"SNOW MY GOODNESS!!"

Well...what can I say other than...ahhhhhhhh!! don't get me wrong...I like a snow day just like the rest of them, but this crazy schedule sure does make teaching hard...two days last week, almost a full three days this week....aiyaiyai! It may be a crazy schedule, but we still manage to fit a whole lot in...read on to find out what we've been up to!

LANGUAGE ARTS
We are well underway with our biography unit...and as most of you are aware (I'm still waiting on a few green signed papers)...we are heavy into the researching and drafting part of this project! The kids are taking notes about the important parts of their person's life and especially about their person's invention/innovation. I am continually impressed at the task commitment of your children...each step of the way is modeled and then they just put the "pedal to the medal" and keep going. I have to interject here for a minute...are they driving you crazy pointing out idioms?!?!? I just used one and I'm soooo much more aware of them ever since I taught them to the kids...they tell me new ones every day and point out the ones I use ALL the time! Anyway...I am hoping that all kids have drafts well on their way to being finished by Wednesday of next week...we will peer conference, revise, and then begin publishing. Another storm could really mess with our timeline, so we may need to start thinking warm thoughts! Hopefully, you and your child have begun discussing the outfit and/or artifacts that he/she can use in the wax museum...it is important for your child to represent the innovator through sight and sound...let me know if you need anything to help with this process.

We have also been writing poetry over the past two weeks...each student has written a "color poem", a diamante, and a haiku. The color poems were published today and they are PHENOMENAL...they will come home, but will also hang in the classroom...and I'm sure many of them will be entered into the Quill...our school literary publication.

MATH

We took the Quarter 2 post test this past week and we also took the Quarter 3 pretest. They are very time consuming, but so helpful in the planning of instruction and the assessing of information taught. These tests do not affect your child's math grade, but all data is kept in a file on the school database. If you are ever curious about your child's pre and post test in a quarter, you are welcome to shoot me an email and I can share them with you or set up a conference to discuss the scores. The goal for all kids is to score an 80% or higher on the post test...all kids made huge leaps in the second quarter, and many had far to leap!!

We are headed into division and spent some time this week estimating...we talked about "compatible" numbers when estimating with division. If you have to divide 35 by 4, instead of rounding up to 40, a more accurate estimate is using 32 because it is "compatible" with 4 and is closer to 35 than 40. This is a whole new way of thinking and takes a while to get used to.

I cannot stress enough how important it is for your child to have mastery of their multiplication facts. Division is so much easier when you have quick recall of your facts. Again, these facts can be practiced aloud in the car on a short drive, on the computer through games, through flash cards, or through skip counting...whatever way works best for you and your child, please help him/her with the multiplication facts!!

SOCIAL STUDIES

We have been reading and discussing global trade the past couple days...discussing how higher costs affect the number of products made, and how lower costs affect the profit, etc. This coming week (barring any other snow storms) we will begin our Entrepreneurs unit. However...we will also be starting our nexty SCIENCE unit.

SCIENCE

We will begin our Rocks, Soil and Fossils unit with worms and composting! Speaking of composting...please send in food scraps (fruit peels, vegetable peels, etc)...for our compost piles...I have the worms, soil, and scrap paper...ALSO...if any parent has time on Monday morning...say, for an hour during our 9:00 -10:30 block or the 11:15-12:00 block, I could use a volunteer to help create our compost piles...(IMPORTANT NOTE: if you mind getting messy or handling worms, this is NOT the job for you!!)...send me an email if you are interested/able...thanks!

I hope you stay warm, and don't let your kids do a snow dance...I don't think I can handle anymore loss of instructional time!! (did I just type that out loud!??!) ;-) Have a good weekend!

Happy Very Long Weekend!

So...just to make sure you don't hurry your child into the car early next week...the students have off school on Monday, January 17th to honor Martin Luther King, Jr....they are also off school Tuesday and Wednesday, January 18th and 19th for teacher work days. So...I will see your lovelies on Thursday, January 19th!!



We have had a great week...so much to talk about...

Language Arts
We have many poets...
Did you know it?!?!?
I am so impressed with the work your kids are producing...we are working on color poems and I cannot wait to share them with you!! Also in our study of poetry we have been using a T chart to try to make sense of poems...one side for the quotes, one side for "my thoughts"...what the kids think they mean...this is a very hard skill...so much inferring involved...but the kids are pretty amazing at figuring out the messages in some very complex poetry. The poems the kids recited on Thursday were wonderful! They did a nice job using strong volume, excellent eye contact, and speaking with a clear and well paced voice!

