Week 25: February 20-24

Important Dates and Reminders:

February

20- Presidents' Day (No School)

23- 3rd Grade Practice Reading STAAR 

24- Go Texans Day

27- 3rd Grade Practice Math STAAR

27- PTA RALLY DAY in Austin 

27-  Family Fair Raffle begins in cafeteria 

March

February 27- March 2- Family Fair Raffle in cafeteria 

3- HCE Family Fair

This week in third grade:

Reading: Readers will take the practice reading STAAR test on Thursday, February 23rd. We will spend a couple of days thinking aloud through STAAR-like nonfiction selections to become more familiar with their length and structure. We will also review fiction selections from previous PSA tests. Please be sure your child gets a good night's sleep and eats a solid breakfast on Thursday! 

Writing: Writers will continue our persuasive/argumentation essays unit. This week, we will move forward with the topic we chose last week. We will focus on the claim and support points, making sure our claim is well supported. Students will begin writing in essay form using their graphic organizer to help navigate this new structure. 

Be sure to ask your child what they are writing about; we have some really creative topics! 

Example of Persuasive Essay Outline (we will also include an introduction and conclusion): 

Spelling: Students will receive new words on Thursday, February 16th and their test will be on FRIDAY, February 24th. (This change is due to the practice reading STAAR taking place on Thursday.) 

White group: Students will receive new words on Wednesday, February 15th and their test will be on Wednesday, February 22nd. (There is no change for this group.)

Social Studies: We will continue our economics unit with our Econ and Me Videos!  ECON AND ME revolves around four children and their invisible friend, Econ, who applies economic principles to individuals, families, and communities. This week, we will study consumption. Econ will show how children can use their $4.00 to spend on goods, save it, or pay for services. 

Math: This week we continue our work with equivalent fractions. Students will fold paper to be able to see fractions that represent the same amount of space. They will also examine number lines to see that equivalent fractions are at the same place on the line. On this image, it is clear that 2/3, 4/6, and 8/12 are at the same place on all three number lines. 

The second half of the week we will practice model drawing to solve fraction word problems. Visualizing and drawing what is happening in a problem will greatly improve understanding. 

Mom ordered a large pizza for dinner. It came cut into

12 equal pieces. Mom ate 3 pieces, Dad ate 4, my sister 

and brother each ate one piece and I ate 2.  What fraction

of the pizza was left?

By drawing and labeling the details of the story, it is visible that the remaining piece is 1/12 of the pizza.

Students will have written homework Tuesday and Wednesday nights and the usual FFF quiz on Friday. Please monitor that your child is studying facts every night. The district expectation for third grade is for students to master their multiplication facts through 12. Many students still have a long way to go. 

We are enjoying our new online adaptive learning system, Dreambox. Students will have access to it both at school and at home. They have already received their login information and we hope you will encourage your child to take advantage of this great resource. Use this link to access the program: Dreambox. It can also be accessed on the blog page entitled Math Websites.  Ms. Moore has added Dreambox to the Symbaloo homepage. Students just need to click on their homeroom teacher's name and they are ready to go. Thank you PTA!

Science:  Natural resources are Nature's gifts to us. We use them to survive and to make products that we use every day. We will review how resources can be categorized as renewable and nonrenewable and will create a flowchart that shows both classifications. The information on this chart will be tested the week of February 27. Students will examine everyday objects and determine the natural resources used to make them, stating whether they are renewable or nonrenewable. And as the week progresses, we will try to justify why certain resources are used to make certain products. What properties make them best suited for the job?