School: Year 8: Science

For Science in Year 8, Kayleigh had Ms Thompson (again). At the start of the year Kayleigh's class list had her in Level 3, which I thought was a little odd considering she did so well in Level 2 the previous year. Kayleigh was a little confused as well, but didn't say anything to the teacher so I had to call the school and ask Ms Thompson myself why they had dropped her down a level. It turned out to be an error and they quickly rectified it and put Kayleigh back into Level 2. Kayleigh again did well at the practical side of Science and did well in her Test. Ms Thompson said at parent teacher night how much Kayleigh had applied herself and how much she helped explain concepts to other students in the class who were having trouble. The assignment in Science was to make a Biome and Kayleigh chose to do a coral reef. For the biome itself we got a plaster kit from Bunnings of fish shapes, which Kayleigh made and painted. Kayleigh then foraged around our backyard for plants that could be used as coral and for rocks. The finished biome weighed a ton - I have no idea how she managed to ride her bike to school with it. The written part of the biome she had a little bit of trouble with, but I showed her how to format it is so it was easy to read and make sure she answered the questions correctly. When Kayleigh got home a week after the assigment was handed in she was very excited to say the she got the second highest mark in the grade. She showed me the marking sheet and I noticed Ms Thompson had forgotten to mark one of the criteria so Kayleigh took it back the next day and got Ms Thompson to correct it - Kayleigh now had to joint top mark - but then noticed (again) Ms Thomspon had only added 1 mark instead of the 2 marks that the criteria had. Kayleigh didn't have time to get Ms Thompson to fix it. Natassja brought the plaster fish home and Terence has stored them in a special place to remind us of Kayleigh.