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Renie Petropoulos » Ms. Petropoulos' Biography

Ms. Petropoulos' Biography

Ms. Petropoulos is excited to be wearing several teaching hats at Decatur: 4th-grade Homeroom, 3rd-grade Mathematics, and Makerspace. She grew up in the suburbs of Chicago and holds her BA in English Language and Literature from the University of Chicago. She earned her MEd in Elementary and Middle-School Education from DePaul University in Chicago. Ms. Petropoulos is endorsed to teach middle-school English Language Arts, French, Social Science, and Science.

 

This is Ms. Petropoulos' eighth year of teaching with Chicago Public Schools and her very first year at Decatur. Prior to Decatur, Ms. Petropoulos taught Exploratory Science (STEM Lab) for four years to Pre-K through 8th-grade students at Saucedo Elementary in Little Village. Before that, way back in the ‘90s, she taught Library Media to Pre-K through 8th-grade students and then First Grade. After that, she worked full-time for eighteen years creating K–12 curricula for the Great Books Foundation’s Junior Great Books program, Encyclopædia Britannica, and National Geographic Learning.

 

Being an editor allowed Ms. Petropoulos to work flexibly at home so she could cook healthy, delicious meals for her family and spend time with her two sons as they grew. When her sons reached middle-school and were more independent, Ms. Petropoulos realized she missed exploring this fascinating world with children and missed providing opportunities to help children find their passion in life! So, she returned to teaching.

 

In her spare time, Ms. Petropoulos loves reading, writing poetry, gardening, birdwatching, and thrift shopping. She also enjoys playing the violin, bass guitar, and electric keyboard—while her pet birds sing along.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Makerspace Activity Rubric
Makerspace Project Rubric
3rd-grade Math Rubric
 
3 = Mastery
2 = Emerging Mastery
1 = Below Mastery
0 = Insufficient Response
Classroom Behavior Expectations
* Respect everybody 
* Take care of our stuff
* Get into the work 
* Ask for help and help others
* Have fun
* Put our stuff back
Makerspace Science & Engineering Practices
* Ask questions and define problems
* Develop and use models
* Analyze and interpret data
* Use math and computational thinking
* Explain and design solutions
* Argue from evidence
* Obtain, evaluate, and communicate information
 

Posts

Week 8

Parent-Teacher Conferences are from 11 to 6m on October 26, 2023. Any parents interested in conferencing with me, please sign up here: https://calendly.com/rpetropoulos/parent-teacher-conference-qtr-1 
 
G3 Math
Students are indeed taking more responsibility for their learning in G3 Math! Ch2 Math Test results were overall much better than our Ch1 results. We started Ch3 (Multiples and Factors) Thursday, and are using our multiplication knowledge to see more deeply into its related patterns. 
 
GK–2 Makerspace
Students watched music videos about the the Moon and its phases and skip counting by 10s, 5,s and 100s. Students highlighted their own recognition of number patterns in a one hundreds chart, and colored a scientific diagram of the Moon, Earth, and Sun.
 
G3 Makerspace
Third graders programmed Kibo robots to perform certain actions, sounds, lights, and paths.
 
G4 SEL/Makerspace
SEL: Fourth graders were given a chart to fill out about what they know about people who work in our school. They were instructed to list several staff members and interview them, then listing what they learned about them. On Friday, we shared what we had discovered about people who work in our school.
Makerspace: We programmed Kibos to do our bidding. We also built marble runs.
 
G5–6 Makerspace
Students built a Marble Run and discussed how potential energy, kinetic energy, friction, and gravity affect the motion of the marble as it travels through the course. Some of us also drew a blueprint of a home and built it out in Legos.
 
G7/8 Makerspace
Various groups of students researched how to utilize a motor using a Micro:bit, created working circuits to power a siren, and completed a programming assignment in Scratch (created for gifted students by Purdue University).

Week 7

G3 Math
Third graders continue to develop more mature study behaviors to match their advanced math knowledge. We have been taking these first chapters more slowly to help them practice delving more deeply into math problems. This is important as a foundational skill when working in fourth grade curriculum. I will be using my experience with differentiation and curriculum adaptation/development to make sure all math concepts in the text are covered—and students' enthusiastic persistence with solving problems continues to strengthen. Congratulations to the third graders who persisted in learning Ch1 content while we moved onto Ch2, and getting excellent scores on their Ch1 retakes. This week we will take the Ch2 test on Wednesday (Multi-step word problems, rounding large numbers to perform mental math addition and subtraction. We will start Ch3 (Multiples and Factors) on Thursday of this week.
 
GK–2 Makerspace
Students watch two music videos about the 7 continents and 5 oceans. Then they color and label a map of the world. 
 
G3 Makerspace
Third graders continue to design Hex bug block mazes and marble runs, stores, public spaces, or spaceships with LEGOs.
 
G4 SEL/Makerspace
SEL: Fourth graders wrote compliments to a partner in SEL and shared something about themselves in a Talking Circle. Students are exhibiting more appreciation for one another and are listening more to one another.
Makerspace: We've been experimenting with marble runs made out of LEGOs and magnets. We will continue conducting science experiments with magnets this coming week. 
 
G5–6 Makerspace
Students program a micro:bit using the following tutorials in www.makecode.org: flashing heart, dice, rock paper scissors, love meter, etc. Students challenge me to a game of dice or rock, paper, scissors. If they beat me, they get some stickers.
 
G7/8 Makerspace
Students finished their scientific models and displayed them in our classroom. They drew a blueprint of their homes and built a LEGO version of the blueprint.

Week 6

G3 Mathematics: This week students practiced mindfulness in their behaviors as students, listening and taking responsibility for their roles in accomplishing goals in groups and on their own. We continued to work on Chapter 2 curriculum, exercising mental math to solve problems and taking care when solving two-step word problems.
 
GK–2 Makerspace: Students studied the anatomy and traits of sea horses, making play dough sea horse models and labeling and coloring a sea horse diagram.
 
G3 Makerspace: Students strove to create a maze out of blocks for a Hex bug that it could complete three times in a row.
 
G4 Makerspace: Students created marble runs out of LEGOs.
 
G5–6 Makerspace: Students worked on level 2 of the Sculpty Pet challenge.
 
G7/8 Makerspace: Students made marble runs out of paper, cardboard, and tape. They recorded the velocity at which their marbles traveled through their marble runs.