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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 4 Math (G3)/Makerspace (GK–8)

Grade 3 Math
After much practice, we took a test on Monday. Students will be able to take a retake next week. In the meantime, those who did well will move on to more challenge extensions, and those who need further practice will practice for the retake. The test grades have been added to ASPEN. If you would like to practice with your child at home: I would advise having a good time with your child going through one problem a day. Make it a bonding moment that your child enjoys with you. Your math time together, however brief, will do much for their experiences at school. Students have math practice assignments in Freckle and I will be posting their booklet work on my homepage. Thank you!
 
Grade K–2 Makerspace
We learned about the dragonfly anatomy and life cycle and why they are my favorite insect...
 
Grade 3–5
Students continued to create projects in Scratch and post them into our Google Classroom stream. They are programing memes, stories, games, and other creative projects to share with their classmates.
 
Grade 6–8
Students were given a number of hands-on and online challenges options to choose from. Students chose LED Light Challenge, Music Amplifier Challenge, Dream Home, Game Designer, Beats Builder, Video Magic Tricks, and more Scratch Challenges to do this week. 
 

Week 3

Grade 3 Math
We finished working on the lessons in Chapter 1. We will have a Chapter test on Monday. Those students who did not finish their two booklets were asked to take their folder home and finish the packets if they wanted to for review. On Thursday, students took the 360 Math assessment. On Friday, students corrected their pretests for Chapter 1 (very similar to the post test they will take on Monday) to review and make sure they understand what to expect.
 
GK–2 Makerspace
Students studied the anatomy and life cycle of the honeybee. We discussed why we need honeybees because they pollinate our crops, as well as the similarities and differences between the bee and ant anatomy and life cycle.
 
G3–8 Makerspace
Students made their accounts in www.scratch.mit.edu and were asked to choose one Scratch tutorial to work on. They copied links to their projects and shared them as announcements in our Google Classroom stream. Students with some Scratch coding experience were given challenge assignments acquired from Purdue University meant for gifted students to prepare them for robotics coding.