T- Shirts For Everyone!

Thanks for all your support for our Jog-a-Thon fundraiser!  Because of our great success, all students earned an Altara t-shirt. You can see from the photo above we're all smiles and wearing our new shirts with pride!  Thanks for all your help!
This week we are beginning new units in Language Arts, Math and Social Studies. 
In math we will be moving on to subtraction and subtraction meanings, along with rounding and estimating.  We will be working on fast facts and increasing our math fluency.  In fact this week our online homework is a math facts practice game that can be found in your successnet account under your "To Do" tab.  Students can choose from addition, subtraction and even multiplication and divisions facts to test for fluency. Have fun with the games =)
After working hard on our last two math topics we celebrated today with popsicles!  Cool! Cool! We were serious test takers and tried our best to be successful and improve our learning- and we did just that!  Not only were the popsicles cool, but we were too!
In Social Studies we are wrapping up our Change over Time, and Native American studies and will be rotating into Mrs. Hadeans class for a Citizenship and American Symbols class.
In Reading Street this week we will be talking about Smart Solutions.  Our question for the week is, "How do plants and animals use their structures to solve problems?  Can you believe not only do animals have to adapt to their environment to survive, but plants do too!  Our story for the week is an expository text titled, Penguin Chicks.  Today we predicted where the story would take place or in other words- the setting. It was fun to gather background knowledge about habitats and penguins and have the opportunity to learn from each other.  This discussion will help build our thinking while we look for the main idea and details inside the story as our comprehension focus this week. Some of our amazing words this week are flourish, absorb,  and inhospitable.  It will be interesting to see which amazing word becomes our favorite in writing and conversation this week.
Well we're off and running and jumping in with both feet, we're having fun and learning a lot along the way.  Have a great week!

Yearn To Learn

This week we are reviewing in Reading Street.  The stories in Unit 1 were about skills that help us make our way in the world.  Students were asked what kinds of questions might be useful to ask to help us make our way in the world?  We talked about trying new things, trading ideas and information, the importance of saving and spending, and the difference between needs and wants. I know it sounds like a lot for a third grader but all students had amazing background knowledge and contributed to all whole group, small group, and partner talks.

Some of the comprehension skills we are reviewing this week are: character, setting and theme, sequencing, summarizing, main idea and author's purpose.  Besides learning amazing words and increasing our vocabulary we have been learning about prefixes, suffixes, and compound words.  Your students are brilliant we are getting smarter every minute of the day and we are working on getting one step closer to mastery!

We have been writing Sound Poems for our study of two cultures coming together, producing All About Me graphics, and are currently working on 4 square personal narratives that tell about a time that we tried something new.  We are working on stretching our writing and using details that appeal to our senses.  Wow! Are we stars or what!?

Our focus in math this week is on rounding, estimation and up to 3 digit addition problems.  Today we worked on taking our understanding of rounding up one notch to estimation. We solved problems thinking about how much some of our make-believe purchases would cost us while on a shopping spree.  Some of those items had to be taken out of our imaginary baskets because we didn't quite have enough money.  Amazing how that whole needs vs. wants thing came up while doing a little math today!

We are finishing up our social studies unit this week with Native American symbol story writing and a closer look at a few tribes with a focus on geography, culture, and beliefs. It has been fun to find a few of us who have some ancestors that came from Comanche tribes.

Just a quick reminder...PAPER BAG BOOK REPORTS ARE DUE THIS THURSDAY, SEPT. 26.  ALL INFORMATION IS INCLUDED IN YOUR HOMEWORK FOLDER.  YOU CAN CHECK A  PREVIOUS BLOG POST DATED SEPTEMBER 9 FOR PICTURES AND A DESCRIPTION.

Have You Filled A Bucket Today?

On the first day of school, we read the book Have You Filled A Bucket Today?  The short book explains to students that we all carry an invisible bucket in which we keep our feelings about ourselves. When our buckets are full, we are happy; when they are empty, we are sad. It is important that students learn that when they fill a friend's bucket, they also fill their own bucket because it feels good to make others happy. At this time, we also introduced the concept of being a bucket dipper. A bucket dipper is a person who hurts other people's feelings, essentially dipping into their invisible bucket.

 

And of course when given the chance to be silly, we always comply!

So...every day since that first day of school, we have been filling buckets and looking for ways to make someone else smile. Yesterday, our class bucket was filled to the brim. Believe it or not there wasn't any room left for even one more single kind action. So we dumped our bucket (so that we could start over of course) and  celebrated today by visiting Ms. Young's 1st grade class room. We spent a little time listening to some wonderful 1st graders read, as well as reading to them. 

