Monday, December 19, 2011

Monday, December 19th

Hello! I know there's been a bit of silence on the blog lately. I apologize for that! If you have any questions about homework, missing or makeup assignments, or anything else related to my classes, please send me an email: b s w i c k e y AT s c b c s DOT o r g (Remove spaces and change at and dot to symbols)


Sixth Grade

Today we worked with decimals - place value, finding a number between two numbers, discovering patterns, etc. The page is called "Decimal Detectives". I also passed out a Decimal Poem that explains how to work with decimals in most situations. Then the students received a "mystery picture". You do not have to finish the picture tonight as there will be time in class tomorrow to work on it!


Seventh Grade

**For the class party tomorrow, remember to bring a $5 gift that anyone in the class would like. It is NOT a gag gift. A gift certificate is a great idea, but it can be a "thing" too. Your parents should have been contacted by our terrific homeroom mom about what to bring for the party. If you have any questions, send me an email and I'll ask our mom. Don't forget that tomorrow is a Mass day so wear your Mass uniform!

Math - Today the class worked on a handout where they found the best route for Santa to take around the world. There is no homework!

Geography - We began reading Chapter 10, Section 1 - about the different ancient civilizations of Latin America. There is homework tonight - answer the questions #1-5 for Section 1.


Eighth Grade

Pre-Algebra: The homework is Angle Relationships. You should use your notes to answer the questions.

Algebra I: Graphing linear inequalities. You were all doing very well in class. Keep it up and we'll go over it tomorrow.

See you then!

Mrs. Swickey

Wednesday, December 7, 2011

Thursday, December 7th

Sixth Grade

There is no homework today. We have been working hard on decimals and filling out the decimals chart for how to work each type of problem. Today, the class learned how to divide with decimals. We were going over examples right until the end of class and I wasn't comfortable giving them the assignment without getting to work on it some in class. They will have time during class tomorrow!

Seventh Grade

Math - We have been working on proportion activities this week. Monday and Tuesday the class used proportions to find out how many "birds" (beans) were in their forests (cups). Today, each group received cut-outs of giant pencils and they used proportions, their own heights and pencil lengths to discover how big a giant would be to use the giant pencils. Most would be taller than our school! It was fun.

Geography - We continued taking notes on Section 2 of chapter 9 today. We also talked about the Nazca lines in Peru and watched a video about them. It's a fascinating mystery....giant line drawings, miles long in some cases, in the middle of the desert. Why? No one really knows!
The homework for today is to color (no marker please!) and label the outline maps of Central America and the Caribbean.

Eighth Grade

Pre-Algebra: The class got review worksheets on triangles and symmetry today. We will discuss any issues with them tomorrow as the boys had to leave class early for the Subiaco Academy presentation.

Algebra I: I'm not putting any examples on the blog, but please email me if you have questions! Just for your information, on #10, the train going from Reedley to Peoria is traveling 85 kilometers per hour not 8t! Sorry for the typo.

See you tomorrow!

Mrs. Swickey

Sunday, December 4, 2011

Friday, December 2nd

Sixth Grade

Adding and subtracting decimals. Remember, when you are adding or subtracting decimals, the most important thing is to line up the decimal points. By doing this, you are also lining up the numbers in their proper place values. Once you've done that, add zeros in all the empty places and then add or subtract as normal. Bring the decimal straight down into the answer. Also, when you have a whole number like 32, you will put the decimal point to the RIGHT of the number. For example:

32 changes to 32.

You could then add extra zeros after the decimal point. If you were subtracting 32 - 0.75, you would write it like this:

32.00
- 0.75

You'd then be able to subtract by crossing out the zeros and borrowing from the 2.

The assignment is the homework page, #1-22.

Seventh Grade

Math - Proportions Worksheet. On the first 6, you are checking to see if the two ratios form a proportion. To do this, you use cross products. So, if you had 5/6 and 10/12, you would check to see if it was proportional by multiplying 12 x 5 and 6 x 10. Since both of them equal 60, the two ratios are proportional.

When you are missing a number, you will still use cross products. For example, if you had

2/5 = b/15, you would cross multiply the two you can, the 2 x 15 and then divide that by 5.

2 x 15 = 30 divided by 5 = 6. So b = 6.

That was easy because you can tell using equivalent fractions. Sometimes the answer will be a mixed number though.

3/10 = 7/m

Here, you multiply 7 x 10 and divide by 3. 7 x 10 = 70 divided by 3 = 23 1/3

Write the remainder as a fraction.

Geography - Answer all the questions in the Activity Atlas on pages 162-167.

Eighth Grade

Pre-Algebra: We made prisms on Friday for use in figuring out surface area. We will continue on Monday. No homework!

Algebra I: Coin and Value problems. Remember, you are using substitution to solve these. First, determine the COUNT statement. How many of each thing do you have? How many quarters? How many dimes? How many tickets of each type? Then determine the VALUE statement. How much is each thing worth? What is the value of all the things?

Here is an example: Tommy had 35 nickels and dimes whose value was $2.75. How many of each type of coin did he have?

COUNT statement: He had 35 nickels and dimes. That means that all the nickels and dimes added up to 35. So, use the variables n and d for nickels and dimes:

n + d = 35

Value statement: The value was $2.75. Since each nickel is 5 cents and each dime is 10 cents, you would write it like this:

5n + 10d = 275

We took out the decimal points to make it easier. We put 5 in front of n, because the n stood for the NUMBER of nickels, so the value all of the nickels would be 5 times that number, 5n.

Now, we need to use substitution to solve. First, rearrange the COUNT statement so that you have what just n equals or just d equals. I'm going to move the d to the right side so I get what just n equals.

n = 35 - d

Now I can substitute that in for n in the value statement:

5(35-d) + 10d = 275

175 - 5d + 10d = 275

175 +5d = 275

5d = 100

d = 20

There are 20 dimes and that means that there are 15 nickels. Remember, the number of dimes AND nickels equaled 35, so I just subtracted 20 from 35 to get the number of nickels.

PLEASE email me if you need help setting up an equation!

See you Monday,

Mrs. Swickey