Our Week: Short in Days, Long in Learning

It was a short but busy week in third grade! The students were really excited to share how they spent their Labor Day weekend.

Hard at work on our first math test!

Students in the third grade math class took their first test of the year  and did so well! They worked really hard and persevered through each question. In third grade, we emphasize the importance of using the whole time and checking each problem multiple times to make sure silly mistakes and errors are caught. We will now move on to Unit 2.  Unit 2’s emphasis is on addition and subtraction.  There are four main areas of focus:

• To review fact families and number families
• To solve “What’s my Rule?” problems
• To use diagrams to help solve number stories
• To review algorithms for addition and subtraction

We also wrapped up our work on geography in social studies.

• See if your child can tell you the three things we use to describe a place's physical geography.  Students should be able to tell you we use physical features, climate, and natural resources.  
• Check and see if your child can describe the physical geography of Indiana.  

We'll be starting our Rocks and Minerals unit next week in science!

In writing, we wrapped up how to SHOW instead of tell when writing  narratives. Students learned that if they use action, dialogue, thoughts, and sensory details, they can produce wonderful writing! Ask your child how they've turned a boring, telling sentence into a great, descriptive paragraph that keeps their reader interested! Next week, we'll focus on how to write great beginnings.

The 100 Book Club has started again!  Although completing the program to 100 books is optional, we would like all third graders to record the books they read in the packet.  Many times students are overwhelmed at the idea of reading 100 books, but they are then surprised at how quickly the books add up with all of the reading they do in 3rd grade.  The students were very excited to get the packets and set a goal to make it to the 25 books level.  Please help them achieve this goal by reminding them to record the books they finish at home.

We're excited to see what next brings in third grade!

Have a wonderful weekend!

Our Week in Review

Third grade is in full swing, and we are so happy with all of the learning that is going on!

• In math we are wrapping up Unit 1, which is a review of some second grade math skills.  We have been working hard on telling time to the exact minute, counting money, and continuing patterns.  Our first math test of the year is next Friday.  Mrs. Nilo's math class just had their first test on Thursday of this week over their geometry unit.    

• In social studies we are working on our geography unit.  The students can't wait to put to use all of these new map skills on our upcoming Map in a Month project.  We have one more week of geography, and then we will be moving on to our first science unit of the year--rocks and minerals.  

• We are becoming better writers every day!  One way we have worked on this is by working on "Show, Don't Tell" in our writing. In Show, Don't Tell, we use our words to show ideas to our readers instead of just telling them.  This makes our writing a lot more interesting to read, and it helps the readers paint a picture of our story in their minds.  We have gotten pretty good at this skill.  Give your child a telling sentence (The boy is mad. The girl was happy.  I am nervous.  The desk is messy. It is a nice day.) and let them tell you what great sentences they would use to show this idea.  We used our Show, Don't Tell skills when we learned about using a 'storyteller's voice' in our writing instead of a 'reporter's voice.'

• In reading we continue to work on our independent reading skills and routines.  We've learned to pick 'just right' books, we've examined our reading interests, and we've learned how to do our best 'real reading' instead of 'fake reading' during our independent reading times.  This will be especially helpful for us as we begin Reading Workshop next week. We are so excited to see the students so excited about reading!

With so much great learning going on in 3rd grade, I don't know how we will top it next week--but I bet we do!  Have a wonderful Labor Day weekend!!  

Kicking Off Writer's Workshop!

Third grade began Writer's Workshop this week and we're pretty excited about it! During this time of day, students work with their teacher, writing partner, and independently to create writing pieces based on the mini-lesson being taught that day. These mini-lessons will gear them up to eventually write and publish their favorite piece of writing! We're focusing on narrative writing this quarter, which is always one of our favorite units! We've been spending a lot of time this week discussing our writer's workshop routine, setting up our fancy notebooks, and brainstorming lots of lists for story ideas. Here's a few of the lists we've been working on:

• Top 10 Best Memories
• Top 10 Worst Memories
• Writing Around a Person-We sketched a picture of someone special to us and brainstormed memorable moments we've shared with them.
• Writing Around a Place-Students sketched a map of their favorite place and marked each spot where something memorable has happened.

