September Newsletter- 7th Grade Team

Meet our class pets!

Please welcome our new pets to the class. They just arrived as well. They are two African Dwarf frogs, and they are completely aquatic. They share their home with a snail that helps keep things clean, and a living bamboo plant that uses their waste as nourishment with thanks to the living gravel that helps convert it into food.

Odysseus is on the left; Poseidon is on the right.

Odysseus is named after the hero of Homer's ancient epic poem, The Odyssey. In the story, he is the king of Ithaca who must battle those who would prevent him from returning home and regain the favor of the Greek gods. He is determined to return home to his wife and son.

Poseidon is named after the Greek god of the sea and earthquakes.

Ms. Bennett's 25 Books

Book Four- In Search of Snow is a fictional novel by Luis Alberto Urrea. The main character is a hopeless romantic, stuck in the middle-of-nowhere pumping gas at his dad's gas station. The story is set in the 1950s and deals with racial tension, a struggle for independence from parents, and the desire to make a life for one's own.



Book Three- Sundays at Tiffany's by James Patterson and Gabrielle Charbonnet is a fun romance. The book starts with Jane, the main character, as a lonely little 8-year-old girl. Her best friend in the world is her imaginary friend, a grown-man named Michael. He disappears on her 9th birthday, according to the rules of imaginary friends. However, they run into each other later when she's an adult and fall in love with each other. She has to figure out if he's real or if she is losing her mind.




Book Two- Jennifer Donnelly's The Winter Rose is the sequel to The Tea Rose. It continues the story of the first book's main characters, but adds the lives of two of her brothers and their romantic interests. My favorite part is that halfway through the book, for different reasons, several of the family members end up in British East Africa in the early 1900s. Given my interest in Africa, I find it fascinating to look at that part of the world during that time and how it became what it is now.




Book One- Jennifer Donnelly's The Tea Rose is a romantic story that takes place in London and New York at the end of the 19th century. The book addresses the poor working conditions of the lower class in London, the terror of Jack-the-Ripper, and making a new life as an immigrant in New York.

Meet the teacher

Welcome to 7th grade language arts! I'm your teacher, Ms. Bennett. As a chance to get to know more about me, I'm going to give you some background information about me. I'm excited to get to know each of you and your stories!

I graduated with my degree in English and Secondary Education from Southwestern College in Winfield, Kansas.

One of the most exciting things I did while in college was spend a semester studying literature at Queen's University in Belfast, Northern Ireland.


My first job was teaching 7th grade language arts at Mulvane Middle School. I was also the year book sponsor and assistant girls' volleyball coach. I spent a year teaching there.

I left Mulvane when a job opened up at Winfield High School, the school I graduated from. I spent four years teaching there and working as the head cheer coach. I taught 9th, 10th, and 12th grade English. One of my favorite classes there was co-taught with a history teacher; it was world history and literature combined.

I came to Marshall last year. I love living in Wichita and teaching at Marshall. I had a great group of students last year, and I can't wait to get to know my new group this year. One of our big projects last year was a research paper over Africa that we did along with Ms. Ott and Mr. Dunn's classes. This paper led to working with Invisible Children on The Rescue event in Wichita. Then, this summer, Mr. Dunn and I traveled to Washington D.C. where we joined around 2,000 other people to lobby our government to pass a bill to disarm the LRA and rebuild Northern Uganda. We will be talking more about all this in class this year!
I am very close to my family. I have three younger sisters, Amanda, Leslee, and Patricia.


I am the proud auntie of two of the cutest boys in the world. On January 5 of this year, my sister Amanda had a baby boy, James.






Sixteen days later, on January 21, my sister Leslee had a boy as well, Daegan. Most of my summer has been spent spoiling and playing with these two.








I also have three dogs that keep me company.

Brownie
Lexie










Elliot