This week has been slammed full of so many exciting things. Where to begin? We started things off on Monday with our Invention Convention Kick-Off. The kids are so excited to get started. Please remind them that Problem forms are due on Monday. I will send home more information after this due date. The final completion date will be April 29th, so students will have plenty of time to engage in the design process. We will also be working with Mrs. Bates and Mrs. Pascual on the presentation piece.
We continued with our busy week by meeting a real inventor whose children attend Tritt. These experts gave the kids some great advice and helped them to see that great inventions are within reach. Thursday was also a first for our class. On Cobb Digital Learning Day, we had the opportunity to Skype with students all the way over at Hayes Elementary an play a fun game of Mystery Number. The kids really enjoyed it! And of course, today is Read Across America Day. We got in our pajamas and cozied up reading. We read one of my favorite Seuss-inspired books, Put Me in the Zoo, which tied in nicely with our reading focus this week, determining point-of-view. We ended today with a trip the ILC for a Book Fair Preview. Did you know that the Tritt Book Fair is back next week? Your children have their personal wish lists ready to go. :) Next week will be our class' week to receive typing practice in the Tech Lab. This will begin at 7:20 and students can arrive as early as 7:15. They will just check in with me and then go straight to the Tech Lab for practice. This special typing practice will help prepare students for the Georgia Milestones that are coming up next month. Not only do we want them to do their best, but we want them to feel confident in what they can do and typing before the test will really help with this. Please try your very best to get your child here early next week. Mrs. Pascual will not be able to accept students who arrive after 7:30, because they just wouldn't have enough time to complete the lesson. We will do this Monday - Friday of next week. Thank you so much for your help with this. The early mornings will pay off! Speaking of Milestones, did you know that you can access the Parent Guide of the Ga Department of Education website? There are even practice problems you can work on with your child. This is a very lengthy resource guide if you would like to have a look at it. This comes from the GA Department of Ed and it can give you some ideas of what the questions will be like http://www.gadoe.org/Curriculum-Instruction-and-Assessment/Assessment/Documents/Milestones/Study-Resource%20Guides/GM_GR03_Study_Guide_11.13.18.pdf Finally, one last reminder. The students will be presenting their speeches next week. They are due on Monday and I will be choosing students each day to share their message to the class. I can't wait to hear what they've come up with. It will be their chance to be the Sage on the Stage! Thank you for helping them practice.
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We had our Invention Convention Kick-Off with Mrs. Bates and Mrs. Pascual today. Now is the time for the kids to begin brainstorming their amazing inventions! Between now and next Monday, students will need to look around their world and think about problems they see. This Problem Finding sheet will be due next Monday (3/4). The end result of all this brainstorming will be an invention created by your child.
Through the guidance of Mrs. Bates, students will learn more about the design process and Mrs. Pascual will be showing the students how to create their own Power Points in Tech Lab here at school. The invention itself is something students will be creating at home. The final project will not be due until early May. I will give you a specific date as time draws closer. For now, only the Problem Finding sheet is due next week. Students may work with a partner in their class, and parents are welcome to help with the tricky stuff (like using power tools ect..) Need some inspiration? Click on the link below to see some awesome inventions on: https://quirky.com/ We have another awesome opportunity with Mrs. Pascual next week as well. She has been so kind to give us her time in the mornings starting at 7:20 to work with our class on typing for an entire week. The Georgia Milestones will be administered online this year and we really want the students to go into this test feeling confident in their typing skills. Please mark your calendars for this typing practice next week (March 4th - 8th). Students can arrive anytime after 7:15 but no later than 7:30 to visit the Tech Lab and practice typing with Mrs. Pascual. Please make every effort to get your child to school early next week. Thank you in advance! We have had such a lovely week celebrating Kindness Week and Valentine's Day. It warms my heart the way this class has grown into such a community of kind little people. It really is a wonder to watch them play so nicely together on the playground. They really are a special bunch!
