Week 17: January 3rd-5th

Week 17:  January 3rd-5th 

Happy 2018! 

We hope you all had a wonderful holiday break.  

We look forward to welcoming back your children tomorrow!  

Reminders: 

1/9  STAARY STAARY NIGHT  Third grade will host a STAAR information session Tuesday evening, January 9, to familiarize parents with our May state testing and answer any questions. We will meet in the library form 6:00pm to 7:00pm.

1/10  2nd NINE WEEKS RECOGNITION CEREMONY will be held in the cafeteria from 9:00-9:40am. 

1/10  3rd GRADE AUTHOR VISIT   Mac Barnett, author of The Terrible Two series, will visit our school on Wednesday, 1/10 and spend time with our 3rd graders.  You can purchase a copy of any of his books using the following link through Blue Willow Bookshop.  


Reading:  We have a quick, but action-packed week in reading as we begin our nonfiction genre study. For the next few weeks your readers will immerse themselves in a variety of nonfiction texts to learn about the purpose and structure of the genre. We will launch our unit by reading high-interest informational articles about the Guinness Book of World Records and penguin rescues this week. Reading MAP testing begins this week and will continue into next.

Writing:  Students will review how to story tell by sharing some of their favorite memories from our two week break.  As the week progresses we will shift our focus to our poetry unit of study.  Your writer will begin looking at poetry through the eyes of the writer.  Students will read and study anchor poems that showcase rich vocabulary as well as portray vivid mental images that spark our senses.

Word Work:  We will continue to facilitate independence and confidence as students perfect their spelling skills within their independent writing. 

Social Studies:  Students will locate a variety of maps from nonfiction articles we read.  We will study these maps to note their features and specifically define key, compass rose, and scale. 

Math: This week we are focusing on taking the winter MAP test. We will also explore the MAP website as we will use it for additional practice. Then, it is on to measuring and calculating the perimeter of polygons. Perimeter is the distance around the outer edge and the sum of all the sides. Along with this basic knowledge, students will be given the perimeter of an object and the lengths of all but one side. Students must subtract to find the value of the missing side.

Students will only have homework on Wednesday but should study their math facts daily.

Science: We will observe how position and motion can be changed by pushing and pulling objects to show work being done. Some examples include swings, balls, pulleys, and wagons. We will also observe forces such as gravity and friction acting on objects. Gravity is the force that pulls all objects together. Friction is the force between two moving objects that tries to keep the objects from moving freely. We will discuss examples of each.

Update for Week of 12/14 - 12/18

Week of 12/14 - 12/18

It is hard to believe that our Holiday Break is almost here! Here are a couple of reminders about our upcoming week:

1) Wednesday is our field trip to the Menil Collection. Please have your child wear their white HCE spirit shirt. We will be back in time for lunch at school so no sack lunch is needed.

2) Friday is a Half Day! On this day, our schedule will be:
8:10 Announcements
9:30 Sing-A-Long
10:10 Recess
10:45 Lunch
11:15 Holiday Party 
12:00 Dismissal 

Math: In math this week, we will continue learning about Division. We started working on division last week. On Friday we worked on the Octopus Method. We will continue practicing with this method during the week as well as learning the Cookie Method. Below are examples of these two methods. For homework this week, your child will have three Mangahigh assignments. Please note: the Fast Facts Quiz will be on Thursday - 12/17. We will not have a problem of the week assigned this week. 

OCTOPUS Division METHOD EXAMPLE:
There were 56 lbs of food for the rhinos. The zoo wanted to share that food among 8 rhinos.  How many pounds would each rhino get, if they all got an equal amount?

COOKIES METHOD EXAMPLE:
There were 56 lbs of food for the rhinos at the zoo. The zoo keeper gave each rhino seven pounds of food.  How many rhinos were there at the zoo?

We learned a new station game for multiplication on Friday called Circles and Stars! 

Science: During our science time last week, we discussed force, motion, position, and work. We discussed friction with a toy car lab and on Friday, we did a gravity demonstration. We will continue discussing gravity this week and begin learning about magnetism.