Happy Feast of St. Valentine!

First off, I wanted to thank the families that hosted the NET team while they were with us. It's great to have such hospitality among our families. The students really enjoyed their retreats and seem to have gotten a lot out of them!

8th grade has finally wrapped up the religious aspects of their culminating and have been focusing on the mass for the last couple of weeks. We will continue this until we start talking about the how the Church is organized, governed, and run on a daily basis.

7th grade continues their journey into the Sacraments and will finish this month. After the sacraments, we will be spending the remainder of the year on the Creed.

6th grade has finished Matrimony and will cover Holy Orders in the next week. We'll quickly cover the mass before moving on to morality and how to live a virtuous life!

I hope you have a great and blessed February and I am looking forward to another great month at Magdalen!

Dates to Remember:

Feb 14: Jim Williams speaks to 7th and 8th grade

Feb 15: Jim Williams speaks to 6th grade

Feb 22: Ash Wednesday, be sure to join your students at mass!

March 2: Vocations fair all day at Magdalen for our 6th grade students

Can you believe it? We're already half way through the year!

This month, 8th grade is working hard on their culminating projects. The religious aspects rough draft is due in Religion class on the 20th. Tuesday January the 16th, students need to bring to class a printed copy of where they are at in their rough draft, which should be beyond a paragraph, edited (with editing marks) and signed by their parents with a full signature of one of the parents. Wednesday the 25th the rough drafts will be passed back out with my suggestions and corrections. I really suggest students pay attention to the corrections. The final draft is due on February 3rd. In between the culminating projects, we'll be going through mass, saints, and morality. At anytime in this process feel free to email me with any questions.

6th and 7th grade will be having family life for two weeks. These students should have come home with their "parent connections" from their Family Life book. You probably have heard about this through emails from Mrs. Palmer as well. Please look over these connections at your convenience and email me if you have any questions. After our Family life sections, we'll be finishing out our Sacraments and moving on to morality (6th grade) and the Creed (7th grade).

Have a great MLK-Day off!

-Mr. Lee

Hey guys, if you are still looking for resources for your culminating Religious Aspects paper, here are a few helpers:

Bible Concordance, New American Bible Translation (condordances are lists of where a specific word is used in the Bible. They are specific to translation, so if you have a different translation than the NAB --which is the one we use at school-- this one won't be of much belp) http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0839/_FA.HTM

Code of Canon Law (Church law, really great if you have something to do with a sacrament) http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG1104/_INDEX.HTM

Vatican II Documents on the various subjects the council went over: http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/index.htm

Catechism of the Catholic Church (Online) http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/_INDEX.HTM

Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church Online (Source material for the Catechism) http://www.vatican.va/archive/compendium_ccc/documents/archive_2005_compendium-ccc_en.html

Pastoral Council for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant People http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/migrants/index.htm

Pontifical Council for the Family: http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/migrants/index.htm

Pontifical Council for Justice: http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/justpeace/index.htm

Pontifical Council for Social Communication: http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/pccs/index.htm

If all else fails, search for "Catholic Teaching on: (insert your subject here)" and look for the Church documents the sites quote, confirm with me to make sure it's a legitimate source.

Hello everyone!

We are now in December! Can you believe it! It is hard to wrap my mind around it, but we have almost finished an entire semester! It's been a great one so far.

We are now in the liturgical season of Advent. We are preparing for the birth of Our Lord! The violet of the vestments during this time reminds us of the kingship of Christ.  I encourage you to take some time this season to think about as a family how Christ is king in your lives.

This month, all classes have been working on their "Take your family to Church" essays. They have been working hard and have come up with some great ideas. These essays are being started in my class and will be finished in their grammar classes after the break.

8th grade will have some days to do research on their Religious Aspects of their Culminating projects. Remember, right now we are only starting the early stages of research. They will have more opprotunities to work on it in January. The rough draft is due on January 20, the  final copy on February 3rd.

7th and 6th grade are continuing on their journey through the sacraments and will have a test  before the end of the quarter.

If I do not get the chance to personally see you before break, I want to wish you all a very merry and blessed Christmas time!

God Bless You all.

News for November!

In class, we finished out the first quarter strong! I am very pleased with the results. Thanks for making my first quarter at Magdalen a great one!

This month all of my classes have been working on a timeline in conjunction with their papers. When finished, it will go all the way from Abraham to modern times, covering Church history and major historical events. It's essential to know where we've come from to know where we are going. The timeline is an in-class project for which there will be no homework. The paper is an out-of-class assignment and should be done at home. The paper is due on Wednesday, October 26th in class.

I passed out rubrics for this paper in class. Students were told to keep this rubric and attach it to their paper when they turn it in. However, I told them I would not provide a copy if they lost it. I have posted the file online for their convenience to print a new one. They must print it at home if they have lost it . The links for their respected grades are provided below.

Also on Wednesday the 26th is a parents meeting at 7pm for the Pure and Simple life program that we will be using for parts of the month of November. Please make a note to attend. For more information on this program, please visit their website here.

For the rest of the quarter, we will be focusing on the Sacraments and Mass.  This is especially nice since we will be covering Mass at the same time the reforms in the mass are set to take effect! I am so looking forward to it!

The rubric files are listed below:

6th Grade

7th Grade

8th Grade

See you at conferences!

I am very glad to be here at Magdalen.  I am looking forward to the new year!