Note Cards, Databases and Research, Oh My!

Students in grade 8 are researching topics related to social justice or rather injustice. They are considering the questions: How can learning about the past help us make just and fair decisions in the future?  What secrets can we uncover about the past?  How can I make a difference in the pursuit of fairness? The topics range from child soldiers to domestic abuse as students pursue topics of their interests and curiosity.  Right now they are furiously locating books, databases, and websites as they take notes to report their findings.  Check out the pictures below to see students at research!

We Love to Write Haiku

Seventh and eighth grade students are participating in the JAL International Haiku Poetry Competition.  The theme for this year's contest is "Festivals."  After brainstorming ideas, students came up with many different festivals in Hawaii and around the world.  Several suggestions included the Merry Monarch Festival, The Festival of Lights, The Lantern Festival, the State Fair, Mardi Gras, the Day of the Dead, and several others that we were not so sure about!  If you have a festival idea, please share it with us so we can write about it.  Here are a few haiku poems from the grade 7 class.

               Lanterns
         Hundreds of lanterns
     Drifting across the night sky
          Turning into stars
                            by AF

New Years
The moon stares down
Watching the bright sparklers shine
Enjoying the lights
by TE


                             Day of the Dead (A Spanish Halloween)
                                           The ancestors come
                                       We revel in their wisdom
                                  Their graves smoke and steam
                                                 by IC

8th Grade 2011 Memory Gallery

Students in grade 8 are looking back at the year 2011 and reminiscing (one of our vocabulary words this week) about a memorable event that made an impact on their thoughts or lives. The photo memory could be a personal, community, state, national or global reflection. An attention grabbing title and caption had to be written for each photo that students selected.  If you are in the neighborhood, please take a look at our 2011 Memory Gallery between rooms 310 and 311 and see the events that made an impression on our students.