Spaghetti Dinner 2/23

Dear Families,

This is to remind you that the Spaghetti Dinner will be February 23rd from 5:00 - 7:00 followed by the Phantom Tollbooth at 7:00. The cost of the dinner is by donation and the Phantom Tollbooth is $5.00. You do not need to go to both.

In order to make this dinner successful, WE NEED TO GET THE WORD OUT and encourage people to attend. Please spread the word at your place of worship, around town, at work, etc. The more people we can get to come the better. Because everything is donated, all of the money raised goes directly to the Boston trip.

We are looking for the following items to be donated.

Parmesan Cheese
Salad Dressing
Salad Ingredients
Drink Mix
Baked goods for dessert
Bread

If you make a donation and/or your child helps out at the dinner this will count towards one of their 3 fund raisers.

Thanks,
Joe Smith

jsmith3@mtsd-vt.org

Portfolio Conferences Coming Up!

Dear Pyxis Families,

How time flies! We are already well into the third quarter of the school year and it is already time for our second round of Portfolio Conferences! Educational research tells us that children benefit greatly from having meaningful conversations about their learning with important adults in their lives.  To that end, we hope that you can attend a Portfolio Conference where your child will present to you artifacts of his or her learning – work from each class that he or she has thoughtfully selected to demonstrate learning and growth.

In addition to presenting artifacts of academic growth, your child will also discuss their progress with the Universal Habits we have been working on this year: Managing Self, Relating to Others, Constructing Knowledge, and Participating and Contributing.

For your convenience, we are scheduling conferences on the evening of Thursday, February 23, and on the morning of Tuesday, March 6. Anyone is welcome – parents, siblings, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, neighbors.  If no adult is able to attend on these dates, we will gladly make arrangements for you to conference with your child at another time.

Please visit http://bit.ly/pyxisconferences2 to indicate your preferred conference times.

If you wish to meet one on one with Pyxis teachers, we would be more than happy to schedule a meeting when we see you at your child’s Portfolio Conference.

We look forward to seeing you!

Sincerely,

The Teachers of Team Pyxis:
Karen Allard
Nathan Caswell
Jana Fabri

Bottle Drive Fundraiser This Saturday!

I want to thank everyone who participated in the calendar raffle. We sold 702 tickets, raising over $7,020! This was by far the most successful fundraiser we have ever done.

Bottle DriveOn February 11th, we will be going around town to collect bottles. If you are interested in helping drive or if you would like to have your bottles picked up please contact Rob DeCicco at rdecicco@mtsd-vt.org or 893-3230 ext. 622 or Joe Smith at jsmith3@mtsd-vt.org or 893-3230 ext. 217. You can also drop your bottles off at Rene’s starting on February 4th and tell them that you would like to donate the bottle refund to the 8th Grade Boston trip.

Thank you,
Joe Smith

Academic Eligibility for Activities

On Team Pyxis, we support and celebrate all the activities that make us well-rounded and active individuals. We are happy that so many of our students play school sports, participate in the middle school play, help with student council, etc! While we want all of our students to pursue a wide range of interests and activities, we must also ensure students attend for their academic responsibilities. To that end, we will hold students to a "three strikes" academic eligibility policy. A "strike" is recorded each time a student fails to complete an assignment on time. We will inform parents after the second strike. Upon receiving a third strike, the student will lose academic eligibility for one week so that he or she can get caught back up with academics. After the week off, if the student is back on track, he or she may return to the activity.

If you have any questions about this policy, don't hesitate to contact us.

The Teachers of Team Pyxis

1/12 Humanities

There are some exciting things happening in class right now:

-Students have completed the first book of their spelling program and are in the process of taking the post-test to move onto the next book. Please check PowerSchool to see if your child is caught up with the requirements for this.
-We wrapped up our class reading of The Hunger Games last week to a round of applause by the students. What a fantastic read. It has helped to set the backdrop for our discussion of the role of government. Students are culminating their reading of the book by creating a representation of some aspect of the novel.
You are invited to a gallery walk of their work next Friday (1/20) from 1:30-2:30 in the library.
-Students are continuing to build their knowledge of the formation of the U.S. government. Students have been researching a delegate to the Constitutional Convention and we will be holding a Mock Sock Convention next week. Please check PowerSchool to see if your child has completed the various aspects of this assignment - the overview, the biography, and the script.

If your child starts making strange requests of you - needing spare socks, dirt, food, googly eyes, etc. - don't be alarmed. Our two ongoing projects are craft-heavy right now and I've encouraged folks to scrounge and reuse what they can. Thanks for your cooperation.

8th Grade Boston Update

Dear Parents/Guardians,

This is a reminder that the second installment of $25 for the Boston trip is due on January 20^th.

I also wanted to give you a quick update on our fundraising efforts.  As of today, we have raised over $12,000.  However we still have a little over $15,000 to go, so we need to continue the good effort in raising the funds to ensure that we are able to go on this trip.  We are currently selling the tickets for the Calendar Raffle.  We will also be doing a bottle drive after the weekend of the Super Bowl and a Spaghetti Dinner, which the date is still to be determined.  Please remember that each student does need to participate in at least three fundraisers or sell 20 calendar raffle tickets.

There has also been a change to the itinerary for the Boston trip.   Blue Man Group was sold out and therefore we will be going to see Sheer Madness instead, which is a comedy whodunit, where the audience is part of the show. 

As a reminder, the date for the field trip is from May 23-25, 2012.  You can pay the remainder of your balance at any time.  The third installment of $25 will be due February 24^th and the final installment will be due April 6^th.  A full refund will be offered until April 1^st.   No student will be denied going on this trip because of financial concerns.   If you need a scholarship, please let us know.

Below is the tentative itinerary for Boston:

May 23  7:00 a.m.  Leave Milton Middle School
11:00 a.m. Arrive at Emerson College
1:00 p.m.  Go to Museum of Science
5:00 p.m. Pizza at Emerson College
8:00 p.m. Sheer Madness

May 24 Small group exploration of Boston: Students will break into groups of 8-10 and visit different museums, such as the Mass Museum of Art, Franklin Zoo, Fenway Park, etc., based on their interests. Do you have any info about dinner that night – will this be on the students?

May 25 9:00 a.m.  Leave Emerson College, walk Freedom Trail, eat lunch at Faneuil Hall
1:00 p.m.  Boat cruise of Boston Harbor
3:00 p.m.  Leave Boston
7:00 p.m.  Arrive back in Milton

If you have any questions, please contact your student's team's Boston representative:

Aquila – Tom Keblin ext. 646 tkeblin@mtsd-vt.org
Cassiopeia – Joe Smith ext. 217 jsmith3@mtsd-vt.org
Pyxis – Jana Fabri. ext. 658 jfabri@mtsd-vt.org
Tucana- Amira Bakr ext. 678 abakr@mtsd-vt.org

Thank you,
Joe Smith

Science Test on Thursday 1.12

Students will take a major unit test in Science on Thursday. Student should study their notes on the following concepts learned in class:

• Feeding relationships, food webs and trophic levels.
• Food energy, photosynthesis and cellular respiration.
• Cell structures.
• Diffusion.