Friday, November 1- Friday, November 8

Important Reminders:
Nov. 8 - 2:00 Fridays begin

Nov. 11-15 - Scholastic book fair

Nov. 13 - No school/parent-teacher conferences K-12 please schedule a time through the front desk. I'm available at CTA all day.

Nov. 27 - 9:30AM Thanksgiving/Chanukah program K-4 (this is a TIME CHANGE!)

Nov. 28-29 - no school, Thanksgiving holiday

dress down dates Nov. & Dec.: 11/15, 12/6, 12/20

Homework:

math:
your child has either:
 (a) addition/subtraction practice w/regrouping
 (b) a subtraction page where your child has to figure out & fill in the missing digits

spelling:
long a & short e: cheap, dream, restaurant, sweet, speak, least, reach, speed

NO EXCUSES: be, been             BONUS: addend

idiom of the week: piece of cake it means: something very easy to accomplish

Your child should complete 3 menu-choice activities for next Wednesday. UNLESS he/she has an assignment sheet that indicates he/she is to write words 3x each on the attached paper and complete any other 2 assignments.

General Classroom Information:
Some of our greatest challenges in third grade are understanding what directions are asking us to do. We don't always know how to use examples to help us figure out what is being asked of us. So, I encourage you to have your kids read directions  on everything from homework to  boxes of pasta or recipes  that you cook.  Generally, when you are out in the world, have your child explain what it is that they are supposed to do and how they know (which words tell them).
At some point reading directions and following them will be important for students. So, when they answer questions in their own way or don't complete something entirely, those answers, even if technically "correct", will be counted as incorrect and marked against them.

You can also have them estimate and round numbers when you are at the grocery store. Have them round prices to the nearest dollar (have them look at it like a ten or hundred) and estimate how much something will cost. So, for example, you are going to buy 3 items that cost $ .89, $3.49 and $2.99. Your child should be able to tell you that 89 rounds to 100, 349 rounds to 300 and 299 rounds to 300, so the estimate would be 700, or $7.00.

These practical skills will go far in helping your child both inside and outside of the classroom.

As always, text or email me with any questions or concerns!

Friday, Oct.25 - Friday, Nov. 1

homework:
Please return H&I folders & homework by
WEDNESDAY  10/30

Math:
 This week your child is practicing  2-digit and 3 digit addition and subtraction with regrouping. Please encourage him/her to show the work they do to solve the problems. Math is more than arriving at the "correct" answer.

Spelling Test 11/1:
long a short a
gain, glass, last, athletic, pain, safe, sale, steak
no excuses:  about, answer
bonus: equator
Idiom: need __(something)__ like a hole in the head - to not need anything at all

Reading log:
continue to read & fill in minutes!


A PEEK AT THE WEEK:
Reading:
We continued with our fairy tale genre this week so that we could really capture the elements of this genre and also to keep the content consistent while we work on rotating efficiently and being productive independent workers.

Math:
This week we reviewed 2-digit and 3- digit subtraction with regrouping. Many of us are struggling with the concepts of regrouping, showing work and lining up the correct place values. In math, when one number is wrong the entire problem is wrong. It is important to go slowly and show how we arrive at answers so that when the math becomes more complicated, we are accustomed to the problem solving process.

Social Studies:
We are still learning about geography. We are learning to read lines of latitude, longitude. We are also learning the differences between political & physical maps, cities, states, countries, and continents.

Friday, Oct. 18-25

HOMEWORK:
Spelling: short vowel words ending in -ck
pluck, knock, shock, truck, stock, dock, lack, snack
no excuses: able, between

bonus: latitude, longitude

idiom of the week: all ears - to listen carefully

test on Friday 10/25

note about homework: if your child received the spelling letter boxes accompanied by the pink "special homework assignment" then he/she is expected to complete that sheet and  2 of the menu choices. If you don't have this in the packet, please complete 3 menu choices. 

Purple H&I folders with homework assignments are due on Wednesday, 10/23. Thank you.

Math:

"making 10" break apart addition. Your child will be adding numbers and "breaking apart" one of the numbers to help the other number equal a 10 so that adding the  numbers mentally will be easier. If you have questions about this assignment, please email, call or text me. We have completed this assignment in class and they played a math game like this for 3 days this week. Your child should be familiar with this math procedure.