My favorite conversation about poetry this week was based on the poem "Mother to Son" by Langston Hughes. I have printed it below...ask your child about the poem...


Mother to Son
by Langston Hughes


Well, son, I'll tell you:
Life for me ain't been no crystal stair.
It's had tacks in it,
And splinters,
And boards torn up,
And places with no carpet on the floor--
Bare.
But all the time
I'se been climbing on,
And reachin' landin's,
And turnin' corners,
And sometimes goin' in the dark
Where there ain't been no light.
So boy, don't you turn back.
Don't you set down on the steps
'Cause you finds it's kinder hard.
Don't you fall now--
For I'se still going' honey,
I'se still climbin',
And life for me ain't been no crystal stair.

Math
In math this week we have continued our geometry unit. We discussed and worked with many different shapes...but our focus was on lines and angles. We discussed line segments, lines, rays, angles, how to name them and how to measure them....and when I took out those protractors, you would have thought I handed the kids a million dollars!! They were so excited to learn to use them and were so motivated to measure accurately!! Next week we will finish up this fun unit!

Social Studies
We finished up the Econ and Me video series and now we will be talking about global trade...and we will begin our Entrepreneur unit...they are going to LOVE it!!

BIOGRAPHIES
Each student picked out an inventor or innovator this past week and were assigned a book or some articles to read. Next Thursday we will begin our biography unit where the kids will be taking notes, organizing their information, and writing an expository essay about the life of their chosen person. This will eventually lead up to the "Hall of Inventors and Innovators"...a wax museum that your child will participate in and that you will be invited to attend. Next week I will inform you of the tentative date for this production so you can mark it on the calendar ahead of time!

As you can see, as always we have A LOT going on...this is all while we are also studying Latin and Greek roots, learning new cursive capital letters, visiting the computer lab for keyboarding and the "selling of lemonade", and continuing Writer's Workshop!! I am continually amazed at how much we can fit into one week!!

I hope you have a wonderful long weekend and I look forward to seeing your kids next Thursday.

WOW...last week got away from me!

Sorry for the incredibly late post...no excuses, just apologies! We had a very busy week...and how about all that snow Friday am!?!? (I know...crazy, right?) Here is how our week went down:

Language Arts
For the next couple months we will be focusing more on root words and their meanings. The kids will have word study packets to complete and they will be assessed on the root meanings as well as the spelling of the words. I am continually impressed with the kids' vocabulary and just want to continue to build on it.

We have started our poetry unit...I love this unit (I feel like I say that a lot...but I just love third grade and all we study!) During this unit we will be learning many different elements of poetry and studying figurative language...We read many different poems this week to experience all of the elements of poetry: rhyme, stanzas, lines, repetition...we also discussed the setting, tone, and mood of these poems...then on Friday we read a Readers Theater that demonstrated forms of figurative language in a very humorous way...the kids were introduced to characters such as "King Pun, Queen Simile, Prince Paradox, Earl of Idiom," and many more we had a lot of fun with that activity! We will continue this unit this week and begin writing some poems ourselves!

Social Studies
We have started another new unit...economy. This week the kids enjoyed a video series titled, "Econ and Me" that is put together to teach the kids all about economic problems, opportunity cost, choices, consumers, production, and interdependence. We talked about resources, limited resources, and scarcity of resources. We have great discussions after each segment and then add words to our economy vocabulary. We are headed into an Entrepreneur Unit where the children will get to apply all of these concepts personally...more info to come on this!

Math
Last week we spent time in geometry...comparing prisms and pyramids, cones and cylinders, their "nets" and discussing faces, bases and vertices...just to clarify...a prism has two bases and a pyramid has only one...the bases are included when counting faces...so...a rectangular pyramid has FIVE faces (one base) and a rectangular prism has SIX faces (two bases)...
We also worked with the perimeter and area of complex shapes. This was a hard concept to visualize initially, but as the week ended, most kids had it! We are headed into measuring angles this week...its so fun to teach how to use a protractor!!

Extra Info
Some of you may have noticed small changes to your child's checklist this week...many of the kids had a hard time transitioning back to school after the break...very chatty...as I explained to them last week and reminded them this week...THEY are in control of what is put on the checklist...its just my job to put it there...so THEY are the only ones who can change it! Reminders from home would be helpful, too...thank you!

Who knows what the forecasters are saying for tues,wed...but if we miss a day of school, just have your kids continue the work on the word study packets and read the book they will be coming home with tomorrow. We are headed into a biography unit in a couple weeks and they will have a reading assignment over this week and next.

Thanks and as always, if you have any questions, do not hesitate to contact me. Stay warm!