Happy Sunday, everyone!
I hope you're all enjoying this beautiful weather! Here are a few things to keep in mind this week:
Book Clubs: On Friday, we started working in book clubs! All students were assigned to a small group and they worked together to select a book that they will all stay on pace to read together. Students will be responsible for setting reading assignments and completing jobs prior to each book club meeting (about twice a week). Students should be able to complete all of this work in school. I will let you know if you should ever expect your child bringing their book/job assignment home to work on as homework.
MCAS: This year, third graders will be taking shortened versions of ELA (Tuesday, May 18th) and Math MCAS (Tuesday, June 1st). While we will spend time learning good test-taking strategies and reviewing previous years' assessments, it's important to remember that this school-year is unlike any other. Because of this, we have received messages from our school and district administration to keep our focus on our curriculum and keeping social emotional learning at the forefront instead of "teaching to the test". If you would like to support MCAS prep at home, there are some practice tests available on the Pearson site linked here. Otherwise, please try to reinforce the message that will be shared in school that students should try their best on MCAS but not let it consume them or stress them out. If you'd like to chat more about this, please feel free to reach out!
Here's what's been going on in our classroom lately!
Math: We have been exploring with fractions using many different formats. Students began thinking about how to share "brownies" with different numbers of people and then we went on to learning about how much space different fraction pieces take up in a whole. Last week, we had fun learning about how to partition number lines into equal pieces and place different fractions along them. Here's a fun music video we watched to help us learn!
Reading: We've been reading Because of Winn Dixie by Kate DiCamillo and learning about Opal, the main character. We recently learned that all characters in stories follow along a story mountain: they encounter many obstacles and challenges which pile up on each other and eventually lead to the climax/turning point of the story which leads to some sort of resolution. Students will be continuing to explore the story mountains that characters follow along on in their new book clubs!
Word Study: We have been practicing spelling words that end in -le (candle, dribble, fizzle) and considering when consonants need to be doubled. Students also have been practicing spelling second and third grade trick words by playing a number of new spelling games! Click here to check out the complete list of third grade sight words.
Writing: We've been working really hard to write speeches about topics that we care deeply about. We've learned two strategies to use when trying to generate ideas for a speech: Noticing a problem/imagining a solution and also noticing someone/some place noteworthy and helping others to see it, too. On Friday, students selected one seed idea that they will develop into a published speech. Some speech topics in our class include: respecting single parents, noticing the paraprofessionals at Dallin, raising awareness of global warming, and respecting people from all different backgrounds. I can't wait to see the incredible ideas that will develop in these speeches over the next couple of weeks!
Social Studies: Last week, we finished up our unit on Indigenous People by creating mini murals depicting the seasonal life of the Wampanoag back in the 1600s! Click here to check out some action shots of students creating their murals!
That's all for now! Have a great week!
Ms. McLellan