A week in review:

This week we continued our review of adding with regrouping and next week we will review subtraction & regrouping. We started our small group rotations in both reading & math. We are getting the kinks worked out. Working independently and staying on task when not directly supervised is an advanced skill that I am confident that we can master! 

We are still studying geography, maps & globes. 

We are working on commas and capitalizing words that start a sentence, are proper nouns like the names of months, people or titles, the letter "I" when used as a pronoun for "me", and important words in titles of books, movies & songs. 

Friday, October 11- Friday, October 18

I am very proud of your children for putting forth their best effort on our first achievement test ever! They were troopers! It was also exciting that we had 100% attendance which hasn't happened in years! Yay, 3rd grade! As soon as the test scores are mailed to the school, Mrs. Sapp will be sure to get those sent home to you parents!

HOMEWORK:
Math:
either instructions for a math game involving playing cards
or
a math puzzle with double digit numbers adding/subtracting to 10

Spelling- short vowel sounds with sk, cl, sw:
clink, cluck, clutch, sketch, skillet, swish, swift, swat NO EXCUSES: every, could
Idiom of the Week: bounce (something) off of someone: to try out an idea on a person to get their opinion before you make a decision

Reading:
read & record minutes

REMINDER:
Library is on Tuesday, October 15. Please make sure your child returns his/her book so that he/she may check out another one.

A WEEK IN REVIEW:
We completed our world maps which look drastically differently from the ones we created from memory! We will continue with maps/geography next week.

In math, we are learning to show how tens get "carried" or "traded" using place value mats and manipulatives. This should help us to understand why we "carry" the numbers when we complete standard US algorithms.

We used centers and task cards to practice skills for the reading test and got to kick back and read our new Spider magazine on Th & F. We read an interesting biographical article about the Grimm brothers.  We are learning the elements of fairy tales and will have time to read and explore some on our own next week.

Friday, October 4 - Friday, October 11

Our first 5-day week in a long time and these 3rd graders really put in the effort! What a great week!

We have the Ohio Achievement Assessment next Wednesday 10/9 at 9AM. We spent 3 days this week practicing and talking about the types of questions that might come up. Your child will bring home the practice information in the HI folder if you want to look it over or talk through anything with them. The most important thing is that they understand that the test is serious, but not a big deal right now. It's just important to be rested, have a good breakfast, wear layers and have a good attitude on Wednesday.

HOMEWORK:

Spelling:
Return the choice board menu that a parent has initialed in HI folder on Wed. 10/9
spelling words:
two, forty, eighty, ninety, hundred, thousand, each, there
Idiom: drop the ball - to make a mistake

Math:
Return the completed game/puzzle that your child had assigned to him/her.

2 different assignments came home.
Assignment A: asked your child to draw numbers from a deck of cards and fill in a ten-frame creating math facts that equal a sum of 10.

Assignment B: Your child completes a number puzzle so that the numbers when added or subtracted together equal  a sum of 10.

Reading log:
continue read and complete boxes on the reading log

THIS WEEK:
We started our MYSTERY number of the week challenge! Each week there is a mystery number which students have to figure out, then they will work through daily activities for that number. I was very excited to see all of the 3rd graders who rose to the challenge! Woot! Woot!
Here was our Week 1 challenge:
It is a 3 digit number. The tens digit is the sum of 6 and two. The hundreds digit is 3 less than the tens digit.
(credit: this program is from Blair Turner on Teachers Pay Teachers)

We began looking at maps and each student drew a world map from memory. We are now working to examine a map and identify significant lines of latitude and longitude so that we can draw the maps using these lines as focus points.

We also had our first library visit. Books are due back by 10/16 which is our next visit.

The Innisbrook fundraiser began on Wednesday, 10/2. Your child should have brought home the fundraising packet that evening.

SKILLS & VOCABULARY:
Some things your child should know if you ask him or her:
-the numbers we add are called addends.
-the answer when you add is the sum
-latitude lines are horizontal on the globe & begin at the Equator
-longitude lines are vertical (or long) on a globe and begin at the Prime Meridian
- a story's theme is the overall message or moral
-the main idea is the overall, most important thing that a reading passage is about
-details support a main idea.

prefixes we know:
re - again
un- not
hemi- half
pre- before