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3rd Grade: 9/23 – Chag Sameach!

It’s been a very exciting two and a half weeks! We started our year getting to know each other, playing games and asking questions. We’ve also spent a lot of time getting to know our new routines. In 3rd grade, students move around to different classrooms. It was a little overwhelming in the beginning, but so far, we’ve been doing a great job!

In reading, we have been preparing ourselves to be successful readers. First we thought about the right space for reading. Some said they liked to read outside, some in bed or on the couch, some like to read with a snack! Now that we have the perfect place to read, we can begin exploring for the right book. We talked about how you know if a book is too easy, too hard, or just right. We even had a book tasting! We “sampled” different books and decided whether they were interesting to us. Some immediately asked if they could keep the book they found in their desk! Another way to be a successful reader is to begin tracking our reading habits. We do this by filling out a reading log every night. We can see the type of books we read and how long we read for. We also set up our library so students can start signing books in and out. We will begin taking books home on Friday. Please make sure to return the books after reading!

We also began reading our first read aloud – Stone Fox!

In writing, we started by sharing the item that reminded us of summer and wrote a story about the item. This was secretly an assessment (shh…don’t tell!). We decorated and set up rules and expectations for our writer’s notebook. This notebook will hold all of our ideas! Finally, we started brainstorming for our first 3rd grade writing piece, the personal narrative. We thought about a special person and then 3 story ideas about that person. Then we thought of a place and 3 story ideas about that place. After coming up with all of these ideas, we finally picked our “seed”, a story idea that will grow! We shared our stories with friends as practice before writing. Have your child share their story with you!

In social studies, we talked about our class jobs as well as classroom rules and expectations. Everyone had a hand in creating these rules! We also looked beyond ourselves and looked at the world around us. We talked about the 7 continents and 5 oceans, and even made our own books! We also reviewed different landforms and bodies of water. We created our own islands with 3 different landforms and named them all!

 

Math

Over the past two weeks, we have been focusing on ordering and comparing numbers. Continuing from Second Grade, we use the image of an alligator (or Pacman) eating the larger number, when comparing two numbers. In Third Grade, we expand on this by explaining the order of the words. Students are understanding that we answer greater/less than questions by comparing numbers while reading them from left to right. For example, if we are comparing 3,795 to 5,379, we would say “3,795 is less than 5,379” or “3,795 < 5,379.” The students are also learning how to round to the nearest tens place and hundreds place to enhance their estimation skills, and practicing this new skill with a dice game called Reasoned Rounding. We are also working on building positive math identities among our young math students. This is all a part of developing a growth mindset and growing a love of mathematics. Have the students proudly pose with the “I am a math person!” frame is a small part of that. See the photo album below for pictures (including some pictures of some of the math games we play):

 

Hebrew with Rimma

Our first unit is “Birthdays”! We were talking about ages and dates, reviewing numbers and the names of the months, how to make plans and invite friends to the party. The students were practicing how to ask their friends how old they are, when they have their birthday, where they live etc. They were engaged in writing invitations to their birthday. Students try role-playing to practice their oral skills by leaving a message about their party. Do not forget to leave out important information such as when, what time and where to make sure that the person who should receive their message has all the information about the party.

Chag sameach! Happy and healthy New year !!

 

Judaics with Shira

Students have been so busy preparing for the new year of school and Rosh Hashannah! Some learning activities included: trying to blow a shofar, learning the names of the different blasts, writing wishes for the new year, and learning about the custom of eating different “simanim” (symbolic foods). Students compiled this learning onto a Rosh Hashannah poster which will go home today. Included is a prompt that each student chose and answered, related to one of the simanim we learned about. Some families might like to ask the same question at their Rosh Hashannah meal.

We also had two special visitors- Rabbi Fried who showed us various horns from a range of animals and showed us how a shofar is made, and Eli J.’s mother, Leora, who talked to us about their family’s Tunisian custom of doing a Rosh Ha’Shannah seder. It has been a great start to the year and I wish all the families Shana Tovah!

 

Music

In Music class, our Third Graders have been reviewing Music Class expectations through the words and movement of our Music Rules Rap and getting used to performing it with the steady beat of a metronome. In preparation for our ukulele study, students have been learning the difference between ukuleles and other instruments, the parts of the ukulele, the difference between single picked pitches and strummed chords and the names of the strings. If you did not attend the Third Grade Parent Ukulele Meeting on September 22nd, please be sure to contact Heidi to request the video. Students will receive their school ukuleles on October 12th!

 

STEAM with Sammi

The biggest news of STEAM class so far is that students have received their chromebooks! There was a lot of excitement in the air today as we found our assigned spot in the cart, learned about our usernames, got logged in, and set up our passwords. This moment has been much anticipated!

 

Aside from the Chromebooks, students have been settling into the school year by practicing routines, going through chromebook contracts (with silly memes to keep us entertained), and creating community expectations. This routine and expectation work over the first few weeks gets us set up for an amazing year!

 

Creatively, the students spent two classes working on a STEAM Improv activity. We randomly selected an object, a material, and a purpose, and students had to imagine a design that would fit those specifications. For example, one group had to design playground equipment, made from primarily empty balloons, that would protect people from the sun. Another group had to design a selfie stick, made primarily of marbles, that would also do a household chore. The creativity was outstanding!! When finished, students did a gallery walk which gave them a chance to practice making kind comments and questions to each other. This is an activity that we will come back to throughout the year when we need a creative brain break.

Art with Iviva

It was fun to be back in the art room and review some of our favorite skills, including how to make pop-up collages and safe use of scissors. We put these skills to use right away by starting to make decorations for the school Sukkah. Iviva reviewed symbolic fruit, animals and vegetables with us for the new year, called Simanim. We are enjoying the challenge of making small models of the Simanim through paper sculpture. We can’t wait to put these sculptures inside the Sukkah.

 

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