Hope your Holidays were glorious!!!

 

Housekeeping:

Monday, November 26, 2012: PLC/Early Release

Monday, November 26, 2012: AR store...everyone in our class reached their AR Goal for the second time!!! Way to go class!!

Monday, November 26, 2012 to Friday, December 7, 2012: Ellis School Food Drive. These are the suggested themes for the first week, after that, anything goes!! The upper grade and the lower grade with the highest amount of donations will receive a class prize compliments of the Ellis PTA organization.

 

Monday: Soup Day

Tuesday: Breakfast Items

Wednesday: Lunch Items

Thursday: Dinner items

Friday: Snack items

 



 Language Arts:
The story of the week is Dancing Rainbows by Evelyn Clarke Mott. It is a story about a young Native American boy who lives with his grandfather. His grandfather teaches him how to dance and the young boy dances at many festivals and celebrations. It is a wonderful tradition passed down from generation to generation.

Spelling List:

• wild
• bright
• die
• sight
• child
• pie
• fight
• lie
• tight
• tie
• might
• mind

Math:
Because of the busy schedule last week and the shortened week due to the Holidays, we will start this week in Math with counting money amounts. We will also begin reading bar graphs, picture graphs, and graphs with information. The students really like this part of the Unit and there will be many questions about graphs on the year-end ISAT exams.

Social Studies: The students in room #1 will complete the Native American Unit this week. We will start our new Science Unit next week.

Question of the Week:

1) What are the 7 colors of the rainbow in order?
2) List a family tradition you enjoy during the Holiday Season.

 














Story of the Week:
Miss Rumphius by Barbara Cooney

Housekeeping:

• Monday, November 19, 2012: PLC Early Release
• Tuesday, November 20, 2012: AR deadline
• Tuesday, November 20, 2012: Spelling Test and Homework due
• Tuesday, November 20, 2012: AR Party...Board Games and Marvelous Medicine
• Tuesday, November 20, 2012: Dr. Shropshire from ISU Physics presentation: (Upper grades 3rd, 4th and 5th presentation from 1:30-2:30).
• Wednesday, November 21-Friday, November 23, 2012: Thanksgiving Holiday Break
• Wednesday, November 21, 2012: Grading Window opens...please have all missing assignments completed.

Language Arts:
The story of the week is Miss Rumphius. We will only be studying this story for 2 days because it is a shortened week. The spelling list is a review of the past several weeks. The spelling test will be given on Tuesday morning. Also, homework for this week is due on Tuesday. It will be our last homework assignment for this six-week grading period.

Spelling Words:

• lay
• feel
• hold
• wild
• might
• paint
• seem
• patch
• three
• own
• speak
• need
• lie
• host
• spread
• float
• row
• leave
• both
• wrap
• know
• mind
• street
• bright
• tie

Math:
The past week, room #1 has been learning how to round to the nearest 100 and the nearest 10. We also learned about symmetrical and congruent figures. This week, we will learn about money values, which should be a cinch, because we do them every morning during our opening.
Remember:
**Symmetrical figures can be folded in half and exactly match up on each other
**A Rhombus can never be symmetrical
**Congruent means a figure that is the same size and the same shape, even if it is shifted.

Social Studies:
Room #1 continues to learn and read about the early Native Americans. This week we will read about the coastal Natives and how they lived and survived in the early times. The students continue to work on a mat weaving project and completing assignments from their Native American folder.

WRITING:
The entire third grade team at Ellis has been involved in a writing pilot program. For the last 4 weeks, our students have been studying, learning, taking notes, and writing about the solar system and a planet of their choice. It has been a long process. When the informational piece was finalized and completed, the third grade teachers took the polished product to be shared with other third grade teachers in the district. I am happy to report that EACH Third grader at Ellis how a complete product with peer editing. all of the papers were wonderful! Here is some of the criteria the papers were scored on:
1) The paper had to have at least three paragraphs. The first paragraph was about the solar system. The second paragraph was about the planet they chose to learn about complete with interesting facts about the planet's physical features and other informational facts. The third paragraph was a concluding statement and a citation of where the students got their information.
2) The paper had to be neat and legible with obvious indentation for each new paragraph.
3) An organizer and rough draft needed to be included.
4) The paper needed to be edited by a peer and checked for complete sentences with proper punctuation and grammar.
5) Stellar papers included detailed more complex sentences and transitional words between paragraphs.
6) Papers were given a 4 point rating:

• 1 point=below grade level
• 2 points =approaching grade level
• 3 points =benchmark or grade level
• 4 points = beyond grade level or benchmark

7) Other teachers in the district were able to use a rubric to grade the Ellis third grade papers. A recent email indicated what an amazing job the Ellis students did in preparing for this assignment.  OUR STUDENTS ARE AWESOME!!!

Question of the Week:
1) If the guide words on a dictionary page were beach and beat, what is the only word from the list below that would be found in between the guide words?

• Bengal
• begging
• bean
• berries
• beaver

Mrs. Shore and I wish you a wonderful, safe, and plentiful Thanksgiving Season!!!

Our Solar System Papers are Finished!!

Housekeeping:
Monday, November 5, 2012: Early Release/PLC
Thursday, November 8, 2012: Math Night at Ellis (6-7 pm)
Friday, November 9, 2012: Veteran's Day Celebration Displays
Tuesday, November 13, 2012: McDonald's Night for Ellis

Language Arts:
The story this week is called Grandma's Records by Eric Valesquez. It is realistic fiction, or a story that could really happen. The story is told by a man who is remembering when he used to visit his Grandma when he was a little boy. He remembers going to a wonderful concert and listening to the music that his Grandma loved. He learns to love music and to appreciate the culture the music originated from.

The spelling pattern focuses on the long /o/ sound.

• coach
• blow
• float
• hold
• sew
• though
• sold
• soap
• row
• own
• both
• most

Skills:
Proper and Common Nouns
Plurals
Subject and Predicates

Math:
For the last 2 weeks we have been solving word problems using addition and subtraction. Some of the strategies we have been using are:

• Comparison Bars
• Math Mountains
• Fact Families

The important idea behind word problems is reading the information carefully and looking for the total or the partners. If the total is given but one of the partners is missing, you will need to subtract. If the total is missing, you will have to add both partners. It is essential for the student to identify the parts of the problem.

Social Studies:
This week we are going to start our study of Native American cultures. We are going to study Natives who lived in:

• Forests
• Deserts
• Grasslands
• Plains

We will also begin to weave our yarn mats. The students can bring yarn from home or use yarn we have at school. We will supply both the yarn and the weaving mats.

Question of the Week:
List 5 proper nouns of your choice.
What makes a noun proper?

Word Problem:
Use a Math Mountain to solve this problem. There were a total of 115 students who traveled to the band competition. The students traveled on two buses. 58 students traveled on the first bus. How many students traveled on the second bus?