Coming up Week of October 24-28We have finished the first grading period! I'm not sure where all the time went, but this week will be the 10th week of school. Can you believe it? I'm am working on completing all the grades for the first nine weeks, so be sure to check home access in the next few days. We have a busy week ahead of us. Tuesday we have a lesson about bullying from the guidance counselor, Friday we have an author visit and, Thursday is Every Artist Live day. Students will use their artistic ability and creativity as they participate in several art activities in the morning. Here is a glimpse of our learning for the week: Writing: This week students will continue to write poems and notice poetic devices that poets use. Later in the week we will write a poem from an object in nature. Students may bring an object from nature to observe and then write about. Reading: We have been reading lots of different forms of poetry and noting the characteristics. We'll continue to read a variety of poems while making inferences, drawing conclusions, and identifying the theme. Additionally, we'll discuss how the poet's words appeal to the senses Math: We have been noticing and wondering a lot in math and have discovered that we can use doubling and halving to help find the product of fives, tens, twos, fours, and eights facts. We have also learned other strategies for multiplying including skip counting, repeated addition, and drawing equal groups or arrays. This week we will continue to practice multiplication using various tools and strategies. We'll add strip diagrams to our list of tools to use to help organize our thinking and we'll learn how to use area models to represent multiplication. There will be a unit test on Thursday or Friday. As always, we will review for the test in class. Science: Friday we made our solar ovens! Everyone is anxious to use them, so if the weather cooperates, we will cook our s'mores on Monday or Tuesday. We still have a few more investigations on light and sound to complete this week as we learn more about energy. We'll also explore a few websites about how electrical energy use impacts the environment. Social Studies: Our focus will be on bullying as part of National Bullying Prevention month. We'll also discuss and learn about empathy, our school-wide character trait for October. Upcoming Events: Monday October 24th-PTA Reflections Due Monday-Friday: October 24-28 Red Ribbon and Bully Free Week (see below for details) Wednesday October 26-Early Release @ 12:00 Thursday October 27-Author Visit Red Ribbon Activities for the Week October 24th– 28th We at England Elementary will show our support for a drug free and bully free America by participating in the following dress-up days. Monday will be Wear Crazy Socks Day. “Sock it to drugs and bullying.” Tuesday will be Wild Hair Day. “I’m wild about being drug free and bully free.” Wednesday will be Wear Mismatched Clothing Day. “I won’t let drugs or bullying mix me up.” Thursday will be Wear an England School Shirt Day. “Our school chooses a healthy environment.” Friday will be Dress Like a Superhero Day. “I have the power to be drug free.” Highlights from Oct. 17-21Exploring Light, Sound, Heat/Thermal and Mechanical Energy 3 Act Task in Math I showed the class a video showing the bucket of candy being poured out. After viewing, the students thought of questions that could be answered. They decided that they wanted to find out how many pieces of candy were in the bucket. Each student estimated the amount of candy including an estimate that was too low and too high. Then they drew a number line and placed their estimates on the number line. Next, they had to determine the information they needed to solve the problem. I gave them the arrays of the different types on candy in the bucket. Then they solved the problem independently. When I revealed the answer, most of the class cheered. Imagine, cheering during math time! That was music to my ears! Classroom Visitors During math, we had the elementary math curriculum coodinator, Brian Bushart, and elementary math curriculum specialist, Regina Payne, visit our class. They worked with students as they noticed and wondered about various groups of arrays, listeneded to students justify their thinking, and helped a few kiddos create tables to notice patterns. Then Mr. Bushart led a math game which the class LOVED. They begged to play it again, so I played against them after lunch. The class won both games-and, no, it wasn't rigged. Playing a Math Game to Practice Doubling Investigating Sound Students poured different amounts of water into glasses to see if the glass made different sounds when tapped by a pencil. We noticed we could make low, high, and medium pitched sounds because the water changed the amount of vibrations. Then I challenged students to try to play a song using the glasses. Many of the groups discovered they could play Hot Cross Buns or Mary Had A Little Lamb. Enrichment (E-slot) Students chose to either participate in a building challenge or use LittleBits, (electronic building blocks). I was impressed at how quickly the kiddos learned how to connect the Littlebits to create sounds, lights, movement, etc. Designing and Building Solar Ovens in Science
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Coming Up Week of October 17-21Writing: This week we will focus on writing poems using sensory images, emotion, and rhythm. We'll also continue to read poetry to notice author's craft. Reading: More poetry! We'll learn about different types of poetry including narrative, lyrical, free verse, and sonnets. As we read, students will visualize and make inferences to increase their comprehension. Also, we'll learn about theme, author's message, main idea, and details that support the main idea. Math: We'll continue to learn strategies for multiplication. Our focus will still be on the fives, tens, twos, fours, and eights facts. We have already noticed lots of patterns as we have observed equal groups, arrays, and tables with fives, tens, and twos facts. Highlights from October 10-14Creating Equal Groups to Multiply Investigating Mixtures We observed various mixtures and used appropriate tools to separate mixtures. Using an Interactive Lesson with Nearpod to Multiply Students worked with arrays during an interactive lesson using Nearpod. They had multiple opportunities to find the product of various arrays by drawing with the Chromebooks. Students submitted their answers which displayed on the projector screen. I was even able to push out student examples to the Chromebooks as we worked so that we could observe different strategies. Meeting with Our Kinder Buddies! We met with our buddies for a science investigation about matter. Miss. Ostrominski put a bar of soap in the microwave. While it was being heated, we observed the soap changing in a surprising way! Then we helped out buddies write a reflection in their science notebook. More Ozobot Fun!!!
During enrichment time, we used the Ozobots again to gain experience with coding and programming. Students had a challenge to complete-they had to complete the correct codes on a path to get their robot from home to the shop without getting stuck in the river. It looked really easy, but we quickly figured out you had to carefully think about the codes and the placement of them on the path. Everyone worked really hard, and lots of the kiddos successfully completed the challenge. Coming up...Week of October 10-15We have a lot to pack into our four day week. We'll be starting a new unit in reading and writing as well and wrapping up matter in science. Take a look below for what we will be learning. Writing: This week, students will be immersed in poetry to prepare for writing poetry. The beginning of the week we'll read with a writers' eye to notice what poets do. Once we have a good understanding of what poetry looks like and sounds like, we'll begin crafting our own poems. Reading: We'll also read lots of poetry during reading to have even more exposure to what poetry looks like, sounds like, and how it sounds when reading it aloud. We will read numerous poems together and notice as well as discuss the features of poetry. Math: Last week we began our multiplication unit involving doubles facts, (fives, tens, twos, fours, and eights). We discussed things that come in groups and how you can use multiplication to determine the number of items in equal groups. This week we'll explore how doubling and halving can be used to find the product for fives, tens, twos, and fours facts. Students will notice and wonder about patterns and relationships found in equal groups, arrays, and doubles facts. Science: We are wrapping up our unit by investigating various tools used to separate mixtures as well as exploring different types of mixtures. Students will take the district assessment by Thursday, then we'll move on to our next unit-Energy! Highlights from Oct. 3-7Using a Number Line to Count Up to Subtract Learning Science Vocabulary with Touch a Talk Investigating and Separating a Mixture Observing and Sorting Trash for PBL Programming with Ozobots
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November 2019
Mrs. Swyers3rd Grade Teacher |