Weekly Update- 10/30

In Social Studies this week, students worked in groups to create world maps.  They practiced identifying and naming continents and oceans while also practicing working and communicating in groups.  Look for a study guide to be going home on Tuesday for a test on November 9th. 

In Fundations we are learning about vowel-consonant-e (v-e) syllable words.  These are words such as like, cake, home.  Students practiced identifying, spelling, and marking these words.  They also learned rules such as to use -ck after a short vowel sound and -k after a long vowel sound.  We will continue practice with these concepts next week.

In reading we read the book, Hiking the Appalachian Trail.  This book was a narrative nonfiction book that told a true story while also including facts about the trail itself.  Students enjoyed hearing about Taylor Witcher and how she, along with her family, hiked the entire Appalachian Trail from Georgia to Maine.  It took them 183 days!  They also learned fun facts like the oldest known person to hike the entire trail was 79 years old and the youngest was 6!  With this book the students practiced learning how to summarize what they read.  They learned to use pictures and headings as guides to help them with their summaries.  They also practiced how to identify the most important ideas and support those ideas with supporting details. 

In previous weeks in writing students have taken days to plan their writing, used graphic organizers, and wrote many drafts before completing their final drafts.  This week students practiced writing to a prompt, in which they only had a few minutes to plan and then a limited time to respond.  We identified key words that helped students to determine what type of prompt it was (descriptive, narrative, or persuasive).  We responded to a prompt as a class and practiced using voice, descriptive words, and different types of sentences.  Students were then able to respond independently to a prompt at the end of the week.

In math we continue to practice adding and subtracting larger numbers.  The students are becoming much stronger with their basic facts!  Thanks for your support in helping them to practice at home.

We ended the week with a FANTASTIC Halloween party!  The students came to school dressed in some great costumes!  They showed off their costumes to the other third grade students during our parade and then decorated pumpkins and had some Halloween snacks.  The party ended with 4 stations of games in which the students took turns wrapping each other up like mummies, playing hot potato with a pumpkin, building a spider web using their bodies and some string, and blindly reaching their hands into some containers holding things like "witch's nails".  I'd like to give a special thank you to the class moms and all the parents who helped and donated items for the party!

Remember next week is only 3 days!   Have a safe and happy Halloween!