These lists are great because they help the kids generate story ideas! If they're stuck or just can't think of anything to write about, they can browse through their lists and pick an idea. In the weeks ahead, we'll be setting goals, practicing SHOWING the reader our story vs. telling, editing as we write, and working on perfecting GREAT beginnings!  We're looking forward to watching our third graders blossom this year in writing!

Writing Around a Person

Special people give us lots of story ideas!

Writing Around a Place

A treasure map of story ideas!

X marks the spot of a good story!

Testing, Testing, 1, 2, 3

Carmel Clay Schools is again participating in assessments through NWEA (Northwest Evaluation Association: www.nwea.org).

In 3rd grade we will take an assessment called MAP, and it will cover reading and math.  These tests are taken on the computer, and they are adaptive, which means they will be individualized for each student.  The data we gain from these assessments will ensure that we not only know your child's strengths and weaknesses in these different areas, but that we also know what they are best prepared to learn next.

To learn more, follow this link to take you to a "Parent Toolkit" on the NWEA website.  The toolkit is a PDF file with more information and FAQs.  

Miss White's class will be testing on Monday and Friday of this week and on Monday and Tuesday of next week.  Mrs. Hreno's class will be testing on Tuesday and Friday of this week and on Wednesday of next week.

Please help us in encouraging your child to do his or her best and keeping all talk of these tests positive, since we have found that a good attitude helps students through these assessments.

We hope you are having a wonderful weekend, and we can't wait to have another amazing week in third grade!

Welcome!

Welcome to the third grade blog!  We are so excited to have the opportunity to work with your child this year.  It has been an amazing start with our new 3rd graders, and we can't wait to see what this year holds.  We are looking forward to seeing the parents at Meet the Teacher on Wednesday, August 17 at 7:00 pm.  We have so much to share with you about the fun year ahead.  

Miss White and Mrs. Hreno

Pioneer Day!!!!!

Hello!  We are only two weeks away from the much anticipated Pioneer Day, and we are SO EXCITED!  Our wonderful Pioneer Day committee has already been hard at work planning this special day, but we need a lot of volunteers to make this day successful.  Please see the note below about the help that is needed--and please consider volunteering to help with this day.  Thank you!  

Many of you have heard about the fun-filled Pioneer Day held each year in May for all of the third grade students at Carmel Elementary.  It is a day when our children experience pioneer life through various hands on activities.  A few of these fun activities include making pioneer crafts, handling antique tools, learning in a pioneer school house, preparing food, square dancing, and listening to a story teller and a fiddler.  This event will be held from 8-2:30 on Friday, May 13th.

To make this day as exciting and memorable as possible for our children, we need many volunteers.  There are many ways to help out.  We need  help both the night before with set up and the day of Pioneer Day supervising activities; we also will need some donations.  Please follow the links below to volunteer. 

If you are willing to volunteer your time on Pioneer Day or the night before with set-up, please sign up here:

http://www.signupgenius.com/go/20f0f49a8aa28a13-pioneer

If you are willing to donate items, we will post the sign up here next week:

Link coming soon. :) 

If you have any questions please do not hesitate to call or email Mrs. Suhy: bsuhy@aol.com or call 317-506-8005.  

This day will be a great way to finish off the school year for our third graders!!  Thanks for your help and support! 

FastPass to Success

We are gearing up for our upcoming ISTEP tests.  For this first round of ISTEP, we will start testing next Monday, February 29.  We will test Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday of next week.  Our testing is in the morning, so please make every effort to have the students here on time.  It is also important for the students to get a good night’s sleep and eat a healthy breakfast.  

We started the ISTEP practice tests today.  We will continue with the practice tests throughout the week.  To add some fun to the practice tests, we are using an amusement park theme. The students got their ISTEP FastPass today with our slogan "Don't wait in line, it's your time to shine!"  We are collecting tips on our FastPass after completing each practice test so that we will be ready to move to the front of the ISTEP line.  At the end of the week, we will celebrate that we have made it through the Islands of ISTEP amusement park with a fun celebration. 

Even though the first round of testing is still a week away, I already know that my smart and talented class is going to do wonderfully.  Their writing has improved so much this year.  They are also very skilled readers, and they are improving every day in their math problem solving.  We are excited to show the state of Indiana how smart we are!  Please help me in keeping all talk about ISTEP positive and supportive—students will do a better job of showing what they know if they are not stressed about the tests.