Hi Families,
If you are planning on watching the Winter Olympics, be sure to check out how France, our class's country, is doing! We'll be keeping a metal count in our classroom!
As we look forward to state testing and as our students are becoming older third graders, I am going to start giving them more responsibility and independence. One way I am going to do this is by encouraging them to really work to interpret and understand the directions given. In the past, I would read tests aloud for the class, going over the directions and the questions. Because I want students to take ownership of their own learning, and because I will not be able to do this for state testing, I will be pulling back from this. I want to equip students with the skills they need in order to closely follow directions and answer all parts of a question. I think this will be a useful skill not just for tests, but in their daily life! This is important when having conversations with friends or family or when given a task to do.
If a student asks me, for example, to read a story problem to them, I will absolutely do that. If a student is unsure what a word is, I will by all means tell them. However, I'm going to put that responsibility on them to ask me rather than automatically having each part read to them. I have stated these expectations to students, and I know they ARE capable of doing this.
To prepare students for this, we did a little directions activity on Friday. If your child hasn't already told you about it, make sure to ask! I won't tell exactly what we did because a few students wanted to try it out on parents and siblings at home :)
As we look forward to state testing and as our students are becoming older third graders, I am going to start giving them more responsibility and independence. One way I am going to do this is by encouraging them to really work to interpret and understand the directions given. In the past, I would read tests aloud for the class, going over the directions and the questions. Because I want students to take ownership of their own learning, and because I will not be able to do this for state testing, I will be pulling back from this. I want to equip students with the skills they need in order to closely follow directions and answer all parts of a question. I think this will be a useful skill not just for tests, but in their daily life! This is important when having conversations with friends or family or when given a task to do.
If a student asks me, for example, to read a story problem to them, I will absolutely do that. If a student is unsure what a word is, I will by all means tell them. However, I'm going to put that responsibility on them to ask me rather than automatically having each part read to them. I have stated these expectations to students, and I know they ARE capable of doing this.
To prepare students for this, we did a little directions activity on Friday. If your child hasn't already told you about it, make sure to ask! I won't tell exactly what we did because a few students wanted to try it out on parents and siblings at home :)
Reminders/Updates
- Please return the Field Trip forms for Beauty and the Beast. It is coming up soon!
- Valentine's Day is next Wednesday! A note went home with student names if you are filling out Valentines.
- Are you interested in donating cookies or serving cookies at our next Family Night? It will be February 27th!
- As the flu bug is going around, please remind your child to be washing their hands frequently!
Upcoming Events
February 12: 100th Day of School! Students can dress like a 100 year old :)
February 14: Wear Pink/Red
February 16: Funky Friday Wear
February 22: NO SCHOOL
February 22: NDLC Night at Funset
February 23: NO SCHOOL
February 27: Family Night: Music and Munchies
March 2: Dress Like Your Favorite Book Character
March 5: Culver's Night 5:00-8:00 (Ms. Feldkamp will be serving from 7-8!)
February 14: Wear Pink/Red
February 16: Funky Friday Wear
February 22: NO SCHOOL
February 22: NDLC Night at Funset
February 23: NO SCHOOL
February 27: Family Night: Music and Munchies
March 2: Dress Like Your Favorite Book Character
March 5: Culver's Night 5:00-8:00 (Ms. Feldkamp will be serving from 7-8!)
Curriculum Update
Math: Mathematicians continued to build their understanding of fractions this week. We also discussed customary units of length--students came up with 21 different units of measurement all on their own!! Next week, we'll dive into telling time. Students in third grade are expected to read and write time to the hour, half-hour, quarter-hour, 5 minutes, and 1 minute. Students did this last year, but telling time to the nearest minute will be new for third grade. We also tell time before or after the hour. For example, we could say 11:45 is forty-five minutes after eleven or fifteen minutes before twelve. We'll also look at elapsed time, using our fingers or an open number line to track how much time has passed. Please continue these conversations at home! Practicing in another setting is always beneficial in helping to solidify students' understandings.
Writing: Our essayists published their FINAL essay of this literary essay unit! Check out Seesaw to see the students saying their essay as a speech. We also took a final assessment as this is our last unit for opinion writing. Next week, we will begin a short unit in which students will be working on an independent writing project. I'm excited to start this unit as students will be able to choose which type of writing they want to work on--narrative, opinion, or information! Students will use all that they learned from each genre to help guide them to generate ideas, plan, and draft.
Word Study: We finished up Unit 6 this week and took the Unit 6 test. Go over the test with your child and see if they can tell you why a word is spelled the way it is! Next week, we'll start a new three-week unit. Word study packets will go home on Monday--students can work on a little bit each night. This unit focuses on open syllables, which are syllables that have only one vowel that is the last letter in the syllable (GO, ME, SHY.) The vowel sound is long in an open syllable, and Y often works as a vowel in open syllables.
Reading: This past week we finished our Character Studies unit! Students learned SO much! Our celebration was a great success! Students had so much fun comparing the book to the movie. This coming week we will be beginning a mini unit on analyzing poetry! Students will have a packet of poetry with a range of different characteristics. They will be learning different poetry techniques and working hard to interpret the deeper meaning of poems. With this there will also be some songs we will be analyzing! I am excited! Make sure students are continuing to read fiction each night at home to help them build their stamina!
Content: This week we set up a falling weight system to demonstrate how gravity can move our vehicles. We also investigated how carrying a load on their vehicle affects the time and speed and the effects of friction. Next week we'll be closely reading an article on lunar rovers to prepare us for our final design challenge: building our own lunar rovers!
Know that you can always contact me with any questions or concerns. Have a wonderful weekend!
Best,
Jenny
No comments:
Post a Comment