Happy Holidays

   We are all very excited about the upcoming break from school. This can be a difficult time for children to be in school, so we have made some changes in our regular routine. We have used the computers each day this week and will continue this next week as well. We learned the ins and outs of Powerpoint, began a typing program called Type to Learn, and learned a new presentation tool called Prezi (thanks Abby!). Next week we will learn about glogster, a digital poster making tool. As we discussed in class any of these tools can be used to create a current even presentation. Many students said that they don't have access to a computer with Powerpoint. If your child is interested in doing one of these for their current even presentation I would love to help out. Just shoot me an email and we can arrange a time before or after school for your child to use our classroom computer.
    Next Tuesday we will have a class party. The students are welcome to wear their pajamas to school and bring in slippers for the classroom. We will have P.E. and recess that day, and the students will not have time to change their clothes. Their pajamas should be appropriate to participate in both activities. They will have time to change their shoes.
     When we return from the holiday break we will begin fact quizzes for multiplication. I am sending home a letter tomorrow detailing the order for the quizzes. Please continue to practice facts at home each night.
    There will be no spelling list next week. Spelling will resume on Monday, January 5th with a quiz on Thursday.

Some photos from December:

Maxwell was a mystery reader.

Mr. Fitzgerald was a mystery reader.

Anthony was a mystery reader.

Mr. Pachter was a mystery reader.

We learned about Chanukah and played Dreidel.

Bodie was a mystery reader.

Welcome December!

  I hope you had fun-filled, restful Thanksgiving break. We spent a few days with my family in Rochester for the holiday. We had tons of fun, but I am looking forward to getting back in the classroom!

Reading Workshop

      We will continue to work on our nonfiction unit. We are working our way through identifying the major text features of nonfiction. This unit really lends itself to many teachable moments. As we identify a feature, we read short articles, discuss author's purpose, main idea, cause and effect, and fact and opinion. We are becoming very strong readers!

Science

      We are beginning a new unit on the constellations. We will learn about the constellations in our winter night sky and the legends associated with them. This unit culminates in the use of StarLab, the district's portable planetarium. It is an amazing experience and I am excited to share it with the class!

Writing

     This week we will begin a new unit writing nonfiction. The students will be writing about a topic they are experts on. Monday your child will come home with a homework assignment in writing. They will need to decide on a topic they are an expert on with little to no research. It would be very helpful if you could have a conversation with your child about this to encourage an appropriate topic choice. In the past students have chosen a sport they know/play, a favorite hobby, an animal, the solar system, or other science topic. I have also had students choose to write about favorite video games. While this is a possibility, it is not a topic that lends itself to the depth of the type of writing we will be doing. If at all possible I would prefer your child tries a different topic.

Math

     We will continue our multiplication study this week with x9, x1, x0, and x10. I will post our strategies on the blog as we learn each set of facts. Please begin practicing facts at home to help encourage speed and accuracy, as well as confidence! 

Spelling

    Your child will bring home a spelling list tomorrow. This list is the review of our last four units. Our test will be on Thursday, and your child does not need to write these words in sentences. 

A few important notes...

    -I will be out of the classroom on Wednesday afternoon for a district math training.

    -The third grade breakfast is next week, Friday, December 12th at 8:45 am.

    -I am running a math club before school on Thursday mornings at 8:30 am. The club will run for 6 weeks. We will review previously taught concepts and strengthen our math skills. I still have two slots open, if you are interested and able to transport your child to school at 8:30 am on Thursdays,  for six weeks please email me for a permission slip. 

A few highlights from our very short week last week...

Maeve was our mystery reader last week!

We pushed all of our desks together the day before Thanksgiving break...

and celebrated the first ever "Thirds"giving!

Multiplication Strategies

We began learning our facts last week. First up, x2 and x5!

Our strategies for x2 are:
           -double the other factor
              ex: 5x2, think 5+5

            -count by 2's, the other factor tells us how many times
               ex: 5x2, think 2, 4, 6, 8, 10

*** All the multiples of 2 end in an even number.

Our strategy for x5 is:
               -count by 5's, the other factor tells us how many times
                 ex: 5x3, think 5, 10, 15  

***All the multiples of 5 end in 0 or 5.

You can begin practicing facts at home using flash cards.

Happy Thanksgiving

We have had lots of fun over the last few week...

Anna was a mystery reader!

