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!!!