Hello 9th Grade Parents!
Welcome to the Parent letter for Freshmen. Whether you’ve had other children at Animas or not, starting high school is never easy. Hopefully, this regular update will help take some of the stress out of the day-to-day by giving you a peek into what’s happening in your student’s core classes and help you both navigate the first year as a high schooler. As a parent of an Animas senior as well, I can attest to the incredibly exciting transformation that will occur over the next four years! I’m so grateful our kids have access to an engaging and fulfilling educational experience where they feel safe and valued. We are lucky!
I’ve added links to each teacher’s digital portfolio. DP’s can be an amazing resource for students and parents and can be used for finding homework, understanding what a teacher is looking for and what’s coming up. I encourage you to explore this often!
Humanities
Stephen Sellers, http://stephensheasellers.weebly.com/
Jessica McCallum https://jessicahumanities9.blogspot.com/
As the golden, honey colored leaves of La Plata County begin to free themselves for their long slumber, the 9th grade Humanities classes will continue to dive deeply into the worlds of Sociology and Psychology in AHS’s longest running tradition — The Mask Project. Expect students to continue exploring notions of self, identity, and socialization through rigorous college level texts, novels such as the award-winning novel Mexican Whiteboy, and deep, probing research into the realms of Media Literacy, Gender Studies, Anthropology, and many more sub disciplines of the Humanities. Students will be refining masks that they’ve painstakingly crafted from scratch in order to represent the myriad ways they’ve been socialized, in addition to creating a highly- refined and polished piece of writing. Ultimately, students will begin crafting a way to curate and present their work to the community in their very first Humanities Exhibition. Stay tuned!
Math
Torrey Baldwin, https://torreybaldwin.weebly.com/
Math 1 is in the process of completing the first unit, in which students are pulling out patterns from real-world and numerical phenomena: e.g. translating tables and situations into equations, creating rules for negative number and exponent manipulation, and most recently identifying varied parent functions and function transformation patterns while working with the graphing calculator. Students have also been introduced to the Problem of the Week (POW) and are learning to work step by step through larger math problems. In doing so they have been working on generating ideas, communicating their thinking clearly, recognizing and resolving errors, and synthesizing their conclusions. The unit will conclude with students showcasing their work via a unit portfolio, and we will transition into the unit, “”Solve it!”” by mid-October.
Physics
Tina Hott, http://tinahott.weebly.com/
For the month of October, 9th grade Physics will be exploring what key features of a trebuchet impact the range of a projectile’s motion. We will be building trebuchets to deepen our understandings of Work, Energy, Mechanics, Force and Motion. We hope to host a Trebuchet Tournament Exhibition in the first part of November to showcase our learning.
Digital Art Foundations
Roxy McKnight, https://rmdp.weebly.com/
Students have been building skills in Photoshop through the Letter Portrait Project, which they wrapped up before heading into an exploration of the Birth of Art, studying art and communication through some of the earliest examples we have–cave art.
College and Career Preparation
College Counselor Jess Adamas, https://collegepreparationanimashighschool.weebly.com/
Career Counselor/LINK Internship Coordinator Janae Hunderman, https://ahsinternships.weebly.com/
Freshman will work with Jess and Janae in one of their classes in early October to take the Strengths Explorer survey as a way to start identifying their personal strengths. Students will also have their first Freshman Career Exploration Program day on October 31st at Animas High School. This kick off day will include workshops to help them learn about Career Clusters and how to identify their strengths within careers.
Advisory
In advisory, we have been focused on getting to know each other with a variety of different activities and structures, including journaling, circle time, and storytelling. You should have received your first grade check email, where your student sends home an email to you with a brief reflection and their current grades- you are encouraged to respond to this email! In the next month, we will be moving into an academic support curriculum and discussing different mindsets and personal responsibility.
Special Events
The first Osprey Parent Coffee is this Friday, October 5, 8:30 to 9:15 in Ashley Carruth’s classroom. Stop by to meet other parents and share your feedback and questions with Sean and Libby. Bring your mug–we’ll provide the coffee!
Student Led Conferences are on Wednesday, October 17 from 4:00 to 6:00. You will receive a letter soon with information about how to sign up for a time slot that works for your family. Participation in SLCs is a required activity for all 9th graders, who must be in professional dress.
How You Can Support Your Student this Month:
Engage with them about their school experience. Ask them tons of questions about their work, classrooms and teachers.
Parent Letter Feedback:
What else would you like to know about AHS?
Would you like to meet more parents and grow connection? Are you new to AHS?
Do you have a thought or suggestion on how we can support our students?
I’d love to hear from you! Have a great day and thank you for being part of the AHS community.
Melissa Stein
Class of 2022 Parent Liaison Animas High School
[email protected]