September 30, 2005

Dear Carmody Middle School 7th Grade Computer Class Parents and Their Children:

Many, many important things to be aware of with regards to "Final Grades" for the first grading period.

1. Students fully understand that missing assignments are not be desired because on the last day of grading period makeup deadline (which was yesterday), all missing grades automatically turn in zeros. This scenario is much like the story of "Cinderalla." In order to assist your child in getting the best grade possible, Dr. Data has done the following things to assist.
   
   
• Extended makeup through today, Friday, September 30th. Even had a few students at the dance come into the computer lab and continue working.

• Allow students to submit all makeup assignments on Monday, October 3rd, during the first five minutes of class. Thus, giving students the weekend to makeup everything once and for all without any penalities. No exceptions after this final, final extended deadline.
• If students need to download assignments, the first ten days of the word processing unit can be made up. To download, simply go to: http://www.kuzmich.com/carmody/claris_syllabus.html or click on the links below. If you don't have Internet access, your child should have printed out the missing assignments here at school and should have taken them home.
• This situation of missing assignments will not exist as frequently for future grading periods because the Carmody Middle School Parent Portal will be up and running soon. Both parents and students alike can check their academic status with all classes ASAP on a 24/7 basis. Note: Dr. Data rarely leaves school without finalizing daily assignments and grades.

Required Word Processing Assignments

If you need to download Adobe Acrobat Reader to view any of the assignments below, please download it by clicking on the following link: http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep2.html and follow the on-line directions. It is free and is a useful program for other uses as well.

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Days of 1st Grading Period Word Processing Instruction

1. Introduction to the PC Lab on how to sign-in, security and use the computers - First day of class in each semester

2. Knock Knock Jokes - Assignment #1 - B-3
3. Principal Letter - Assignment #2 - B-4
   


4. Using ClarisWorks and More Jokes- Assignment #3 - B-5 and B-6



5. A Fractured Fairy Tale - Assignment #4 - B-7 and B-8



6. Back and Forth to the Future and Crazy Alphabet - Assignment #5 - B-8
   
   
7. Pete's Wardrobe - Assignment #6 - B-9
   
   
8. Peanut Butter and Jelly Sandwich and My Spell Chequer - Assignment #7 - B-10
   
   
9. Oops and Double Answers - Assignment #8 - B-33 and B-34
   
   
10. Everybody, Somebody and Nobody and Limericks - Assignment #9 - B-25 and B-26
    
    
11. Extra-Credit Assignments:

See Dr. Data for the following assignments. They can be done at home or in class for extra credit at 25 points per assignment:

Your Favorite Words, Crossword Puzzle, Practice Activity, Hello, My Name Is .........., The Crazy Alphabet, Definitions, and others.

Required Korean Pen Pal Letter

There will be a 400-point two-part pen pal letter assignment to a student in Korea which will be due in either October or February of each semester A 300-point preliminary Korean pen pal letter is due on Friday a week before the final copy in either October or February of each semester. The preliminary draft for 100 points can be hand written or typed. See separate hand-out dealing with Penpal instructions. Penpal instructions. More Info Coming Soon.


• Please e-mail Dr. Data at: jkuzmich@earthlink.net since he has much difficulty reading all his e-mail in two different accounts.
  
  
• If you and/or your child needs to see the latest assignments, please go to: http://www.kuzmich.com/carmody/claris_syllabus.html and you can read and even print out the daily assignments as they are already listed by day. Note: Fridays usually do not have new assignments since we do typing tests and makeup workout. For example, day 7 was done on Thursday of this past week and day 8 was on this past Monday and I modified things this week so that we only went up to ten day by yesterday, which allowed students to makeup missing assignments and work on their Korean pen pal letter all week..
  
2. I need some V.I.P. assistance for helping our students complete the daily assignments at home whenever they don't finish them in class (which means homework). Namely, it is recommended that students saved their word processing documents in Rich Text File format which is the "O+" blood in the word processing industry. Thus, you child can read, print and save their assignments at home and/or a school and have complete readability. To save in Rich Text file format, simply go to "Save As" in your word processor at home or school and select the file format as .RTF or Rich Text File. Usually, there's an icon for file type, and one can select save different file formats bases the default file type of the word processor.
   
   Please give your child a 3.5" floppy diskette to use in my classes because I showed the classes how to save in Rich Text File format so they can take any or all of their work home on a daily basis to complete there or bring back to class to print out in school. I gave a ton of floppies out today to help make it easier to complete their work at home. Knowing that students can easily misplace floppies, I need your assistance to make sure that they take good care of their diskettes so they can earn credit for doing all the work! Note: the assignment generally require the following ingredients to earn full credit.
   
   
• Heading with their name, date and period on three single space lines at the top of the paper with right justification
• Then double space below with the enter key and put the title of the assignment in 24 to 36 point type size.
• Then double space again with the enter key and type the entire assignment as given on the assignment paper (top to bottom) with nothing left out!! The instructions are noted so hopefully, the student will follow the instructions verbatim.
• Select any easy to read type font. Avoid script looking fonts, old English or crazy Wing Ding type of fonts.
3. An alternative to using a floppy diskette for taking work home is to print out their work at the class period and then take it home and continue typing at home on a new file where they left off at school. Then, printout the home file and staple with the school printout and bingo, the assignment is now complete if they follow the instructions as specified above!!!!

   Hope this helps our students complete their assignments for submission to me. Note: any assignment not typed correctly in full will be graded with a lower grade. But, it can be completed later before the end of the grading period and resubmitted to me without penalty. Note: Friday, September 30th is the end of the first grading period. I did advise that all makeup work be completed before Friday, September 30th.

4. All The Right Type orders were extended through today and will be ordered Monday morning without fail. If you should desire to order, Dr. Data must have the order by focus period on Monday at 7:30 a.m. Today, there was one student testing at 62 words a minute with zero mistakes to illustrate how rapidly some students are progressing in just six weeks and their score was 214 points on a 100 point test!

5. Preliminary drafts of the Korean Pen Pals were due today. Length was at one page in length with several paragraph, double spaced type or hand-wirtten on two pages with topic sentences in each paragraph in CSAP standards. Note: the final copy is due on Friday, October 7, 2005 with two pages, double spaced type. Important that students follow CSAP procedures with good grammar, spelling and syntax. For your information the Korean Pen Pal is the final project for the word processing unit. It will be mailed to Seoul, Korea to Mr. Young-Hun SHIN, English Chairperson in Kwangju district in Seoul, Korea. Their Korean students have studied English since 1st grade and basically read and write as well as our Carmody students. Please start your search for pictures, stamps and other memorabilia because the letters will be mailed shortly after Friday, October 7, 2005. For specific details about this final project, please go to: http://www.kuzmich.com/carmody/penpal_908.html. Please note that photos and memorabilia can be included in the letter when it is mailed to Seoul, Korea. Start collecting such items for "a picture is worth a thousand words." Dr. Data will mail and pay for the air mail postage to Korea. For every Korean pen pal letter your child receives from Korea, they will earn 40 bonus points. Therefore, the letters need to be well written and include some memorabilia. And best of all, students will earn a total of 400 test points for CSAP compliant Korean Pen Pal letters. 300 of these points will be on the second grading period.

Hope this information is helpful.

Till next time,

Dr. Data