Can you believe it's OCTOBER?!?

Hello! I hope you're having a wonderful weekend! I thought I'd let you take a look into the classroom and see (and read) what we've been up to!

Let me start with...thanks for always letting me know about transportation changes and absences. Just a reminder to please send the emails to the email address below and copy me...this way the school has record of it, and I am informed as well. That's the only problem with Remind...I can't forward your messages to the school, so this way we make sure we are covering all of our bases.

OK...with that business out of the way...here's what we've got going on...

Language Arts

I don't really have any pictures of this time in the classroom because I am working with small groups...however, I can tell you all about it. We have been reading excerpts from novels and next week our focus is on Greek mythology! While reading these above grade level pieces of literature we are working on the 3rd grade ELA standards and having AMAZING discussions! It's so much fun getting to know your kids as thinkers! While I'm working with small groups, the other students are working in rotations on other independent or partnered activities. Often they are working on vocabulary in an individualized blended learning program called Wordly Wise which was specifically purchased by the Advanced Academics department for magnet students. Sometimes they are using the chromebooks practicing their keyboarding on Typing Club. Sometimes the students are Reading for Stamina (a fan favorite!!) or they could be discussing a question with a partner and having a discussion. As you can see, we are very busy during ELA time! 

Writing

This quarter our writing focus is NARRATIVES. Let's be clear...we do lots of other writing...but the instructional focus this quarter is narrative writing. Each day we have a mini lesson and then the kids work on their narratives...they also meet with their writing partners. These partners are for listening, bouncing ideas off of, making suggestions, and listening some more...and I'm so impressed with how well your kids have taken to the idea that one draft can be worked on over multiple days...this is not an easy concept as most third graders write a piece, think it's amazing, and are finished. ;-)

I have lots of pictures of their writing times and writing partner times, because I am walking around working with individuals and talking to groups. Take a peek...

Word Study

As I'm sure you've probably realized by now, your child has his/her own word study list each week...therefore there are 29 tests to give each week. The students are finally into this new word study routine, and as with everything else, they're awesome with it! Each week the students are given a pretest based on some type of spelling pattern and then they build their own lists based on the words they get incorrect on the pretest. Then they choose other words from the "extra words" list that they may be unfamiliar with...not necessarily focusing on whether they can spell them or not, but focusing on whether they know how to use them. Then during the week they complete a word sort thinking about the way the words are spelled, and they write definitions for each word. On Fridays they are tested on how to spell the words and they have to define one of those words. We are working our way up to defining more than that...the next few weeks the kids will have to define three. If you ever have any questions about word study (or anything else for that matter), please don't hesitate to email me! Here's a glimpse into test time on Fridays...

Social Studies

We are working on a unit all about culture. We had such an interesting discussion about how America has often been referred to as a melting pot, and that many now think it should be referred to as a tossed salad. Ask your child about this...it was a cool conversation! The kids' projects are due this Wednesday...I'm really looking forward to seeing what they've chosen to represent their culture. 

Math

The first month of school has been a whirlwind...but it's my job to try to challenge all students while making sure to cover the third grade standards, and help other students learn new things...we spent a lot of time working with Inspirational Math from Jo Boaler as I mentioned in the previous post...and then we spent a while exploring problem solving strategies and how to best "map out/take apart" a problem...all the while delving into patterns, and addition and subtraction of big numbers. All of my students can add and subtract with ease...and with multiple strategies, but one of my jobs is to help them learn the most efficient strategy, so, many students have spent the past week or so mastering the subtraction algorithm (the way YOU were taught to subtract!!) Because their conceptual knowledge is so strong (thanks to all of those other strategies they've learned), they picked up on it quickly. Those who came to me already knowing it, were given other instruction during this time. And EVERYONE worked on rounding as an estimation strategy! NOW, we are headed into multiplication and measuring the area of rectangles. Again, I work with small groups, so my pictures are minimal, but I took TWO the other day...although your child may not be pictured, this is what small groups look like during math while at the instructional table...other kids are working on a TenMarks assignments, follow up assignments, or problem solving with a partner discussing different solutions.

Weinberg Field Trip/Volunteers/Homework/ETC

I will choose chaperones on Monday and inform everyone who was chosen to go on the Weinberg field trip. If you are chosen, I will choose different parents to go to the ESSL, so that I can try to get as many parents as possible on trips with us. 

Thank you to everyone who has signed up to volunteer in the classroom...I have a volunteer ALMOST every day of the month, which is crazy cool! If ever you cannot make it, please throw me an email...it's NEVER a problem, but it helps in my planning.

Keep your eyes open for some emails and info about the Fall Festival and Pumpkin Math (two different opportunities to join us in the classroom). And our two room parents, Ms. Simmons and Ms. Maucher, will be in touch soon about how you can donate items or money for our Fall Festival party!

If your child cannot complete a homework assignment for any reason, please send a note. I am a very understanding working mom of kids who have homework, and I understand circumstances that prevent homework every once in awhile. Please just let me know. Thank you.

As always, please contact me with any questions or comments...I'm loving teaching your kids, so thanks for sending them to me each day ready to learn!

Great First Week!!

Thanks so much for sending me fantastic kids...they are polite, well behaved, and ready to learn...who could ask for more?!

Here are a few pictures of some of the things we did this week...

We read The Important Book by Margaret Wise Brown and discussed her style of writing. We then mimicked her style and idea of importance and wrote our own Important Thing pieces. I'm excited for you to see them tomorrow night at Back to School Night! 

(More about BTSN at the end!)

During our first two weeks we are participating in "A Week of Inspirational Math" designed by Jo Boaler and her team at youcubed. She is the co founder of youcubed and a professor of Mathematics Education at Stanford. The activities are centered around the fact that ALL students can be good at math and that a math mindset is extremely important. Her activities are very creative and visual and have the students doing math before they're even aware that's what they're doing. This particular activity below is where the students studied a visual representation of numbers that led us into conversations about multiples, factors, prime numbers, and so much more!

And hopefully you got to see your child working on the Four 4s...your kids would have blown you away with the way they were working with numbers...once I explained square roots (quick five min explanation)...they were doing things like the square root of four plus four times four minus four equals twenty...or when they figured out that four over four (the fraction) was equal to ONE!!  They went crazy solving for different numbers.  

We read the story The Kingdom With No Laws, No Rules, and No King. Then we collaborated in small groups to brainstorm important rules for our classroom. Finally, we collaborated as a class to write "Our Kingdom's Rules!" Take a look...

We sorted all rules that were similar and then categorized them into five main rules:

Act safely and be healthy.

Be responsible.

Be respectful.

Act fairly.

Be KIND.

I was very impressed with their cooperation!

Back to School Night is tomorrow night! The PTA meeting is at 6pm and then the evening begins at 6:45. There will be three back to back sessions that you can visit the classroom...each one is exactly the same, so you only have to come to one! If you cannot make it, I will send the information home and if you have any questions you can just email me! Email is the best way to communicate with me...or you can respond to the Remind messages I send out.

I hope you had a great weekend and I look forward to seeing you tomorrow night!