Newsletter--Week of 9/28

News from 3P

Week of: September 28, 2015

Reading and Language Arts: This week will be our final week of fairy tales. Students will be reading and watching a few versions of The Three Little Pigs. With each version, we will be looking at the story elements, theme and point of view. **Students should be reading at least 20 minutes for homework every night!

Grammar: We will continue to work on common and proper nouns. We will be working on making connections between the two types of nouns and sorting which are common and which are proper.

Writing: This week in writing, student will be writing another opinion piece. They will be describing why they are the “Pick of the Patch!” Make sure to stop by the 3^rd grade hallway during conferences to see why you should choose your child from the third grade patch!

Social Studies: This week we will be reviewing and testing over pioneers. Study guides are coming home today. Pioneer quilt square projects are due on Wednesday of this week. Please let me know if you have any questions.

Math: This week we will be testing over 10’s, 3’s, 0’s and 1’s. We will then be switching groups for our next unit. Up next….Place Value. J

Dates to Remember:

Tues. Sept. 29-Math Unit Test (10’s, 3’s, 0’s and 1’s)

Wed. Sept. 30-Pioneer Quilt Project Due

Fri. Oct. 2-Pioneer Test

Array Cities in 3T Math

For the past few weeks we have been studying different multiplication factors and learning new strategies to solve multiplication equations. One strategy is to use an array. Mrs. Thurston's math class used arrays to make buildings for Array City. A few students in our class wrote a little bit about the project.

By: Patrick

I really liked the project. I like building arrays in math class. Math is my favorite subject. I also liked going around the room and seeing everyone’s arrays. I really liked how the arrays were the windows, and I liked how we got to solve our math equations.

By: Molly

In third grade at math class we did our array cities and all the kids got to named them. We all got to go around the room and do the array math problems. Mrs. Thurston put us in groups and we all worked very hard. For buildings you can make any building as long as it is an array. You can make schools, sky scrapers, and apartments. I love array cities!

By: Aimee and Beth (Aimee's mom)

In order to build an array city, you must first cut out the buildings. Each building has windows and doors. The building from a line which makes up a street. When we make an array city, we make each building a separate color and all the windows are the same. We cut out the buildings, windows and doors out of the construction paper and use glue to attach the windows and doors to each building.

Field Trip to Danada Farm

By: Addy

Our third grade class went on a field trip to Danada Farm! It was a great field trip. We got there and we went on a hay ride.

We went to the corn field and saw a woman dressed in old fashioned clothes.

She was picking apples. She told us a big story about how she got here. She told us how to survive if we were settlers. Then we went to more corn fields and this time we got to see soy beans and take some home. Last, we came back from the hay ride and went in the barn. We got to see two horses. The first horse's name was Nick. We got to see Nick paint!!

He is a very messy painter. He painted on a canvas. The next horse was named Captain. We got to learn how to groom Captain and we got to pet him too!

Then it was time to go. We loaded up the bus and drove back to the school.

Newsletter--Week of 9/21

News from 3P

Week of: September 21, 2015

Reading and Language Arts: This week we will continue to work with fairy tales and Point of View. Students will be reading stories and highlighting the character’s point of view on their own. We will also continue to focus on making connections: text to text, text to self, text to world. Students should be reading at least 25 minutes for homework every night!

Grammar: The focus this week will be nouns: common and proper nouns. Students will continue to make connections with these types of nouns (for example: school and Lowell Elementary School). From here, we will be moving on to look at singular and plural nouns.

Writing: We will continue to work on opinion writing. This week the prompt will be as follows: Do you enjoy the fall season? Why or why not? Use your reasons and evidence to prove your opinion.

Social Studies: This week we will be discussing work life and a child’s life during pioneer times. Students will also be assigned a Pioneer quilt project towards the end of the week. Look for that to be coming home.