Ryleigh, Emily and Anna ran a 5k with Girls on the Run!

Mr. And Mrs. Gold were mystery readers!

We celebrated our writing during American Education Week!

Liv was a mystery reader!

Full Weekly Update

   Thank you for coming in today to celebrate our writing. If you were unable to make it I will send home the writing this week for you to celebrate at home. Also, we will have many more third grade events this year that you can take part in.

Reader's Workshop
     We have begun a new unit on nonfiction. We began looking at the text features found in nonfiction and how they can help deepen our understanding of an article or book. We will also look at the different formats nonfiction authors use.

Writer's Workshop
    Today your child brought home our completed paragraph unit. The paragraphs attached to the packet were completed together. I hope that you see an improvement in your child's writing with the personal narrative and our Friday Letters. It is now my expectation that all students will use proper capitalization and punctuation when required to write complete sentences.
    We have completed our personal narrative unit and the students will write an on-demand narrative for me to use as an assessment for the unit. Then we will move to our next unit, informational writing.

Math
    We have completed our first of three multiplication units. This unit was designed to help the students understand the concepts behind multiplication and when/why we multiply. We learned how repeated addition relates to multiplication, how to use arrays and how to quickly find equal group amounts. We also learned that the commutative property applies to multiplication. We will be taking a test on this unit tomorrow.
     We will begin the next unit Wednesday. This is where we will begin to learn our facts. We will start with 2x, 5x, 0x, 1x, 9x, and 10x. As I introduce these I will be posting our strategies to finding answers on the blog to help with homework. It is important for the students to practice their facts at home each night! Flash cards are an easy and quick way to practice facts. There are also a number of websites and apps to help students study facts.

Social Studies
      As a cross-over with reading, we will be learning about Ancient China and modern day China. We will use nonfiction texts to compare and contrast China, then and now.

Stay tuned for some photos from the past few weeks!

American Education Week

Just a friendly reminder that you are invited to celebrate our writing tomorrow at 11:30. Your child will share their personal narrative with you and a small group of peers and parents. After our writing celebration the students will go to recess and lunch. Please feel free to accompany your child.

Have no fear...the blog entry is here!

     Last week was amazing! Our class worked incredibly hard and we accomplished so much. It was so nice to be in school for five full days. This week we will also work hard, but we are faced with an unusual week. Tuesday is a half day for the students (12:10 dismissal). I am a member of the district's Science team and I will be out all day on Wednesday for our first meeting of the year. Thursday is our Book Fair preview day. We will browse the Book Fair at 9:55. On Friday, we will have an opportunity to purchase books from 11:30-12:00. Please feel free to come in and join us. Just sign in at the office and come right down to the classroom. We have recess and lunch right after and you are more than welcome to stay. Also, on Friday afternoon I have a district meeting to attend on our writing curriculum. I will be out of the room from 12:00 until the end of the day.


Reading
     We put the finishing touches on our character study last week. We also began reading short texts (fiction and nonfiction) together and closely studying the author's purpose, word choice and main idea.
     This week we will begin our nonfiction unit. We will begin by examining the common text features found in nonfiction and how we can use them to help deepen our understanding of a nonfiction text or article. We will continue to read short stories and poems together this week.

Writing
     We are close to finishing our paragraph unit and our personal narrative unit. This week we will work on revising our narratives and adding more detail to the heart of the story. We will also continue to practice writing cohesive paragraphs.

Math
    It is here!!!! MULTIPLICATION!!! The class is very excited and so am I. We will be taking a short test on subtraction and then begin our first multiplication unit. We begin by relating addition to multiplication, then looking at arrays and the properties of multiplication.

Science
    We pollinated our plants and we have been watching our seed pods grow. This week we will finish our unit and make our final observations.

Language Arts
     We have been reviewing what makes a complete sentence and the different types of sentences. We are preparing to learn about compound and complex sentences. We will also learn how to properly use quotation marks so that we can begin writing dialog.

   We had a very nice Halloween party and we did so many fun activities on Friday we weren't able to write a Friday Letter.

Last week we used Base 10 blocks to model subtraction with regrouping.

We pollinated our plants using real bees!

Look at all that pollen!

Thank you to our Mystery Reader Dr. Metallo (Ryleigh's grandfather).

We also had a student Mystery Reader last week, Sara.

Happy Halloween from my ninja and police officer!