Winners of Ms. Stephens' 8th grade read-athon be shared today---keep posted!  Thanks to Ms. Kim Claire who came to speak to our students about book selection for the Justice Unit as well--please review her blog when time allows...  http://informedteenshwlibrary.blogspot.com/

Congrats and thanks to our Student Council for their work and efforts with many of our students involved in Girls Scouts on our "THINK" before you speak week!  Let's avoid gossip and rumors throughout the weeks and days ahead....

Joselinne B

Chloe B

Margaret B

Emma C

Nicole E

Mackenzie H

Emme M

Julia S

Lily T

Also--amazing efforts generated by our 8th grade student Alexis L for her work in conjunction with our Student Council in their efforts in collecting gently used books for the Rafaki Orphanage in Ghana, Africa.  Amazing service and outreach in a global fashion....

Parents, please keep in mind that MCAS is starting up in just a few weeks!  Please make sure to check the calendar on the website..

Mr. D.

Welcome Back, everyone!  We hope all of our MRMS families had a wonderful vacation...  Please make note that Quarter Three academic progress reports have been made available via Edline as of 2/22. 

Happenings...

Great to see our Grade 8 students working on creating visuals in Art class with Ms. Concannon.  Students collaborating to design group sketches of a head, body, and legs that have no seeming connection to each other----interesting! 

Grade 6 Ancient Civilization projects on Ancient Egypt--amazing work in Ms. McKay's and Mr. Barker's classooms--and thanks to our parents for their efforts as well!

Grade 8 music students creating small music movies incorporating timing and melody via IMovie on the new Macs in the 2nd Floor computer lab!  Well done, Ms. Linkin!

Justice Unit books are being selected--thanks for the presentation by staff at our local library to give our students some interesting choices to consider.

History Day Competition is schedule this weekend at Beverly High School.  Thanks to Mr. Walker and all of our students who will represent our school community so well!

Mr. D.

Academic Progress Reports

We hope everyone is enjoying vacation week.  To all MRMS families, please make note that Quarter Three Academic Progress Reports have been posted to Edline Accounts as of 2/20.

We look forward to a safe return on Monday, February 25th.

Mr. D

Interesting video

MRMS families,

The MRMS faculty enjoyed a 'flipped' faculty meeting this past week.  In their own rooms with small groups of colleagues, faculty watched the video and then commented their reactions via a google document.  Using the google document allowed faculty from all over the building to collaborate with each other 'in live time' via the internet.  Without question, some interesting dialogue that surfaced about how schooling has changed for us--and for our students as we prepare them for a globally competitive world.

What are your reactions as to what schooling should be as we move into the 21st century? 

Please feel free to respond! 

What is effort?

-Some answers as we build some common language at home and at school:

One of the key finding is educational research over the last several years is that effective effort in school allows students to 'grow smarter' through perseverance, resourcefulness, and resiliency.  

As a parent myself, sometimes we can struggle with the concept of effort as a developed skill--yet below is some specific information on the topic that was developed by Jon Saphier and his research team.  Saphier has identified the skill of developing effective effort as 'attribution retraining'.  Through experiences at home and school, students often attribute school academic success on innate ability "he/she's just born smart" and/or mere chance "I just was lucky when I scored a good grade on this test".  Having spent almost 10 years in a middle school classroom, I can attest that when students were provided the clear strategies to their learning and then applied effective effort, they achieved the most academic success!

Here's Saphier's work--enjoy!

"What is Effective Effort?

(taken from The Skillful Teacher: Building Your Teaching Skills, by Saphier, Haley-Speca, Gower; 2008; pp. 299-301)

Students must believe that they have control over their success.  “Attribution retraining means getting students to change their attributions of success and failure away from factors over which they have little control (luck, task difficulty, innate ability) to the factor over which they have the greatest control: effort.  Teaching effective effort means making students aware that effective effort (effort that results in the achievement of a goal) is a combination of working hard and applying effective strategies.  Emphasizing the strategy component with students is essential to giving them an explanation other than lack of ability when they are working hard and aren’t yet seeing progress….Students need to be taught what effective effort means and how to employ all six of its attributes:

1. TIME: Do I put in sufficient time to get the job done?

Although time alone is far from sufficient to accomplish difficult academic tasks, it is absolutely required.  And it is true that some students truly don’t realize that several hours of outlining, drafting, and editing may be required to make an essay meet a high standard.

2. FOCUS: Am I working efficiently and without distraction?

Work time should be efficient and low in distraction.  There is plenty of latitude for individual style in defining focus.  Some students don’t find music, even loud music, distracting while they work.  In fact for some it is a way of blocking out other environmental distractions.  But talking to friends about the upcoming weekend or watching TV while doing academic work is not compatible with the concept of focus.

3. RESOURCEFULNESS: Do I reach out for help and know where to go for it?

Students need to know to reach beyond themselves for help, know how to do so, and where to go.  Sources of help may be other people (study buddies, homework help centers, relatives) or other sources (reference books, online services, reference librarians).

4. STRATEGIES: What strategies am I using or could I use?  Do I have alternatives when a strategy isn’t working?

Students need to know and use appropriate strategies to deal with academic tasks.  A voluminous literature confirms that students do significantly better in academic work when their teachers explicitly teach them strategies for improving reading comprehension, organizing and revising writing, and reviewing, remembering, and summarizing (Paris, Wasik, and Turner, 1991; Pressley, Borkowski, and Schneider, 1987)

5. USE OF FEEDBACK: How or where can I get feedback on what I am doing?  What does the feedback tell me about how to improve my performance?

Good students listen to and look carefully at the feedback they get from teachers and use it to improve their performance.

6. COMMITMENT: When something is difficult, do I stick with it?  Do I really try hard?  Effective effort is grounded in will.  You have to want to accomplish something to put out the effort and organize yourself to complete a tough learning task.  You don’t have to like it, but you do have to be committed to trying hard.

Fancy Friday today!  

Thanks for the Student Council for organizing this fun activity over the last few Fridays. Thanks to Emma for the awesome t-shirts!

We hope you all enjoy a wonderful vacation.

Grade 6 Ancient Civilization project are absolutely amazing!  Great efforts by Ms. McKay and Mr. Barker for all of their leadership.  Outstanding perseverance by our 6th grades over the last 5 weeks.  We're proud of you!

Grade 8 students having the annual Friends of MRMS breakfast tomorrow morning followed by the tubing trip to Amesbury.  Special thanks to Ms. Kelly for organizing the trip and to the Friends for the scrumptious goodies for our students!  Please be reminded that students must wear appropriate attire for the weather---although it's a bit warmer outside, no shorts, please....

Best Buddies Valentines Day gathering taking place today!  Great fun.

To all of our families who have yet to pay for the various after-school extra-curriculars and or/intramurals, please make sure you forward those fees as soon as possible.  Thank you for your cooperation.

Great appreciation to the grade 8 families who came to the High School information night this past Monday---and special thanks to our 6-12 curriculum leaders for their thoughtful and welcoming presence.

We hope all of our families have a wonderfully relaxing and safe vacation.

Mr. Driscoll