Math: This week we will continue with multiplication/division. We will focus on the distributive property and will also touch on multiplication of 1’s and 0’s. Please make sure to continue to help your child with multiples of 3.

Dates to Remember:

Tues. Sept. 22- Picture Day

Wed. Sept. 23- Field Trip to Danada Farm

Wed. Sept. 23- Lowell Spirit Wear Day and Cook’s Night Out at Chipotle-come to dine out and help your school earn some $$$ J

Thurs. Sept. 24- Laps for Lowell-Lowellpalooza during PE times

Fri. Sept. 26- No School

Newsletter--Week of 9/14

News from 3P

Week of: September 14, 2015

Reading and Language Arts: This week we will be introducing Point of View. Students will be reading stories and highlighting the character’s point of view. For example, we will read the story “Little Red Riding Hood” and “Little Red Riding Hood: A Newfangled Prairie Tale.” With each story, we will talk about the main character’s point of view and how their view changes the story. We will also continue to focus on making connections: text to text, text to self, text to world. Students should be reading at least 20 minutes for homework every night!

Grammar: The focus this week will continue to be on capitalization. Students are having trouble remembering to capitalize proper nouns and words that start our sentences. Please help to remind your child about these important steps.

Writing: We will continue to work on opinion writing. This week the prompt will be as follows: Is Illinois a good state to live in? Why or why not? Use your reasons and evidence to prove your opinion.

Social Studies: This week we will begin to study Pioneers. Students will define what a pioneer is and we will also talk about what it was like to travel as a pioneer. Please make sure to talk to your child and ask them questions about this topic.

Math: This week we will continue with multiplication/division of 10’s. We will then venture out and begin to study multiples of 3’s. This might be the first time that your child will learn their 3’s. Please make sure to help your child, if you have free time, counting from 3 to 30.  

Dates to Remember:

Wed. Sept. 16- First Meeting with our Kindergarten Buddies J

Cam Jansen Collaborations

3P had fun reading Cam Jansen mysteries this week! They did an awesome job putting their minds together to summarize what was happening throughout the mystery. 

Today, we spent some time working together to make a mind map of different character traits for Cam Jansen. The kids did a great job thinking and working together to come up with LOTS of ideas! 

Newsletter-Week of 9/8

News from 3P

Week of: September 8, 2015

Reading and Language Arts: This week students will be reading a mystery series called Cam Jansen. With this story, we will continue to focus on story elements and vocabulary. We will also focus on mystery words and will continue reviewing making connections: text to text, text to self, text to world. Students should be reading at least 25 minutes for homework every night!

Grammar: The focus this week will continue to be on capitalization. Students will review when to use capitals in their writing. Please encourage your child to reread and make corrections within their daily work and homework.

Writing: We will continue to work on opinion writing. Opinion writing includes the same components as persuasive writing; we are just using a different name from Common Core standards. The past 3 weeks, we have done whole group opinion writing and focused on using linking words such as: because, for instance, for example, in other words, etc….

Social Studies: We will finish up studying Illinois this week. Our focus will be Illinois symbols and fun facts. Our test will be next Tuesday. Study guides are coming home on Wednesday! J There will also be an AT HOME project assigned this week. Be looking for that information.

Math: This week we will continue to learn about multiplication and division. Students will be tested on 2’s and 5’s multiplication and division. We will also begin studying 10’s. While some students are beginning to master their facts, this is not an expectation at this point in the year. Please continue to assist your child as needed.

Dates to Remember:

Tues. Sept. 8- Math Test (5’s/2’s Multiplication and Division)

Mon. Sept. 14- Illinois Project Due

Tues. Sept. 15- Illinois Test

Scoot!

On Friday, third grade spent time reviewing what we've learned in Math so far this year. Everyone started in the hallway to hear directions for the review game SCOOT! 

Over the next 30 minute, students scooted back and forth between all three classrooms looking for hidden equations and word problems. 

The kids loved working together to find and solve over 20 clues!