We had some great visitors this week. We kicked off with a visit from Norma and Chris who taught us all about schools in Zimbabwe. The kids learned how children in Zimbabwe use many things that we throw out in new, creative ways. Norma even demonstrated how a bread bag can be This week we continued studying time by learning how to calculate elapsed time. I have found that using a number line is a great way for kids to visualize this concept. You will see some examples of this on papers coming home tonight. It can be a little tricky, so I encourage you to keep practicing this with your child at home. After the break, we will be studying Metric mass and volume (grams kilograms, liters, and milliliters). We finished up Mr. Popper's Penguins this week. The students were so wrapped up in the last few chapters that they insisted we keep reading until the end yesterday. We compared it to the movie today and found them to have a few similarities, but also very different. Ask your child which one they liked better. We have also been studying point-of-view this week. Take a look at our latest post on See Saw for some stories told from the point-of-view of an American explorer. Finally, while you are on See Saw, you should see a message from me to the class. I would love for you to share photos from the fun adventures you go on this February break. Whether staying close to home or travelling a long way, we'd all love to share our experiences with each other when we return. The students did great with time this week. They should be able to tell time on an analog clock to the minute at this point. Next week, we will be calculating elapsed time. Some great times to talk about this are before going to the movies or taking a trip. You can help your child look up how long the movie lasts and have them figure out what time it will be over. If you are planning a trip for February Break, let your child try and figure out what time you'll arrive.
In Reading, we have been gathering new information with non-fiction text. We read Swarms of Terror about how locusts destroyed crops in the Midwest during the 1890s. We've also been working on building on existing knowledge to make new connections. Next week we will begin examining point of view and thinking about how our own point of view differs from the characters in a story. We have been working on opinion writing for the last few weeks. Next week, I will be sending home some information about our next project, a persuasive speech that the students will write. Be on the lookout for this on Monday. I can't wait to see what the students choose to speak about. Next week is jam packed! On Monday, we will be hearing guest speakers from Zimbabwe who are going to get us ready for our next STEAM Challenge. Our next STEAM Day is the next day on Tuesday. And of course, Valentine's Day is on Thursday. If you would like your child to participate, please send in Valentine's for them to pass out that day. We have 19 students in our class. If you need another copy of the class list, I'm happy to email it. Surprise! I know I don't typically post on a Monday, but I have a few beginning of the week updates to share.
We started off the week with an inspiring and uplifting message from Brent Pease and Kevin who both work for the Kyle Pease Foundation. Here is a link to some of the amazing work they do empowering individuals of all abilities to get involved in sports. Click here to learn more about them. Ask your child to tell you about the program. Valentine's Day is coming up fast! We will exchange Valentine's as a class. I will attach a class list via email if your child would like to bring in Valentines. If you choose to participate, please bring have your child bring in a Valentine for each student. We are up to 19 students now. Students may decorate a Valentine box at home and bring it to school next Thursday to put all of their cards in. And finally, a few upcoming events for this week: Ident-a-Kid will be in the building from 8:30 to 10:00 tomorrow if you would like your child to participate. The Family Dance is this Friday. 3rd Grade's dance time is 7:00-7:55 pm (2nd & 3rd) Today was Super Bowl Friday in our classroom and we had a great time tailgating and kicking field goals! We made our own paper footballs, flicked them, measured the distance, and recorded our calculations on a line plot. The snacks were so tasty and the kids loved getting to graze all morning while they worked. Thank you to everyone who contributed to this fun day!
In Math next week, we will be telling time to the nearest minute. Please begin practicing this with your child. I know that many of them have Fit Bits and so many are good at checking our phones and iPads for the digital time, but anyway that you can expose them to analog clocks will be a big help. In Reading, we will be studying text features of non-fiction and historical texts next week. This ties nicely into our science unit on Habitats as well. We will continue with our Opinion Writing unit in writing. We had a serious talk yesterday about reading homework each night. I know that times are busy, but please continue to encourage your child to read for 20 minutes each night for homework. This is not optional, but required homework. We started new reading logs this semester to keep track of what they are reading at home. I would really appreciate your help in reminding them to log what they read each night. Thank you in advance! Please check your child's purple folder for some upcoming events. On Monday, there will be a parent preview of the SAFE Program with Hermanbelle that our counselors will be presenting to the students. There is also information on Picture Day which is coming up on 2/14. I so enjoyed all of the videos the students sent from home with our "See Saw Snow Day" assignment. We even got to watch a few each day when we returned to school. I hope this inspires them to create more. If you need some tips on posting these to See Saw, I am happy to help. |
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