Dear Families,
We had a fun-filled month of learning in February. We hope that the home-school connection will be strengthened as you stay informed on all the learning that is taking place at school!
Arantza having fun reading her valentines.
READING:
We continue to press on to help students understand how to better comprehend what they are reading. This month, we have looked at the traditional literature genre of tall tales to find story elements (setting, characters, events, problem, and solution). What fun it has been to hear many different versions of classic tales including John Henry, Johnny Appleseed, Pecos Bill, Slue-Foot Sue, Paul Bunyan, Davy Crockett and Mike Fink! Students read Reader’s Theater script versions of these tales, selected roles, and are rehearsing their lines. Children are working in cooperative groups with the other actors in their play to use sensory imagery to create the setting. Please stay informed as you will be invited to join us for these amazing performances.
WRITING:
In February, 3rd graders worked on raising the quality of their essays. During this process, students learned how to organize their ideas by using topic and supporting sentences. We have been using outlines to help structure and guide our details into paragraphs. Students are now working on the structure of their ideas, how to support their opinion, and learning the strategies to balance their essays. Students brainstormed ways to create a strong introduction to hook the reader into their essays. Word choice, sentence structure, and complete paragraphs are main contents that we will be focusing on in the upcoming weeks. In March, students will be using rubrics and checklists to monitor their writing process before publishing their final drafts. Stay tuned for the next published essay!
WORD STUDY:
Students have been working hard to learn how to read and write words with affixes. This month we specifically studied the following suffixes:- s, -es, -ies, -y,-or, and -est. Be sure to be on the lookout with your children for these suffixes in the real world. It will be an exciting and educational game of “I Spy…” Students are currently identifying frequently used homophones and learning how to spell them.
MATH:
In February, students were introduced to fact family triangles to show students how three numbers in a multiplication problem (the 2 factors and the product) are related to each other. This provided a nice transition into division, and students developed a deeper understanding of the inverse relationship between multiplication and division. Students saw how division uses the same fact families, and how the use of arrays relates the two operations together. Students experienced division in a playful and meaningful context by becoming “employees” at a packing company. They had to figure out how to evenly load a certain number of cartons onto trucks.
Oliver, Isabella, and Milla counting the seeds in their bell pepper.
SCIENCE:
We began a new unit in Science called, “The Structures of Life”. In this module, children learned to identify observable properties of plants such as seeds and fruits. Students also investigated the effect of water on four kinds of seeds: sunflower, bush bean, green pea, and corn. In small groups, students observed, described, and recorded the structures of their germinated seeds and learned their functions for the growing plants.
We look forward to meeting with you for our Spring conferences on March 30-April 1 to discuss your child’s progress this year. We will be in touch with you soon about scheduling conference times.
