Reading / LA - This week we have been working on our writer's workshop. The students are writing personal narratives. The focus is on getting kids to enjoy writing again, and it is so wonderful seeing students talk with such enthusiasm about the stories that they are writing. Students are even asking me if they can take their journals home to write each night. Right now we are trying to keep them in school but there hopefully will come a time when they can go home for kids to work on there as well. Next week we will be working on Nouns and Cause and Effect.
Science / Social Studies - We are also finishing up our Plant and Bee unit. Thank you so much for sending in the seeds to share with the class. It is great to see the different types of seeds that are found in our food and even in our backyards. Next week we will be doing a short unit on the sun - moon - Earth system. We will be focusing on day, night, seasons, and year. We will learn about rotation and revolution of the Earth. We will also be starting another Social Studies unit dealing with landforms and map skills. We are going to start a new project in school where we will be creating a treasure map by incorporating all of the different landforms and map skills that we have learned so far this year. This will be completed in school.
Math - We will continue working on Chapter 2 in math. Students have been learning strategies to do mental math. We are focusing on addition and completing algebra number sentences. We will also continue to work on having students explain their thought process on how they answered story problems.
We are doing something new this chapter....students are being assessed before each lesson with 5 questions based on the next lesson being taught. If students miss 0 or 1 answer, then they get the challenge homework. If students miss more than 1, they get the regular homework. You may have been seeing different types of homework this past week. There are students who still want to try to challenge homework even if they miss more than 1 question. They may do the challenge paper any time but MUST complete the regular homework first. If students choose to do the extra work, whether it is challenge homework or menu math in class, they can earn Breindel Bucks! There is also going to be other activities that students may choose to do but is not required.
If students are in need of extra practice on certain concepts, don't forget that you can access the book on line and there are also some great activities that you can do through success net.
Compass is available for students to access from home. You can get to the Compass site by accessing it off of the Seneca Valley web site. I put assignments on the site that is based on what the students are learning in class. This is a great resource for Math and Language Arts. Students do have a schedule where they work on this program at school, but it would be great to see more students doing this from home. Most kids really enjoy this program, so it is a great and fun way to practice the concepts being taught.
DON'T FORGET...Tuesday is an early dismissal day for students and Wednesday is parent teacher conferences. No school for students on Wednesday.
We are on our last box of tissues, if anyone is willing to donate more Kleenex, we would truly appreciate it.
The Rotary purchased dictionaries for all of our third grade students. Students will keep it at school until the end of the year and they they will be able to bring it home. We are very thankful for their generosity.
November Book Project (Brochure and reading log) will be due Tuesday, December 1st because of our Thanksgiving break. Make sure students are reading at least 20 times during the month. Students will also be taking an Accelerated Reader Quiz on the book that they choose for their project. If students complete other books they may also take an AR test on the computers.
Thank you to all of the wonderful moms that came in to help with our Halloween party. It was a great success and the students had a wonderful time. I truly appreciate all of your hard work! Thank you again for everything that you did to plan such a wonderful party.
cyber-pet
