Newsletter for November 4, 2011

What We Learned This Week

Word Study: Next week's spelling words are: flame, flower, dream, drive, breeze, brave, drank, draw, flake, flapping, brace, and brand. In each of these words, the side by side consonants blend together, but we can still hear the individual sounds. Our patterns will be fl, dr, and br. Additional words you may want to use with at home spelling strategies (see http://3rdgradehudson.blogspot.com/2011/09/parent-information-highlights.html) include drink, drop, drill, flip, flat, fled, brat, bring, driveway, drift, dribble, flies, flirt, flicker, break, bread, drooping, dromedary, drive-in, Florida, flutter, fluid, breathe, breakthrough.

We also continued our study of idioms. Please take a moment to look at these posted in the hallway when you come for conferences. I've enjoyed seeing so many students from other classes reading them and learning about idioms.

I introduced the generalization that we use "a" before words beginning with consonants and "an" before words beginning with vowel sounds. We will need to revisit this several times typically before it begins to stick.

Reading: We have been studying summaries: characters (who), setting (when and where), and plot (sequence of events: beginning, middle, end). I am using picture books and short stories to support this learning. Reading groups have been formed for all students who will be in them this quarter. Alternatively, some students are receiving their primary reading instruction in intervention. Some students are doing both. Reading groups have discussed strategies for choosing "just right" books and have started writing summaries of what they have been assigned to read. I will slowly introduce new jobs to each reading group as they develop mastery of each literature circle role.

Writing: We are concentrating on revision using three strategies to improve our writing: adding descriptive words that create a mental picture, combining short sentences with transition words to build sentence variation that mirrors our speaking, and adding sentences to provide missing details. This is new for most students and will take time as well. We're looking forward to receiving our pen pals letters soon.

Math: We started linear measure and have practiced measuring lines to the nearest cm, 1/2 cm, in, and 1/2 inch. We begin by identifying our two choices and then we round up or down depending on whether or not the line is equal to or past the halfway mark (1/2 cm/inch for rounding to the nearest whole cm/in and 1/4 cm/in when rounding to the nearest 1/2 cm/in). We have also discussed different types of measurement (quantity/amount, volume/capacity, weight/mass (technically different, but as long as we're on planet Earth, they're more theoretically same than different), length, and time), and their most common respective units of measure. We also identified personal references for a cm (the widest part of a push pin), inch (width of a common Pink Pearl eraser), foot (length of a sheet of paper), and yard (width of a door frame).

Science: We have nearly concluded our earth science unit. We evaporated saturated salt water and looked at the salt crystals that were left; added color to our crystal gardens as the liquid evaporates, made models of sedimentary rock using different colors of clay to represent different erosion events and compared these models to our earlier sedimentary rock models (we mixed gravel, sand, and clay in water and observed that the heavier particles fell out first to create layers of different material). I am investigating the possibility of rescheduling our field trip and will update when I know more.

We are currently working on "Skip To My Lou" and "Ain't No Bugs On Me" in Ukulele Orchestra. Please feel free to print these sheets out for your student to practice at home. Please trim your students fingernails, at least on their left hand (their chording hand). It will help them a great deal when forming chords.