Week 33: April 30 - May 4

Reminders:
5/9 - Bike to School Day
5/10 - Gallery Night @ 5:00
5/14 - Math STAAR
5/15 - Reading STAAR
5/21 - Publishers' Picnic @ 11:00 - 11:30
5/24 - Chariot Races @ 8:30
5/25 - Winds of Time Parade
5/28 - Memorial Day (No School)

Winds of Time is just around the corner. In third grade we study Ancient Rome and take part in our own version of the chariot races that entertained Romans all over the empire. We need wagons to transform into chariots. Please lend us your wagon and ask your neighbors to help us out, too! The following SignUp Genius will help us keep track of what is coming. Thanks for your help!  Chariot Wagon SignUp

Please note that Publishers' Picnic has been changed to Monday, May 21. We hope to see you there to share what your child has accomplished this year. Bring a picnic lunch and a blanket and enjoy!

For the rest of the year, third grade will be piloting a new schedule that will add a few interesting segments to our day. Students will participate in Morning Meetings that build community, valuing the thoughts, feelings and accomplishments of all students and helping students feel included in our community. We aim to develop students as empathetic collaborators who work successfully in teams. During Office Hours, students will further develop executive functioning skills such as organization, planning, study skills, self-regulation and flexible thinking. In Unit Time, we will begin our study of Ancient Rome as an interdisciplinary unit of discovery with students' questions guiding their learning and collaborative problem solving.

Math:  This week in Math is devoted to a targeted review of all skills covered this year. We have spiraled reviews all year and for these weeks before STAAR we will challenge our students to focus and work more carefully than ever before... remembering to use strategies we have taught, know when you need to figure out a multiplication fact you are not sure about and NOT GUESS!  Our daily warm-ups will target relationships between numbers in a chart, two step word problems, expanded notation and comparing 4 and 5 digit numbers. Friday's warm-up will be a grade in our grade book. We will also have our usual FFF quiz.

Science:  This week in Science we will continue adding to our Weather Logs and will transition to our focus on Personal Financial Literacy. We will discuss human capital and how a person can make themselves more valuable as an employee. We will cover scarcity and supply and demand. Students will review the value of saving and budgeting and the convenience and responsibility of credit cards, debit cards and cash. We will view interest in the context of both borrowing and saving.

Reading: Our students have completed listening and interacting with our grade level read aloud, Wish Tree by Katherine Applegate. It was an amazing experience, to say the least! The story is based on the point of view of Red, a red oak tree who doubles as the town's wishing tree each May 1st. This Tuesday, May Day, will give our third graders an opportunity to wish on our very own HCE wish tree. 
Our lessons this week will be taught in small groups that address the individual needs of our readers based on recent assessments. 

Writing: It is hard to believe, but the HCE annual Publishers' Picnic, which takes place on May 21st, is just around the corner, and our third grade writers are excited! This week's explorations are taking on a creative tone. Students will be completing a piece inspired by the book Not a Box, exploring descriptive language by creating nature-inspired poetry, and using a poem about monsters and aliens to compose a piece of writing that focuses on character development. It will be a great opportunity for students to peer conference, revise, and refine their work.

Social Studies: When in Rome, live as the Romans do; when elsewhere, live as they live elsewhere. -Saint Ambrose
Social studies skills will be incorporated into student exploration of Ancient Roman culture. Ask your third grader which questions they have become interested in researching in more depth during class time. 

Week 32: April 23-27

Reminders:
5/9 - Bike to School Day
5/10 - Gallery Night @ 5:00
5/14 - Math STAAR
5/15 - Reading STAAR
5/21 - Publishers' Picnic
5/24 - Chariot Races @ 8:30
5/25 - Winds of Time Parade
5/28 - Memorial Day (No School)

A big thank you to our wonderful parents who chaperoned our trips to the River Oaks Country Club and Main Street Theater. We couldn't do it without your partnership!

