Week 24: February 19th-23rd

Week 24:  February 19th-23rd

Reminders:
19th:  Monday is a student holiday in honor of President's Day.  We'll see you tomorrow!

23rd: GO TEXAN DAY! Wear your best Cowboy/Cowgirl/Cowperson clothes!

26th: 3rd Math Practice STAAR 

27th: 3rd Reading Practice STAAR

28th: Field Trip Museum Natural Science. Please have your child bring a sack lunch to eat while on the field trip.

Reading:  We will continue to work through narrative nonfiction texts and comprehension strategies during our Reader's Workshop mini lessons.  Your readers will use text evidence to make inferences about the subject(s) of the true stories we read.  We will also spend some time this week reviewing strategies your readers can use while answering a multiple choice question.  

Writing:  Students will continue to write expository pieces. We've worked with graphic organizers to brainstorm supporting details that support our main ideas.  This week, we will focus on the structure of an expository essay.  We will model how to transfer important information from a graphic organizer into paragraphs within their essay.  

Social Studies:  We're looking forward to this week's activity in social studies!  We will be using a paper-based grid map to play Battleship.  Students will play one another to practice navigating grid maps.  We will then journal about our experience and strategy of using a grid map to play the game. 

Math: We will continue to dive deeper into Division word problems while introducing them to the various strategies that will build their confidence in solving those problems. We will discuss what Division means, review new vocabulary words (multiples, dividend, divisor, and quotient), and discuss when they divide in their life. Knowing their fact families can them solve problems! Please have your students study their multiplication facts. We like to have students skip count for fun (multiples of 6: 6, 12, 18)! 

Homework: The Problem of the Week will be sent home on Monday. Please have your child bring it to school on Friday. Homework #1-3 will be sent home Monday-Wednesday. Please have your child be on DreamBox for at least 20 minutes a day at home. 

Science: We will begin our Solar Sytem unit this week! This includes exploring main characteristics of the sun as a source of energy and physical characteristics of the Sun. Later in the week, we will explore the main characteristics of the moon and how it compares to Earth. We are so excited about this unit and your scientist will too!

Week 21: January 29th-February 2nd

Week 21:  January 29th-February 2nd

Reminders: 
2/2: Spring Group Pictures are this Friday.  These pictures are taken as homerooms.   Time slots are as follows. 10:25 Rozzell/Morphey, 10:35  Badrak/Saint Val, and 10:45 Duncan/Ford.  
2/6 and 2/7:  HCE Book Fair located in library. 
2/8 and 2/9: Noon Dismissal

Reading:  Determining the main idea of a text can be tricky business!  We're going to continue searching for text clues (text evidence) to infer the main idea of an entire or portion of text.  Your readers will see this week that identifying the main idea from several sections of an article will lead to a strong nonfiction summary.  We will conclude the week by introducing cause and effect relationships.  Cause and effect is something we experience in our daily lives.  We will learn tools to identify this relationship within a nonfiction text. 

Writing:  We will celebrate your poet's hard work this week!  Our publishing celebrations are always a wonderful way to unite as a community of writers and "high five" one another on a job well done.  Your children are excited to share their finished anthologies with their peers.  Later in the week we will practice note taking strategies as we read through a nonfiction text and organize our thoughts/reactions and important ideas.  
Social Studies:  We're rounding out our study of maps this week.  Students will apply what they have learned throughout the month to create their own maps.  We're challenging them to include a title, compass rose, legend, map scale, and grid system.  

Math: We will continue to learn many strategies to multiply such as skip counting, number line, area model, and an array model. We will build from easier digits such as 5 and continue to increase the digit to 6 through 9. As it is important to know multiplication facts, we are helping our mathematicians understand and internalize what it truly means to multiply, where they can see it in the real world, and how to apply it in their daily lives. 

Homework: In addition to our Monday-Wednesday regular homework pages, we will begin "Problem of the Week." This assignment will be sent home every Monday and will need to be returned on Friday. This assignment is meant to be a team effort as we would like your student to solve the problem alongside you.  On Friday, we will discuss the many ways your student solved the problem with the support from you all! 
Science: The students will learn and understand how soil is formed and the role of decomposition. Later in the week, the students will explore plate tectonics and its relation to earthquakes and volcanoes. Soil is different in different places because of different rocks in the area and different plants and animals that live there and die and decay. Important concepts to remember:

• Constructive forces build up the Earth
• Destructive forces tear down the Earth
• Earthquake:  A sudden release of energy under the Earth’s surface that makes the ground shake or crack.
• Earthquakes build up the land (constructive) by pushing upward forming mountains and tear down the Earth (destructive) by opening crevices and causing land to fall or slide.
• Weathering: The process that breaks down rocks into tiny pieces over time.
• Erosion:  The carrying away of weathered rock 

 

• 

  Different types of Soil: Sand, Clay, Humus, Loam

Mrs. Ford's Classroom Update 12/9-12/13

LANGUAGE ARTS
Spelling
We WILL have spelling homework this week.  Please look for new words to come home on Monday.  Students should return their spelling menu homework on Thursday.  Our test will be on Friday. 

Reading
Students will start to learn to infer in reading.  Inferring is something we do ALL the time.  You notice that your friend isn’t as talkative and you ask what’s wrong, you see a picture of people bundled up and you know that the weather is cold, these sorts of thoughts are what we call an inference.

In third grade, we use a helpful equation to infer.  BK+TC=I.  This means that our background knowledge, plus text clues help us make an inference about characters, settings and events in the stories we read.  This week we will focus on making an inference with photographs and poetry.   

Writing
Students will start working in small groups to research a cultural holiday.  They will work with their groups to take notes, and organize a presentation to teach the class about their learning the week before Winter Break.  Please let me and your student know if you will be leaving early that week (12/16-12/20).  We want to make sure that he or she gets the chance to contribute to the group project.

SOCIAL STUDIES
Map Skills
Students are hard at work designing their own city using a grid map.  This week we will practice using a map scale.  Your child will bring home a review sheet on Tuesday to help him or her prepare for the next Social Studies test on Map Skills.  They are welcome to use this review, vocabulary cards and the Social Studies Journal to prepare.  Please make sure that the Social Studies Journal comes back to school every day.  We will continue to add notes about our learning.