LANGUAGE ARTS AND HISTORY:

Seventh graders are steadily writing their DAR essays for the annual contest offered by the Lonestar DAR chapter. St. James students have participated in the DAR essay contest for the last 5 years. This year’s topic, women’s suffrage, is proving to be challenging and interesting to the students, according to student D.P. The students must imagine that they are living in 1919, at the height of the suffrage movement and Congressional passage of the 19th Amendment. Each student has created a character to discuss the pros and cons of women’s suffrage on American society from that character’s perspective. Not only did 7th graders research the origins of women’s suffrage in America and use note-taking strategies to gather pertinent facts, but they also have converted their notes into an organized format and then inserted their opinions to create a cohesive and expressive essay. Students are deftly combining three different writing styles--narrative, expository, and persuasive--into one essay. How amazing that a multitude of skills are utilized to produce just a few pages!

MATH AND SCIENCE:

St. James 7th graders had a very unique and rare learning opportunity in Science. They’ve been studying anatomy recently. Dr. Benjamin DuBois and Dr. Jason Yost conducted a lab in which they guided our students through the process of dissecting hearts. A cow heart and two pig hearts were donated by a local butcher shop. The doctors were able to help them actually see and touch the things they’ve been studying.

It was an amazing experience being able to see the details of the muscles, the intricacies of the arteries and veins, and establish with visual understanding the actual flow of our blood through the heart and our bodies. Thank you very much, Drs. DuBois and Yost! The students, and teachers alike, learned many things and have a deeper level of understanding of the circulatory system.

Our first week at school was full of firsts! This was my first year teaching at St. James Day School, and it was the school’s first time in recent history to have a 7th Grade class. We spent the week getting to know one another and getting accustomed to the new routine of changing classes - another first for many students. We filled the week with fun learning experiences such as BreakoutEDU and the Marshmallow Challenge, while practicing the Four C’s of 21st Century learning: Critical Thinking, Collaboration, Communication, and Creativity. It was a wonderful way to start the year! - Mrs. Ayers

Here are some insights from our 7th Grade class in Math and Science

My favorite thing was the BreakoutEDU after lunch. We also started science and learned about Science Olympiad. In Leadership class we discussed what it means to be a Spartan. Overall the first week at St James Day School was an amazing experience.

~C.A.

My first week was extraordinary with three people. I enjoy math and science with Mrs. Ayers because she is a fun teacher. Mrs. Jordan’s class is awesome because I like reading.

~D.P.

The new 7th Grade is already fun. It is more relaxed than any other year, even PreK where you get naps. I feel that we are enjoying the few minutes between classes, since we now get to switch classes.

~D.Y.

7th Grade Language Arts, History, and Latin:

This year, blog posts will be written by students so that they can reflect on their learning. Please read on from D.Y.:

This week we made lightbulbs about we will create, do, and think, and then we stuffed them. Mrs. Jordan is going to hang up the lightbulbs. Also, every day we start by reading for 10 minutes and we really like this. On Friday we wrote letters about Code Talker, the book we read over the summer. It was about the Navajo Marines and how they helped us win World War II by being code talkers and using the Navajo language to send messages.