In Ms. Brown's ELA class, 7th graders read Roald Dahl's short story, "The Landlady," to conclude a unit on foreshadowing and suspense. In conjunction with the National Junior Honor Society's annual Thanksgiving Food Drive, 7th graders donated tea to bring to life the central plot device in the story. To analyze the importance of tea to the story's antagonist, students wrote explanatory paragraphs on index cards, which were arranged together to form a teapot display above the generous donations of green, black, and herbal teas!

In Ms. Brown's ELA class, 7th graders were challenged to extend their understanding of how setting impacts mood in Kristen Lewis' short story, "The Nothing," through a "spooky tree" photo contest. In the text, a key setting detail that contributes to the story's uneasy mood is a tree "that had a face caught in a scream." Therefore, students had to find their own local "spooky tree" and explain why - if it were placed as a setting detail in a story - it would also give readers an ominous feeling. By identifying and explaining two specific "spooky" features of their chosen tree, 7th graders captioned their photos.  The winning photo is pictured, and the description read, "At Village Green Park, there is a tree with fallen leaves and burls/bumps on the trunk, which gives me an uneasy feeling. The fallen leaves are creepy because it makes the tree look like it is dying and has not been tended to. The five burls/bumps on the trunk make the tree spooky because they resemble the form of a baby that is trapped in the tree, which is unnerving." 

To immediately immerse students in the setting of Roald Dahl's short story, "The Landlady," 7th graders were greeted with window signs in their English classroom door - a yellow chrysanthemum photograph, a B&B notice, and a travel marker to a nearby lodging - as well as a tray of vanilla and chocolate tea biscuits and lemon Lipton iced tea. 7th grade enjoyed munching on the tea and biscuits during an interactive read-aloud of the classic suspense story. Throughout the reading, the 7th graders were able to understand the other classroom changes, like the plush parrot hanging in a cage at the front of the room, the fireplace video crackling away on the Smartboard, and the small plush dachshund on the floor beneath it. 7th graders love when the story - from its sights to its tastes - comes to love in their own classroom.

As an annual tradition before starting a play adaptation of Charles Dickens´s A CHRISTMAS CAROL, 7th graders researched various Christmas customs in Victorian England to build background knowledge about the story´s historical context. From parlor games and Christmas carols to holiday dinners and decorating, students compared and contrasted Victorian traditions to modern day holiday customs. To write an authentic text for a real audience, 7th graders summarized their research in a 2-paragraph, friendly-letter formatted holiday card and delivered them to their assigned a HNOM faculty/staff member or administrator!