November Happenings

The month of November has just flown by hasn't it! We have had a busy month of celebrating, learning, and growing together at Freeland Middle School.

After each marking period, we always celebrate with a SOAR assembly that brings our student body together to share successes, honor students, and have some fun! During our assembly this month we were able to honor two students who received the Optimist Club award - Jackson Vlassis and Ryleigh Roberts.

We also celebrated several students for being students of the month/marking period! Students are chosen for this honor when they continually show effort in their academics and follow our building wide SOAR expectations.

The Choir was able to serenade us once again with a few of their beautiful songs. We are super excited for their upcoming Choir Concert featuring many class Christmas carols on December 12th at 6:00pm in the auditorium. Immediately following the Choir Concert our Band will also be performing some holiday tunes for us!

There was also an opportunity for staff and students to have some fun together with games that the student council planned.

Our students have also been hard at work with many project based learning experiences. This is a building and district initiative we started a few years ago to make sure our teachers were equipped with the tools and knowledge to engage students in 21st century learning that focused on collaboration, critical thinking, communication, and creativity. Mrs. Gotts' class did an incredible job with their project based learning experience and are showcasing their work in the pictures below. 

And, this month got even more amazing today when we had a HUMAN giving tree show up to kick off our sharing tree event. Every year, FMS students give back to local families in need by participating in the Giving Tree project. Thank you Mrs. LaFond for helping us to kick off this great event! 

What a great November our school has had, we cannot wait to see what December brings. 

Robotics

Freeland Middle School Robotics, FTC Team #5386 The Fabricators, competed on November 18^th in Marysville. The team went 4-1 in pool play earning the 3^rd place alliance captain in the playoff round. They won both semi-final matches against the #2 alliance and made it into the finals against #1. Although they did not win in the finals, their performance did earn them a spot in the state championship in Battle Creek on December 15-16. Congratulations to a great group of students from FMS!

Good Luck at States FMS Robotics Club!

Student-Led Conferences

On November 9th, our Freeland Middle School students and parents will experience their first student-led conferences of the 2017-2018 school year. Each year, Freeland Middle School hosts three different parent/teacher conferences. Two of these conferences are structured around a "student-led" conference, and one conference, in January, is a more traditional looking parent/teacher conference.

In preparation for the student-led conferences this year, our teachers have put together several helpful documents so that our students and parents understand how these conferences are structured.

If you are interested in a snapshot of what our student-led conferences look like, please watch this video which is a great example of how a student walks his/her parents through the conference to showcase strengths and weaknesses throughout the grading period.

To prepare for conferences this year, our students will have three homeroom sessions on November 7th, 8th, and 9th to finalize their portfolio of work, complete self-reflections on each of their classes, goal set for the next grading period, and practice their conference with one another. Students will follow this adjusted schedule on November 7th-9th to allow time to practice and prepare for these conferences. Students will complete a goal setting reflection form prior to the conferences to provide them a guide for talking about their progress this marking period. Additionally, on the night of conferences, they will utilize a student-led conference checklist to make sure they do not miss anything that needs to be discussed with parents.

This year, we have also created parent preparation documents to help all of our parents better understand their role in the conferences, and to help prepare for how they can support students as they walk parents through their work. We ask that parents review the parent checklist for student-led conferences prior to November 9th to better prepare for how to help your child with the student-led conference process.

We are so excited to partner with parents and students throughout the school year and hope that you enjoy the process of student-led conferences. If you have any questions in regards to the conferences please contact Mrs. Wulff at wulffr@freelandschools.net or 989-692-4032.

Parent/Teacher Conference Dates/Times:

• Thursday, November 9th 4:30-7:00pm (student-led conference)
• Thursday, January 25th 4:30-7:00pm (traditional conference)
• Thursday, April 12th 4:30-6:30pm (student-led conference)