Everyone has selected an amazing animal to learn more about!

 Hello Third Graders!!
Hope you had a great 100's day. Your Water Cycle Projects were great!! This year every student had a completed project on time. Nice job!! We are going to do some other activities with our water cycles on the IPAD's.
Housekeeping:
Monday, February 11, 2013: PLC/Early Release
Thursday, February 14, 2013: Valentine's Day (We will make our bags in class this week and pass out Valentine's at our Thursday party. Each student will receive a class list so they can write out their cards at the party).
Friday, February 15, 2013: Students need to be at 62% of their Reading Goal!!

Reading/Language Arts:
This week we start our Research Reports on an animal of our choice. We will get our information from Websites, My Big Campus, lectures, and home. Much of the writing will be completed in class. There will be a rubric explained to the students so they know what our expectations are for the paper. The students may choose to do research at home and bring the information to school. The writing project will take at least 2 weeks. Their Solar System papers were so great, we thought we would try some more writing.

Math:
Room #1 just completed their Unit Seven Math Test on 0's, 1's, 2's, 3's, 4's, 5's, 9's and 10's. We have been going over several strategies in class to help them connect that multiplication is simply repeated addition and that division is no more than repeated subtraction. This is a difficult concept to understand. Once they get that idea, then they can learn and memorize their multiplication facts. We teach them strategies along the way to help them if they can't remember a fact. We are testing for fluency on the following multiplication facts:
0, 1, 2, 5, 9, 10
The students are times for one minute and given 30 problems. As soon as they pass off zeros and ones, they move to multiplication by 2's and so forth. If they can pass off all of these families, they earn a pizza party!! We are giving them several weeks to earn their pizza party. Extra practice at home is a GREAT IDEA!!

Science:
The Water Cycles were such a hit and all students turned in and presented a project. We continue to learn about the surface of the earth and its characteristics. We will finish up Earth and its resources this week and then start our Arctic Unit.

Question of the Week:
What is the area of a rectangle that is 9 inches wide and 7 inches long? Write the multiplication equation to answer this question.

What is a good trick when multiplying by ten?

What is your favorite thing about third grade?