Winds of Time is just around the corner. In third grade we study Ancient Rome and take part in our own version of the chariot races that entertained Romans all over the empire. We need wagons to transform into chariots. Please lend us your wagon and ask your neighbors to help us out, too! The following SignUp Genius will help us keep track of what is coming. Thanks for your help!  Chariot Wagon SignUp

Reading: This week our readers will continue interacting with our third grade read aloud, Wishtree by master storyteller Katherine Applegate. It is a book that consistently leaves our children wanting more! 

An Amazon Top 20 Children's Books of 2017

The New York Times-bestselling story of kindness, friendship, and hope. 

Trees can't tell jokes, but they can certainly tell stories. . . .
Red is an oak tree who is many rings old. Red is the neighborhood "wishtree"―people write their wishes on pieces of cloth and tie them to Red's branches. Along with a crow named Bongo and other animals who seek refuge in Red's hollows, this wishtree watches over the neighborhood.
You might say Red has seen it all.  -Amazon 

Students will be working on refining test-taking strategies using this week's feature poem, "I Saw My Teacher on a Saturday." Our third graders are becoming proficient in discussing the structure of poetry, including: stanzas, free verse and narrative structures, rhyme scheme, tone, mood, purpose, etc. 

Guided groups will be the focus this week, working with students at their individual levels to evaluate non-fiction text features. On Wednesday they will take an assessment on three genres of text and we will continue to elevate their reading skills based on the data we collect.

Writing: Our read aloud, Wishtree will be the inspiration for a poetry assignment in writing this week. The students will create a draft, then revise and final draft a piece the follows the rings of a tree through their own lives. Students will final draft on watercolor paper; what a wonderful piece to share at this year's Publishers' Picnic!

Social Studies: This week our money-saavy Cougars will continue to work through the video series Econ and Me, during their study of economics.  This has been a wonderful opportunity for our students to work on effective note taking skills and to apply the concepts learned to their personal financial literacy. 

Math: This week in Math we are exploring pared tables and input-output tables. Both concepts require students to discover the mathematical relationship between numbers from one column of a table to another. 

In this table, students  must see the relationship between the number of pages and the number of pictures. The pattern can be determined vertically by adding 4 to each line (if the numbers are sequential) or horizontally by multiplying the pages by 4 to find the number of pictures. Any operation can be used in the table. Students must ask themselves "What has been done to the first number to get the other?"

Tables can be written horizontally, too.  But the process is the same. What is done to the bottom number to get the top number? In this case, you divide by 4. 

Here is a resource that can further explain the concept of function machines.

Function Machines

At the end of the week, we begin learning about Personal Financial Literacy. This exposes our students to the basics of economics. We will discuss credit cards and planned and unplanned spending. It is always interesting to hear how children think the financial world works. Hopefully our exploration will clarify many misconceptions they have.

Students will have written homework Monday through Wednesday nights and their usual FFF quiz at the end of the week. Please make a greater effort with your child to further their multiplication facts. We are down to the wire to being fluent and proficient at all math facts!

Science: The first half of the week we are reviewing customary weight measurement and metric and customary volume. Students will jar their memories about how we measure weight and liquids here in the United States. On Wednesday they will participate in a volume lab where they will use graduated cylinders, beakers and measuring cups to better acquaint themselves with liters and milliliters. At the end of the week we practice measuring inches to the nearest half and quarter inch. Now that we have learned fractions, this should be a fairly simple exercise.

Week 31: April 16-20

Reminders:

4/18 - Field Trip to Main Street Theater
4/20 - Progress Reports go Home
5/9 - Bike to School Day
5/10 - Gallery Night @ 5:00
5/14 - Math STAAR
5/15 - Reading STAAR
5/21 - Publishers' Picnic
5/24 - Chariot Races @ 8:30
5/25 - Winds of Time Parade
5/28 - Memorial Day (No School)

Math: This week we are finishing up our study of fractions and all ways to decompose, compare and model those numbers that are greater than zero and less than 1. Key points include:

• Reasoning  through comparing fractions with like numerators or like denominators is pivotal!  
• Equivalent fractions cover the same amount of area on similar whole models.
• Models can be divided into more or less equal pieces to show equal fractions.
• Equivalent fractions are located at the same place on number lines that are divided into different numbers of equal pieces. 
• Be careful when number lines are not lined up exactly.

