September 2011 - Battlefield High School

Specialty Programs
Visual and Performing Arts
Governor’s Schools
Interested in attending the Visual and Performing
Arts Governor’s Schools next summer Please see
Ms. Munchel, Trailer 6, for the application and information.
The county-wide pre-adjudication will
be November 7 at Woodbridge HS. It is important
to have the application in the works in order to try
out at the county level.
Gifted Education
Mrs. D. Moulen,
Ms. D Munchel,
Gifted Education Resource Teachers
It’s been an interesting start to school this year...
earthquake, hurricane, floods. Even so, we’re planning
to forge on ahead with seminars beginning the
second week of school.
Most, but not all, of our students are in clustered
Pre-AP English 9 and 10 classes and will receive
services through those class periods. Students who
are not, will receive passes to attend seminar out of
other classes. We thank Mrs. Johnson, Ms. Miller,
Mrs. Provenzano, and Ms. Starkey for agreeing to be
on our team. They are all excellent, caring teachers
who will work with your students and you for them
to have a successful year.
We are excited to have the largest enrollment of senior
GEMS classes (Gifted Education Multidisciplinary
Seminar) ever in the history of BHS. After
a roundtable discussion the first days of school it is
obvious students are coming to the class with open
minds and ready to explore the philosophical ideas
presented in the class. Since Ms. Munchel has taken
on three classes of AP Psychology, Mrs. Moulen will
teach all sections of GEMS this year.
All students will be working on their Differentiated
Service Plans in the month of September. Freshmen
will set high school, four years after high school,
and career goes. After that they will develop, from
scratch, their long-term course plans. Sophomores
and juniors will revisit their course plans especially
looking at some changes in classes that BHS is offering.
Seniors are in their final courses so they will be
focusing on their goals. Service plans will be mailed
home when they are completed.
We are beginning to look at field trip options for
all grades. Ms. Munchel will be volunteering at the
Newseum and will be exploring specific options
there. There are some interesting exhibits opening
in November at the Smithsonian American Art Museum—one
of Mrs. Moulen’s favorites. The Udvar-
Hazy Smithsonian Air and Space Museum is still
offering their Mission to Mars lab. Sophomores attended
that last year and were challenged to theoretically
create their own Mars rover keeping within
a budget and working as a group. Mrs. Moulen is
looking into a two-trip sequence focusing on Thomas
Jefferson.
We plan to have our parent and Governor’s School
meetings in late September or early October. We usually
have the meetings after the Governor’s School
applications are released by the state. Keep an eye
on the Gifted Resource—All Grades and Governor’s
School pages (which will be activated soon) for a
date for that meeting. We encourage you to join
the All Grades page and your student’s specific year
page. Please be patient as the county is still working
to get Fusion fully operational.
If you wish to contact us, Mrs. Moulen is the primary
contact for gifted education this year. Due to a hearing
impairment that makes talking on the phone difficult,
the best form of contact for me is to send me
an email at moulendl@pwcs.edu. If I am not your
student’s teacher this year, I will forward your message
to Ms. Munchel. If you know your student has
Ms. Munchel, you can contact her at munchedk@
pwcs.edu. You can leave a phone message for either
of us with Mrs. Blackwell in the front office.
If you wish to have your child screened for the Gifted
Education program, please contact Mrs. Moulen.
I will handle most of the screening this year.
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