We decided the best way to celebrate our overflowing bucket of good deeds was by going out and finding another way to fill a bucket- and we did just that! There were smiles all around and lots of high fives were shared!  So be ready to ask your third grader, How did you fill a bucket today?     

Catch Up With Reading Street

This week in reading street we are reading an expository text titled Supermarket.  This article tells the history of the supermarket. In early America, almost everyone grew their own food on family farms. They traded with one another to get what they needed, and bought things at town marketplaces.  Soon there were general stores and small “mom-and-pop” grocery stores. Stores became bigger, and today we have large supermarkets that sell all sorts of foods and nonfoods. Here's a fun fact- Did you know that bananas are purchased more than any other fruit? We decided in our class, that they are our favorite too!
The comprehension skill we are focusing on this week is compare and contrast.
When you compare, you tell how two or more things are alike. When you contrast, you tell how two or more things are different. Here's a fun activity for you to try at home: I Spy
Choose an object in plain sight but don’t tell your child which object you have chosen. Instead of giving traditional clues, use compare and contrast statements such as, Its shape is like an apple’s shape, or Its color is different from a banana’s color. After your child identifies the object, have your child choose an object and give clues.
Our conventions skills this week is learning about imperative and exclamatory sentences. Commands, tells someone to do something. It begins with a capital letter and ends with a period.  An exclamatory sentence, or exclamation, tells something with very strong emotion. It begins with a capital letter and ends with an exclamation mark. 
Example:  Imperative Sentence: Put the cup on the table.
                 Exclamatory Sentence: This apple is delicious!

It's Time For An Adventure!

Our very first book report is due Thursday, September 26th.  The genre for this book report is either adventure or fantasy.  Fantasy is a fiction that includes magic and other fantastic elements that are somehow connected to a real world setting or to an entire fantasy world.  Adventure books may or may not be fantastic, since they include some nonfiction stories, as well.  Adventure books have action, excitement, suspense, and a main character who constantly overcomes challenges.  This book report is presented inside a container. (ex: lunch sack, gift bag, oatmeal container, manila envelope, shoebox, etc.) Pack 4-5 items in the container that represents the characters, setting, problem, and solution.  All students will present their container to a small group and explain why each item was chosen.  The rubric and directions are included in the pink pages of your homework folder.  Good luck!

This week we GET to take the IOWA basic tests.  This is a national test that 3rd graders and 5th graders are required to take to test our knowledge compared to all students in the USA.  We will be testing this Tuesday through Thursday.  Please help your student by making sure they get to bed on time and remind them to eat a healthy breakfast for some extra super brain food!  Thanks for your help!

We Are Off And Running!

We are looking forward to our annual Jog-a-Thon scheduled for September 17.  It's time for training, running, increasing stamina and collecting pledges over the next two weeks.  Thanks for supporting our one and only fund raiser this year.  All pledges go directly to crucial programs for our school.

This week we are beginning our Social Studies focus on communities and the change that occurs over time.  Today we talked about artifacts and how the things left behind help us understand others.

We are continuing on with our topic on numeracy in math.  We are working with ordering greater numbers, focusing on place (which place is the number in?) and value (how much is it worth?). We are describing numbers in 4 different ways including standard form, expanded form, word form, and place value blocks representations.  Last but not least, we are making sentences true by using greater than, less than or equal to symbols while working with numbers in the hundred thousands. We'll be showing our thinking with an assessment on Thursday :)

This week in Reading Street we are reading the exaggerated story, Kumak's Fish.  Kumak and his family set out one morning to ice fish.  Kumak is using his Uncle Aglu's amazing hooking stick.  All Kumak's family catch fish except him.  Finally he hooks something, and it takes the entire village holding on to Kumak to reel in his catch-- a long line of fish holding on to each other--enough fish for the entire village.
The comprehension strategies we are focusing on this week are sequencing, or the order in which things happen in a story, and visualization.

We are becoming writers inside our classroom.  We are using technology and creativity to publish a narrative all about us.  We can't wait for you to see it! We are also focusing on writing great 5 sentence paragraphs that contain a topic sentence, 3 detail sentences, and a closing, cover it all sentence.




Don't forget...our first adventure book report is due soon.  Find that adventure and get lost in the book! All information and rubrics are found in your homework folder.