I don't know about many of you, but fall is my favorite season. The beauty of the leaves and the crispness of the air can't be beat. Students have started to settle down and feel comfortable in the classroom. It is just a time of year I absolutely love!
A few reminders: -Picture Day is this Thursday! -On Friday, you will be receiving an email to sign up for conferences. Please choose one time slot only! Math: We worked on solving multiplication and division problems by representing them with pictures. Students learned they need to include a picture, math sentence (3x4=12 or 6x2=12), and word sentence on each story problem. Their math sentence and word sentence answers should match. Literacy: We continued to discuss strategies readers can use to understand their books. This week we focused on making predictions. Students made predictions about their personal books as well as predictions about our read aloud, Stone Fox. Writing: We started narrative writing and students learned about strategies they can use if they cannot think of a story to write. They can think of a person who is special to them and then list small moment stories they have shared with them. They can also think of a special place, map it out, and remember stories that go along with that special place. Students also learned the saying "If you think you're done, you've just begun." Science: We continued our PYP Unit: Who We Are by watching a Bill Nye video on Genes as well as reading about inherited and learned traits in our science activity books. Students also had the opportunity to create a creature which included 5 inherited traits and 5 learned behaviors. They came up with some clever creations! Here are a few pictures below from the kids enjoying Fun Friday.
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I had a blast this week, and I certainly hope that your child did too! We learned a whole bunch of fun information.
Math- This week was focused heavily on the distributive property. After thinking back to last year and how confusing it was to teach 3rd graders the distributive property, I set out on a journey to find a better way. We took a break from Engage NY and instead became doctors...that is Distributive Doctors. :) I have to say this year was much of a success! Reading- We finished our mini unit on how readers build their reading lives and started our second read aloud book, Stone Fox. We read through the first chapter where their response when I stopped was, "No, no, no, please do not stop!" I think it is safe to say that they are ready to be engaged. Please remember to sign your child's reading log each week. They need to total the number of minutes read ONLY AT HOME. School minutes do not count as home reading minutes or go for Go For the Gold. Science- We have been learning that different organisms inherit traits. Students created a flower that included four different traits that were inherited from the parent flowers. We also looked at the inherited traits specific animals inherited from their parents by comparing and contrasting the parent and its offspring. Writing- We continued to push ourselves as writers this week. Their goal was to write a maximum of ten sentences on a given topic. Some of their topics were "If I Were a Teacher" or "My Favorite Cartoon Character". Students were extremely excited to share some of their pieces. They were also supposed by how much they could write! With a full week under our belt, we have really started third grade. Thanks for all of you who made it to Curriculum Night. It was wonderful chatting with you and great to have you there. For those of you who were not able to make it, I sent home a packet with your child that summarized what I went over that night. :) Please let me know if you have any questions.
I really want to stress the importance of your child bringing their reading log to and from school each day! It is a habit we are trying to build as 3rd graders. Math: This week we continued with our work in multiplication and division. Students were able to make flash cards for the multiplication facts 0-2. We have been using our extra time to study our math facts to ensure we have the memorized by the end of third grade. Please make sure they are practicing them at home as well. Science: We nearly finished our Me Posters. Students created a poster where they learned how to write their names in bubble letters, create an acrostic poem using their name, draw a self-portrait, and create a border around their poster. They are turning out extremely well! We will start this week with our study on heredity. Writing: Students are working on building their writing lives by spending time each day writing about a topic. We are remembering to use capital letters and punctuation at the end of sentences. They are also responding to their reading as well. Literacy: We have continued to discuss what it means to build our reading lives and how to make reading the best it can be. We learned to find "just right" books, read books like they are gold, and to record their reading using a reading log. We finished reading Judy Moody is in a Bad Mood on Friday. We were able to relate the book to our third grade lives. We survived our first week of third grade! Your children are motivated to learn and such a joy to have in the classroom. I can tell they are ready for this school year! The students had the opportunity to share a little about who they are by bringing three items in a bag that represented them. So fun to learn about their passions!
We also spent some of our time this week working on a "Time Capsule". They filled out a little booklet on some of their favorites, drew a picture of themselves, and traced their hand. At the end of the year we will "dig" up those time capsules and have the opportunity to see how much we have changed. We started some math work. Students learned that multiplication is simply repeated addition. We had the opportunity to represent multiplication sentences (i.e. 3 x5) by making three equal groups of five. The fun part was, we got to do it with goldfish and then eat them after! :) We started our first read aloud book "Judy Moody Is In A Bad Mood". The book starts off with Judy beginning her year in third grade. We have been able to make comparisons between our third grade year and Judy's. On Friday we began the first part of our "Me Poster". They learned how to write their name in bubble letters. Next week they will write an acrostic poem, learn to draw a self-portrait, and make a fun border around their poster. Our focus at the beginning of the year is all about "Who We Are". The Me Poster, Time Capsule project, and the bring yourself in a bag all tell about "Who We Are". I will see you all next week for Curriculum Night! I am looking forward to a new school year! Please check this page regularly as I will do my best to post what we have been doing in the classroom!
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Sept. 14th- First Day of Online Learning
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