Lolly the Trolley

On Monday, October 18th, Civics students will take a field trip to Cleveland to participate in a Lolly the Trolley tour. The purpose of the tour is to explore Cleveland's ethnic heritage as we explore the urbanization and immigration history of our great nation.

Students will have a one-hour, narrated tour of Cleveland. After, we will visit three ethnic markets (Asian/Chinese, Gallucci's Italian, and La Borincana Spanish) and finish at the West Side Market.

Students are asked to bring a $5 deposit by Tuesday, October 12th. Payment for the field trip will be made by JVS. This $5 will be returned to students the morning of the field trip to use as spending money. Additional money may be desired, however.

Our bus will depart the JVS by 8:10 and will return by 2:00. Dismissal will be at the regular time.

If you have any questions about the field trip, please give me a call or send an e-mail.  You may also be interested in checking out Lolly the Trolley for yourself.

What's Your Color Personality?

In Psychology class, we have spent a lot of time discussing different tests and whether they can tell us anything about our true personalities.  I recently came across this quiz, which tells what your favorite colors reveal about you.

Take the short quiz at the Real Simple website.  Write up a short description of your results by Friday, September 24th if you're interested in some extra credit!

Grades

Finally, I have caught up with my grading!  Today, all students have received an updated grade and any work was returned.  On Monday, October 4, students and parents will have the opportunity to access student grades through ProgressBook.  If you have not received any information about this, please contact the school office.

Back to Work

I know not many of us look forward to another week, but hopefully you've enjoyed your weekend and you're ready to get back to work.

Psychology can look forward to having our first test of the year.  Computer Applications will present the presentations we've been working on.  Civics will continue taking notes and discussing the American citizen and our rights and responsibilities.
~Mrs. Pluta

2011 Profiles in Courage Essay Contest

This is an essay contest open to any U.S. high school student in grades nine through twelve.  The first-place winner receives $5,000 cash and $5,000 in a college savings plan.  So if you don't mind writing an essay of 1,000 words or less, check this out!

The essay contest is a reflection of President Kennedy's book Profiles in Courage.  For more information, visit the Profile in Courage Award at the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation's website.

Good Start to the Week

Today was a great day.  Psychology students started working on chapter one by completing a crossword puzzle containing the chapter's key terms.  Hopefully those that didn't finish in class remember their homework!  Civics is continuing to work through the Citizenship Test.  We should finish that up Wednesday.  Students will need their Civics books on Wednesday and Thursday.  In Computer Applications, students continued to work on their personal biographies.  Part of the project includes a flyer.  No one is including a name, so we can see how well we know one another.

See everyone in class tomorrow!

1 Week Down, 39 to Go!

Well, hopefully none of you are too sick of school yet.  I think our first week together was great.  It has been nice getting to know all of my new students and to see their enthusiasm for school--especially for our first three-day weekend.

I have a lot planned for this week.

• American Civics: We will finish reviewing the citizenship test.  I have told students that it's important to hang on to this packet--it will be the basis for our final exam in May.  After that, we'll be moving on to our first unit, What is Government?
• Psychology: This week we will begin our first chapter, What is Psychology?  This chapter helps continue the course introduction we began last week.  If you have enjoyed the psychological tests, there are more to come!  This week we'll also discuss alternative sciences, including palm reading and horoscopes.
• Computer Applications: Students have gotten right to work using the computers.  Last week they began using PowerPoint to create a slide show about themselves.  This week, we'll add to this assignment to create a Personal Biography project.

I'm attaching this picture because we didn't have much sunshine over our long weekend.  Hopefully you were all able to relax and catch up on the sleep we're all missing out on.  I'm looking forward to getting back to school, and I hope you are too!

~Mrs. Pluta