Weekly Newsletter

Investigations in Science 7
September 13, 2019

Announcements...
​ What We Did This Week…

MCPS is planning a ​STEM Festival Showcase to
be held at Northwood High School from 10:00AM
to 1:00PM on November 2​. ​ ​The event will be open
to the public, and will include a keynote speaker,
hands-on activities, demonstrations, and exhibits.
Ask Your Child…
​ aquarium), a potato, and a fire (s’more worthy). If an
● How many characteristics of living things
must something have in order for it to be
considered living?
● How many cells make up the average adult
human body?
This week, we learned about the six characteristics of
living things. Living things are made of cells, can perform
complex chemical activities, use energy (can move),
respond to their environment, grow and develop, and can
reproduce. We looked at the 6 characteristics of living
things. Students went around to different objects and
predicted which things were living by analyzing if it had all
6 characteristics or not. They looked at dried beans,
water, a pencil, fish (pretending to swim happily in an
object has 5 (or less) of the 6 characteristics, it is
considered non-living. Some of the objects were trickier
than others and students were asking very inquisitive
questions such as:
· ‘Can’t a fire grow and develop?’
· ‘Isn’t a pencil made of wood? Doesn’t that mean it’s
made of cells?’
· ‘Water will respond to a stimulus if it gets too cold,
right?’

Wednesday, we looked at what cells are and what the cell

Upcoming...
​ theory is. The cell theory consists of 3 statements. 1) All
living things are made of cells. 2) Cells are the basic unit
of living things. 3) All cells come from existing cells.
Topics: There have been an additional 3 parts to the cell theory,
● Microscopes but we are only going to focus on the top 3. We also
● Diffusion reviewed the parts of a microscope.
● Organelles
Today we are observing plant and animal cells. Students
Dates: created slides of an Elodea leaf and onion skin, then they
observed a prepared slide of human cheek cells. From
observing all three of the slides they were able to
● September 13 - Joe Corbi Fundraiser Kick
determine that plant cells are rectangular while animal
Off
cells are round. We started having discussions about the
● September 19 - Back to School Night
functions of different parts of the plant based on their
● September 20 - Cells Review Sheet due observations. We will be going more in depth with the
● September 20 - Rock Character Kick Off Day parts of plant and animal cells next week.
(Wear FMS gear or school colors <blue and yellow>)
● September 20 - After School Activity Fair P ​ d.7
● September 23 - Mindset Monday begins
● September 24 - Olney Theater Field Trip
● September 24 - Cells Assessment Pds. 1,
6, & 7
● September 27 - Cells Assessment Pd. 4
● September 30 - No School
● October 4 - Joe Corbi Fundraiser Ends
● October 4 - Early Release
● October 9 - No School
● October 14 - Open House
● October 23 - Community Circle in Science
Classes
● October 24 - Ireland Student/Parent Meeting
6:00
● October 25 - SGA Dance 7:00
● November 8 - Early Release/End of Quarter 1
● November 11 - Early Release
● November 12 - Early Release
● November 15 - Medieval Times
● November 27 - Early Release
● November 28-29 - No School
● December 5 - International Night
● December 23 - January 1 - No School
● January 20 - No School
● January 24 - Early Release/ End of Quarter 2
● January 27 - Professional Day/Possible
Instructional Day
● February 17 - No School
● February 28 - Early Release
● March 23-25 - Bay Trip - I will be out of the
building
● March 27 - Early Release/End of Quarter 3
● April 6 - 13 - Spring Break
● April 23 - Take Your Child to Work Day
● April 28 - No School
● May 25 - No School
● June 15 - Early Release/Last Day of School