Students will work in pairs and individually to practice fraction skills. We will use our knowledge to play Fraction Brick Wall and our favorite, Fraction Taco. 

Monday through Thursday, everyone will work on a warm-up that is a spiral review of skills covered all year. On Friday, a similar warm-up will be graded and entered into the grade book. There is a POW (Problem of the Week) due and a fact quiz (FFF) this Friday.

Science: We changed up Science a little last week and began our exploration of the water cycle and its role in making our weather. How is it that the three ingredients of weather: air, water, and the sun's heat energy, make it all happen? Students will be responsible for knowing the what and why on all parts of the cycle. Target vocabulary includes evaporation, condensation, precipitation, runoff and accumulation. Students have a quiz on Thursday covering the 9 weather tools we have researched in class.

Week 30: April 9-13

Reminders:

4/10 - Field Trip to River Oaks Country Club for Men's Clay Court Tennis Championship
4/18 - Field Trip to Main Street Theater
4/27 - Progress Reports go Home
5/9 - Bike to School Day
5/10 - Gallery Night @ 5:00
5/14 - Math STAAR
5/15 - Reading STAAR
5/22 - Publishers' Picnic
5/24 - Chariot Races @ 8:30
5/25 - Winds of Time Parade
5/28 - Memorial Day (No School)

ROCC Field Trip Information                                           Dress: Please try to send your child in this year’s gray #COUGARSTRONG t-shirt. Being dressed the same helps us better keep an eye on everyone. The weather is forecasted to be 60’s in the morning to mid 70’s by afternoon. A light jacket or sweater that can be tied around your child’s waist is appropriate.

   Lunch: We are eating an early lunch (10:00) at school in the cafeteria. Regular cafeteria food will be served. The menu for Tuesday is chicken and waffles, baked potato with cheese, salad with chicken, and Wowbutter and jelly sandwich. We will eat lunch as usual, just early.

   Snack: Everyone will be hungry when we return to school. Please be sure to send a good size, healthy snack your child can eat around 2 in the afternoon.

   Schedule: We eat lunch at 10-10:30, bathrooms and then board buses to leave at 10:45, arrive at ROCC at 11:15, restroom and then must be seated by 11:45, match is noon to 1:30, board buses and head to HCE at 1:30 to be home by 2:00 or so.

   Chaperones: Please arrive at school while we are at lunch (10-10:30) so you can help as we get ready to leave.

Math:

As we have concentrated on fractions on a number line, it is time to compare fractions in different forms. We will spend this week looking at fractions using fraction bars and circles to compare the amount of each shape that is shaded. The fraction with the larger area shaded is the greater fraction. When looking at the fractions in number form, the rules are simple. Just ask, "How big are the pieces?" When fractions have the same denominator (pieces of equal size), the numerator determines the comparison. The smaller numerator is the smaller fraction. When the numerators are the same and the denominators are different, the denominators determine the size. Larger denominators are smaller pieces and therefore the smaller fraction. 

Later in the week we will review all we have learned about fractions in a round robin activity. On Friday, we will complete a benchmark of past skills to see how we stand after our weeks of practice. Also on Friday we will have our usual Fast Fact Friday quiz and will check the Problem of the Week.

Science:

During the week we are logging the weather conditions in 10 different U.S. cities. This includes temperature, general sky conditions, humidity and wind. We are researching nine weather tools that help us forecast our own weather on a daily basis and long term. Vocabulary cards will go home this week that explain those tools. Students will be tested on them next week. Specific date to be determined. At the end of the week, we will review metric liquid volume. Students will participate in a very wet volume lab on Friday and have an opportunity to use various tools including beakers and graduated cylinders.

Reading:
All of our third grade students are participating in a grade level read aloud and discussion using the book Wishtree by Katherine Applegate. It was chosen in part for its eloquent vocabulary and in addition, for its powerful themes, including prejudice, friendship, kindness, and acceptance. Please ask your child to share about the book, and his/her reactions to the characters and plot.

