Welcome back to Grass Valley Charter School!
We hope that you had a great summer and are excited to come back to school. Your 7 th grade teachers are Katie Surface and Juliette Parks. Katie has been at GVCS for 3 years, and this is her 2 nd year teaching 7 th grade. Juliette has returned from teaching overseas for 2 years, and this is her 7 th year teaching middle school. We have been working hard to get the classrooms ready, creating fun expeditions, and are looking forward to meeting everyone next week!
We are including the Middle School schedule for next year. For those of you returning to GVCS it will look a little different from last year. We will start by building crew each morning, before starting
Core Block A, which will be time for our science expedition. Our first expedition is called “My Body,
My Habits, My Choices,” which will focus on the human body from the inside out. Due to fieldwork impacting math classes, math will be taught in the core classrooms instead of switching classes. 7 th grade will be using a new math text, called Course 2 Mathematics, by Prentice Hall. This is based on
Common Core standards. We also purchased new science textbooks: Life Science, by Glencoe. The electives will also be a different format; you will have each class for a 5 week block once throughout the year, and the classes will continue to be 6-8 grade mixed. We have hired new teachers for drama, P.E., movement; creative writing (with Mr. Maddock), art, and computers. Core Block B will focus on
Language Arts.
We are thrilled to be able to share teaching responsibilities for our expedition content during
Core Block A. We will be switching classes a couple times a week. Students will get to know both 7 th grade teachers through this model, and this allows students to become accustomed to different styles and personalities of teaching, which will help them in their academic career.
All middle school classes will be going to Synergia, in August, to help build crew and character traits. This is a high and low-ropes course in North San Juan. We will need drivers to drop off students and pick them up when we are finished. This is not fieldwork where parents can join the activity, but we thank you for driving. Katie’s Crew will be going August 28 th , and Mrs. Parks Crew will be going the
29 th . Please keep those dates in mind and let us know if you can drive.
Accompanying this letter is a supply list. You do not need to have everything the first day, but we included a list of the first day necessities. Elective teachers may require additional items, so you will have about a week to gather everything you need.
We have been working hard on getting our classrooms ready for you. Katie’s class is Room 21 and Mrs. Parks is Room 23. They are located in the back hallway by the playground, and have a nice view of the courtyard and the New Climbing Wall. We will be in the classrooms on Tuesday, August
13 th from 2:00-3:00 if you would like to stop in for a sneak peak of the room and a quick “Hello.” We will be working, so this is a brief visit, and we can chat more once school starts. If you can’t make it, we will definitely see you on the first day of school, Wednesday, August 14 th at 8:30am!
See you soon,
Katie Surface and Juliette Parks
(Your 7 th grade dream team)