. On last week’s memory there were 65 points. With 14 students in our class, that totaled 910 points. As a class, we scored 907 points out of the 910 points possible. Great job 6th graders!

Science: This week we will complete our study of the cardiovascular system and our heart dissection. Your children are great dissectors! On Friday we will take a test on this unit. Your child has a study guide for this test. We will be “chunking” the study guide into parts and learning a little each nigh so that by Friday we will know the material well. Please encourage your child to spend some time each night this week studying for this test.





Our PTL will be hosting a spaghetti dinner this Thursday from 5 – 7 p.m. I hope to see you there!

In Christ,

Sheryl Duff