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September 23, 2025
Our third graders warmed up their brains with a challenging Breakout where they had to solve multi-step word problems, using all four operations! Although division was new for some, they persevered and shared a variety of strategies for solving the problems.
They have been busy over the past few weeks exploring the steps of the Creative Thinking Process, FEFO. They applied fluency, elaboration, flexibility, and originality to design an original product that solved a problem. They are very creative! See their prototypes below.
New this week- Our third graders began pondering and exploring how toys and games have changed over time. They reflected on why some toys/games that have been around for many decades have been successful, while others have not... We can't wait to explore and investigate more next week!!
September 16, 2025
We began by challenging their brains with a BreakoutEdu activity and through collaboration they were able to solve all 5 puzzles and broke out!
Our third graders continued working on creative thinking and the FEFO process with some fun activities to practice Fluency and Flexibility! We read and discovered the amazing possibilities of a Beautiful Oops! and discussed how we can use our flexible and original thinking to create endless possibilities. We discussed the difference between inventions and innovations, and then they collaborated in small groups to design something to help with an everyday problem! After brainstorming and discussing their creative ideas, they drew their invention/innovation and began building their prototypes! Next week they'll finish building and will get to present them to our class.
September 9, 2025
We had a very busy, but fun day in Horizon! We started our class by applying critical thinking skills to solve the Daily Set! It was a BIG challenge competing against the computer! Then we continued with our goal setting from last week. Students created a personal goal and a collaborative goal based on Scholarly Behaviors. We will continue to check in on their goals throughout the year to reflect on their progress and encourage additional steps they can take to achieve their goals!
New this week- Students compared problem solving to creative thinking and explored the steps of Creative Thinking. Creative Thinking is the cornerstone to divergent thinking, critical thinking, and problem-solving. We introduced the terms: fluency, elaboration, flexibility, and originality to describe the steps. FEFO
Students worked on the 30 Circles Challenge to see how flexibly they could think about what to turn their circles into. I saw some very creative perspectives! One student drew a penguin and another drew the perspective of the top of the cake! Great divergent thinking! There were also lots of balls, planets, foods and emojis!⚽️🌍🙂 Students then combined Originality, Flexibility and Elaboration by creating images out of 4 squiggles given to them. They were so excited to share their creativity with our class and I was so impressed and excited about their enthusiasm!
Next week students will continue to apply FEFO and identify a real-world problem to solve with an innovative product.
September 2, 2025
I'm so happy to have your third graders in our Horizon class! It was an awesome day of collaborating on a challenging puzzle, communicating multiple perspectives about what Horizon Class is and learning more about ourselves through a personality quiz. See below for the puzzle we used to practice our critical thinking and problem solving skills, along with ideas shared while collaborating on what our Horizon class is all about.
We will continue reflecting on the personality quiz next week, to set individual and collaborative goals that we will refer to throughout the year.
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