Most of our time in reading is being spent working in small groups, with each student focusing on a genre that is tailored to their greatest area of need. The three types of text include: expository (informational text), literary nonfiction, (nonfiction content shared in story form-biographies are an example), and fiction. It is our goal to challenge our third graders not only to comprehend these texts, but to think on a much more in-depth level. For example, What was the author's purpose for writing this piece? What in the text lead you to that conclusion? How do the subtitles throughout the text connect? What is evidence of this? At the end of the week students will be taking an assessment about the genre they have been studying.

Writing: Our students continue through the writing process, revising and editing their piece of expository text. There is a saying: "When your draft is done, you've only just begun!" This idea of revising or making changes to improve the draft's content can be daunting for our budding writers, however we are teaching and modeling specific examples of how to revise effectively. For example, deleting words and phrases not needed, changing a single word to be more interesting or specific, or changing the punctuation in some way. This is a great opportunity for students to conference with not only their teachers, but with their peers.

Social Studies: Third grade Cougars are fine tuning their note taking skills as they continue their study of economics using the Econ and Me video series. Even though the videos date back to the 80s, (just looking at the hair makes that evident) their appeal is great, and the information still rings true today.  Students are learning about the importance of making smart economic choices, and understanding the benefits versus risks of each decision.

Week 29: April 2-6

Reminders:

4/10 - Field Trip to River Oaks Country Club for Men's Clay Court Tennis Championship
4/18 - Field Trip to Main Street Theater
4/27 - Progress Reports go Home
5/9 - Bike to School Day
5/10 - Gallery Night @ 5:00
5/14 - Math STAAR
5/15 - Reading STAAR
5/22 - Publishers' Picnic
5/24 - Chariot Races @ 8:30
5/25 - Winds of Time Parade
5/28 - Memorial Day (No School)

Math: As we better understand how to compare fractions with like denominators on a number line, we move on to comparing fractions with the same numerator but different denominators. The key is to visualize how big the pieces are. A very difficult concept for many students is that, as the denominator gets larger, the number of pieces the whole is divided into increases AND the size of the pieces gets smaller. The bigger the denominator, the smaller the pieces. So, 3/5 is smaller than 3/4 because the "fifths" pieces are smaller than the "fourths" pieces.

4/5 > 4/10

Later in the week we will begin a study of equivalent (equal) fractions or fractions that show the same amount but use different numerators and denominators. We will use various models and manipulatives to visualize the area covered by equivalent fractions.  

Students will construct a Fraction Taco and practice exchanging one fraction for its equivalent while playing this very fun game. 
We will also learn the box method of multiplying 2 digit X 1 digit. It is similar to the expanded form we learned last week but is put in a neat little box. Finally we move to the usual algorithm that most adults use.
Our usual Problem of the Week and Fast Fact Friday quiz will take place on Friday, April 6.

Science: This week students will complete an activity researching the current temperatures in 4 cities in different parts of the U.S. and world and record those temperatures on thermometers with different scales. Tuesday students are introduced to an on-going weather unit and will examine tools used by meteorologists to view current weather conditions and the movement of weather patterns across our area, state and country. 

Reading: Our readers will be working on how to approach a piece of text to determine which parts  are important vs. interesting. (Oftentimes these are two different things.)  The first step is to preview a piece of text to develop initial understanding. Secondly, the text is read and read again, this time considering what the writer would most want the reader to know. In addition, our children will continue their work evaluating the genre of test, and how it is uniquely different from other genres. For example, if you were reading a book for pleasure, it would not be typical to take notes, highlight key sections, or navigate how to best answer created questions. This is necessary when working through our state assessment.

Writing: Expository writing shouldn't sound robotic or leave the reader feeling bored!! This week HCE writers will work on developing effective endings. They have experimented with creating leads that draw a reader in, so now they will work on leaving the reader with "food for thought". Although the purpose of an ending is to restate the topic, it should be memorable and not repetitious. The models the teachers provide will give valuable insight to this craft.

Social Studies: Our global economy is complex, so it is never too soon to learn about how economies operate and the key concepts involved. This work our third graders will be using a video series called Econ and Me to understand about saving vs. spending, needs vs. wants, as well as how goods and services as well as producers and consumers are central to an economy. Who knows? By the end of study, we might just have the next child entrepreneur in our midst!