The Week 2/22 - 2/26

Hello Parents! We have a very busy and exciting week!

-Tuesday, February 23rd is the Book Fair and PTA Dinner at 5:30-7:30

-Wednesday, February 24th is Breakfast with Buddies - from 7:15-8:00 your child can browse the Book Fair and enjoy a doughnut provided by Dad's Club. This day is also Duncan/Ford time to go to the Book Fair. Our class will be in the library from 9:15 - 9:45. Please send money if you would like your child to purchase any books.

-Thursday, February 25th is a 1:30 Dismissal Day - Please send a handwritten note if your child will have a change of transportation.



Math- In math this week, we will continue learning about graphs. Last week we worked on pictographs, bar graphs, and tally charts. We will finish up our study with dot plots. On Thursday and Friday, we will begin our unit on fractions. We will start our lesson with unit fractions and on Friday we will talk about non unit fractions. On Monday, you child will bring home a POTW that is due on Friday. The homework this week will be a review on perimeter, area, and graphing. The fast facts quiz will be on Friday.

Science- On Thursday, your child will be taking a quiz on the flowchart that was sent home on Tuesday. The quiz will be the exact same flowchart and your child will need to fill in the information using the word bank. Leading up to the quiz, we will continue talking about natural resources (sun, soil, plants, animals, coal, natural gas, minerals, water) and how to conserve our natural resources.

REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE VIDEOS

The Three R's

Going Green Song

New Reading Homework

New Reading Homework for the next few months

• ·        ONE article or selection from a story to read for homework for the week.
• ·        Three nights to complete the reading, leave tracks of thinking and answer the questions using evidence. 
• ·        This reading will count ONCE for the nightly reading homework assignment.
• ·        The passage should not take more than 20 minutes for your child to read independently. If you child cannot read this, please let his or her teacher know as soon as possible.
• ·        Answering the questions and looking for evidence to support his or her answers may take more time at first.  They will match the number on the questions to the numbers on the answer document.
• ·        Most weeks, the selection will come home on MONDAYS and be due in class on THURSDAYS. 

We sent an email and attached an example of a selection that we have completed in class together.  Students should also have their personal copy to share.  We also attached a copy of this week’s homework in the email sent to families.  We will not send home an electronic copy each week.  We decided it important this week, since it is our FIRST time with this type of homework.

We work hard to find articles on a variety of topics and interests in hopes to make this an engaging homework piece for your child.  Who knows it might even spark a topic of conversation at the dinner table!

Thanks for your help,
Tara Childers
Omi Ford
Laura Jackson

The Week of 2/16-2/19

Parent Reminders and Information: We will be going to the Museum of Natural science on Friday, February 19.  Students WILL return in to campus in time for lunch.  Please make sure you have sent your child's permission slip back to his or her homeroom teacher.

Language Arts
Reading- Last week we poured our hearts into figuring out how to take notes on an FQR chart using non fiction texts.  Now that we are much better with that skill, we will look at the facts we recorded and learn if they are interesting or important to remember as a reader.

Writing- Students did a great job learning about types of leads and trying them out on the narrative they have chosen to take through the writing process.  We will work more this week on learning about the difference between editing and revising as we work with our narrative stories.

Spelling/Word Work- Test 2/17.  We will take an application grade of spelling patterns and concepts 2/18-2/23.

Social Studies- Test will come home, 2/16 to let you know how your child did on his or her Story of America, Part One assessment.    

We've started the second half of our study and have learned about the life and work of Louis Pasteur.  We will also be learning about Jonas Salk, Bill Gates, Maria Mitchell, Henry Ford, and Cyrus McCormick.  You can reference the SOCIAL STUDIES WEBSITES page on this blog for more information and reading.

Math- In math this week, we will continue working on graphing. Your child will be working on created pictographs, dot plots, bar graphs, and tally charts. We will be transferring the data from tally charts and pictographs and putting the information into a bar graph or dot plot. Your child will have a homework worksheet on Tuesday and Wednesday night. Our fast facts quiz will be on Friday. We will NOT have a problem of the week. 

Science-During our science time, we will continue studying about natural resources. We will learn where our daily resources come from. On Tuesday, your child went home with a Natural Resources flow chart. We will be taking a quiz next week on this information. Your child will be receiving a blank chart and they will be expected to fill in the missing information. 

2/8-2/12

Note to Parents: With the upcoming excitement of the Super Bowl, we have had an increase in students bringing football and baseball cards to school.  Students have been distracted in class and had some trouble on the playground "dealing and trading" cards.  We ask that you please have your child keep his or her cards at home. 

Language Arts
Reading- While continuing to read non-fiction this week, readers will learn a helpful strategy called determining importance.  As we read texts we will stop, think and discuss what important in important to the text rather than simply interesting.  While this sounds simple, it's a more challenging skill for third graders as they have to set aside their personal opinions and think about the information, just the facts! 

Writing- We are continuing to finish up our work on narratives.  We will focus on getting our own personal narratives on paper and practicing many different types of leads to help our readers get hooked into our stories.

Spelling/Word Work- Application grades will be taken 2/4-2/9.  New words will go home 2/10. Test 2/17.

Social Studies- Students should use the review study sheet for our first assessment on Tuesday, 2/9/16.  They can also use our newspaper, journals and online resource (www.studiesweekly.com) to prepare for our test.  

We've started the second half of our study and have learned about the life and work of Louis Pasteur.  We will also be learning about Jonas Salk, Bill Gates, Maria Mitchell, Henry Ford, and Cyrus McCormick.  You can reference the SOCIAL STUDIES WEBSITES page on this blog for more information and reading.

Math- This week in math we will be diving into graphing. We are still studying pictographs, bar graphs, tally charts, and dot plots.  The students will be taking information in tally charts and pictographs and creating bar graphs and dot plots to match the information.  A test question to access this skill might look like this:

The dot plot graph looks like this:

  

A math worksheet will come home on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday night. The Problem of the Week will come home on Monday and will be due on Friday. Please continue to study every night for the Fast Facts quiz. 

Science - We will be moving on to Natural Resources in Science.  All students will discuss and learn examples of renewable and non renewable resources and where they originate from.  Students should come to discover that most non-renewable resources come from under the earth.  We will merge into conservation and recycling next week.

Update 2/2/-2/12

Language Arts

Reading- We are moving into a new genre of study for a few weeks.  We will be focusing on nonfiction.  This week we will review and introduce new nonfiction text features.  Text features are things found in nonfiction texts that help the reader understand and synthesize new information.

Writing- We are continuing to finish up our work on narratives.  This week we are reproducing a narrative with dialogue and inner thinking.  We are also working on adding these elements to our own narrative stories.

Spelling/Word Work- Our spelling test is 2/3.  Application grades will be taken 2/4-2/9.  New words will go home 2/10.

Social Studies- We continue to learn about people who have impacted the Story of America. For the first half of our unit we have focused on explorers.  Men and women who were brave enough to go discover new lands! We also spent an entire week on the life of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and how his story impacted our history.  Students brought home a study sheet for our first assessment on Monday.  Please use the green sheet, newspaper, journals and online resources to help your student prepare for this test on 2/9.  We will begin the second half of our study with a look into the scientist and inventors whose creations impact our daily lives and health!

1/25/16 - 1/29/16

Our testing is done and we are excited to get back to our classroom routine!

MATH:

In math this week, we will continue to work on multiplying two digit numbers by a one digit number. On Tuesday and Wednesday, we learned about the pictorial method when we multiply. This week, we will be learning about the expanded method and box method for multiplying larger numbers. On Friday, we will begin our unit on metric measurement. For homework this week, we will have a worksheet on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. A problem of the week will go home on Monday and it will be due on Friday. Our normal fast facts quiz will be on Friday.

                                                     

Expanded Method

Box Method

    

LANGUAGE ARTS:

Reading: This week we will focus on the genre of poetry.  Your children come with loads of background knowledge about this genre.  I'm including both classes anchor charts to show off all that they already know.  We will work more at examining the mechanics and meaning of poetry during the week.

Writing: We are wrapping up our work with narratives.  Students will finish mapping out their own stories as we critique what elements add value to narratives.  We will focus on critiquing authors' uses of inner thinking and backstory this week.

Word Work/Spelling: Monday through Wednesday of this week we will be taking an application grade on last week's words.  Wednesday, students will receive new spelling words.  The next test will be on Wednesday, February 3.

Fun Focus Fridays: You may have heard that we are trying out something new for Fridays.  On Fridays, for our Reading and Writing block, we will move through work stations.  Stations will focus on word work, writing, reading skills and strategies we have learned throughout the week and cursive.  Station work will be presented in a game or group work manner in hopes to make our show what you know time engaging and worthwhile.

SOCIAL STUDIES: During our unit on Story of America, we will learn about the following explorers over the next few days:

Christopher Columbus (1451-1506)-An Italian explorer working for Spain who sailed to the Americas while trying to reach Asia from Europe.

William Clark and Meriwether Lewis – American explorers who, in 1803, led The Corps of Discovery in exploring the land west of the Mississippi River. They journeyed overland across North America to the Pacific Coast and back.

Daniel Boone (1734-1820)-An American pioneer leader who helped settle the state of Kentucky and created the Wilderness Road, a trail in the Appalachian Mountains that early settlers used to move west.

Juan de Oñate (ca. 1550-1626) A Spanish explorer who founded the first European settlements in the upper Rio Grande Valley, including the city of El Paso. 

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year!
Thank you for offering your children life experiences and a chance to read over the break!

Please make sure to reference the email from Mrs. Ford about upcoming assessments.  We will be giving a NRT assessment and CoGAT over the next two weeks.  Testing will require us to move schedules around, so our blocks of learning will be modified over the next few weeks.  The information below will catch you up on the learning that we will cover from 1/11-1/22.

Language Arts
Reading- We have entered the second C in the CCP process.  Students have consumed (read) many great examples of narrative.  We will spend the next few days reading like critiques to determine if an author uses various craft elements to enhance their story.  The next few days we will look at ways to use dialogue to move a story rather than just using dialogue for the fun of making commas and quotation marks!
Writing- Students will begin using the narrative arc to help them plan out a story before writing. This pre-writing tool is helpful for writer's to use to see if a story is worthy of taking to publication.  If the parts of a narrative aren't clear, it might be a story simply worth remembering but not taking through the writing process to publication.
Spelling-Your children completed a midyear inventory last week in Word Study.  I was so pleased to see how they have progressed in their knowledge of spelling concepts.  We will reorganize ourselves into new spelling groups this week.  New spelling words will come home on 1/13.  Our test will be on 1/20 and an application grade will be taken between 1/21 and 1/26.  Your support at home with spelling concepts is appreciated.

Social Studies
The third 9 weeks brings us to our unit called, Story of America.  You may remember it as history! :)  Last week we discussed the terms; past, present, future, year, decade, century and millennium.  We will use the next few weeks to think about the time and life of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.  Students will work to complete a learning menu.  Activities on the menu will challenge them to think about their dreams for our country, how MLK Jr.'s life and death impacted the way we do things today and ways we can honor those who have made a difference in the history of our country and world.

Math
In math this week, we will continue working on multiplication and division. On Monday, we will play the game kahoot which will review the vocabulary and skills from multiplying and dividing. On Wednesday, we will review for our test on Thursday. We will prepare in class for our test so no review will be sent home. On Thursday we will take our multiplication and division test. Due to testing this week, we will not have a problem of the week. On Monday, your child will come home with an addition and subtraction review worksheet. We will have our normal Mangahigh homework on Tuesday and Wednesday night. We will still have our fast facts quiz on Friday. It will not be a grade this week.

Science
In science this week, we will begin keyboarding. We will spend the three days that we are not testing learning how to keyboard. We will work on the proper keyboarding posture and we will work on using the home row keys. We will spend these days doing lessons and practice building keyboarding skills.