September 28th Update

Another great week of learning in 3C!

LITERACY

This week we:

• focused on a few reading strategies during our read aloud time while enjoying some awesome books. We focused on tuning into interesting words when reading Rebecca Bender's books Giraffe and Bird and Don't Laugh at Giraffe. We also focused on making connections when reading to improve our comprehension when reading The Interrupting Chicken, Interrupting Chicken and the Elephant of Surprise and The Incredible Bouncing Chowder.
• started our reading intervention schedule for one-on-one reading conferences during read to self time. Students who require the most assistance get the most time during these conferences with the intention of quickly raising reading levels.
• wrote our HLATs. This is an assessment tool that all grade 2-9 students complete in September in Black Gold School Division. They will be marked by October 30th, as we need to wait for exemplars to be provided prior to marking. 
• completed week 3 in our focus on IDEAS in writing. This week we focused on including the 5 Ws (what, where, when, who and why) in our writing to ensure that we are giving our reading adequate information. 

NUMERACY

This week we:

• learned how to add the gap to the final number in a sequence
• learned how to extend increasing patterns using three steps. (1) find the gap, (2) double check your gap, (3) add the gap on to the last number
• learned how to identify the gap in a decreasing pattern by counting backwards
• completed our MIPI assessment. This assessment tool is used by grades 1 to 10 students in Black Gold School Division. These assessments have already been scored. 

SCIENCE

This week we:

• continued to learn about the layers of the earth
• started constructing a 3D model of the layers of the earth using modelling clay. I have no photos of this activity at this time because my hands were constantly busy helping the students warm up their modelling clay! LOL! Photos to come next week after we add our finishing touches!

TERRY FOX WALK

This week we:

• learned why Terry Fox is a Canadian hero!
• enjoyed a chilly walk!

INTRODUCING OUR FIRST STAR STUDENT

This week we:

• enjoyed getting to know Kacey better!
• Please note: I'm sharing more photos than I normally would this week to give you a better idea of what happens during your child's Star Student week. I understand that this project takes some time to put together but I promise you, it is worth it. The students just glow with pride when it's their turn in the spotlight!

ORANGE SHIRT DAY 

This week we:

• read two books and had discussions about the use of residential schools in Canada.

 

Talking about this topic is tricky with Grade Three students and I promise you that I put a lot of thought into it. We started our discussion talking about how sometimes when we look back at things that happened in the past, we wonder "why would people think this was ok?" I opened the conversation by talking about how when I was a child, it wasn't the law to wear seatbelts, so I didn't wear one (until I was eleven years old...I just looked it up). They were shocked by this! I went on to explain how when I came home from the hospital, my mom held me in the front seat because there was no such thing as car seats. Again, their mouths fell open in shock! We then talked about how knowing what we know now, that seems crazy and you may even question what my parents were thinking. But back then, it's just the way it was. 

From here, we started talking about what we learned from the books about residential schools and how it affected the children and the Indigenous groups all over Canada. 

The parts that I focused on were:

• the children weren't allowed to speak their own languages and "lost" their languages over the years. We talked about the impact of not being able to communicate with their parents when they got home.
• the children were unable to maintain their connection to their culture at that time and often lost the knowledge and skills to participate fully and confidently in their culture when they got home. 
• when they finished with their time in the residential schools they often lacked a sense of belonging to either community (Euro-Canadian or Indigenous)
• they lived at the schools and missed their parents 

I'm very sensitive with this topic for the students, because I know for most of them, this is the first time that they've heard about it. I focus on how the intention behind the residential schools was not to harm children and that the people running them thought they were doing what was best for the children at the time. But just like the seatbelt law, we know better now. 

It did come up in the Stolen Words book that children were struck. This shocked the students at first but then someone chimed in with, "My grandpa told me about getting the strap when he was a kid at school and he didn't go to a residential school!" We talked about how that's another example of things that were "normal" in the past, that we can't imagine happening today. 

Finally, I did share with the students a story about a trip that my family took to Alert Bay, just off the coast of Port MacNeil, on Vancouver Island. I told them about going to the Big House to take in a T'sasala Cultural Group traditional dance performance. I talked about meeting an Elder that quietly watched as people filed into the Big House to take their seats. During the introductions, her daughters introduced her to us and explained that she has a hard time believing that we came to witness her culture. They explained that she grew up in a residential school and was taught to be ashamed of her culture. She is moved to tears during every performance as she watches the spectators enjoying and embracing her culture. I shared some photos and videos with the students from this day.

If you have any questions about our conversation, please feel free to contact me at any time. 

IMPORTANT REMINDERS

• Monday - Orange Shirt Day
• Monday - Elder Sydney Courtepatte of Michel First Nation will be doing a 30 minute presentation around 9:20 for the Grade 3s and 4s.
• Wednesday - Early Dismissal
• Friday - Admazing Savings Pack orders due
• Friday - Photo Orders due
• Wednesday, October 9th - Photo Retakes

Bonus Math Post - Increasing Patterns

In grade three, the focus is on numerical patterns. 

What number comes next?

2, 5, 8, 11, __

This task can be quite tricky for students! Our JumpMath program does a fantastic job in breaking this task down into manageable parts! The first thing that a student needs to be able to do is to figure out how the pattern is growing? What are they adding to 2 to get to 5? This is called "The Gap". 

If a student is unable to do this in their head, they can use this trick:

After they can determine "the gap", they are ready for the next step...adding the gap to a number.

The final step is putting those two tasks together, find the gap, double check the gap,  and add it to the last number in the pattern to continue the pattern.

We will use these same strategies with decreasing patterns.

September 20th Update

It was a short but great week in 3C!

LITERACY

This week we:

• finished up our first full round of reading conferences! I have now read with every student in 3C and will be working on a schedule for weekly reading conferences. Students who need the most support will get more frequent one on one coaching with reading strategies. All students receive daily reading instruction (modelling the use of a variety of strategies) during our read alouds. 
• finished reading the Skippyjon Jones books focusing on checking for understanding and backing up and rereading.
• wrote in our journals
• completed our second week of writing mini lessons ideas. This week we focused on writing topic sentences at the beginning of paragraphs and using supporting sentences that stay on topic.
• continued working on our lowercase handwriting letters in the kite strings family (i, t, u)

NUMERACY

This week we:

• finished up our work with Touch Math and subtraction
• started our unit on Patterns by finding the gap between two numbers

SCIENCE

This week we:

• learned about the layers of the earth
• touched a piece of the mantle
• went on our rock walk

To see your child's photo with the piece of mantle, click here:

Click here to see all of our Rock Walk photos!

PE

This week we:

• focused on spatial awareness in the gym to ensure student safety
• practiced different forms of locomotion (skipping, galloping, walking, jogging, running, etc.)

TYPING

This week we:

• started our six week school wide typing practice. Students will be practicing every day at school and can practice at home too! Students can access their accounts by using this link: https://rbes3c2.typingclub.com/ Their username is their first name and the password is 3c.
• learned how important it is to use homerow! Perfect practice makes perfect!

IMPORTANT REMINDERS

• Cross Country Meet - Wednesday morning (Cross Country students only)
• Picture Day - Wednesday and Thursday
• Terry Fox Walk - Friday (*Bring in Toonies for Terry please.)

September 14th Update

Last week was another great week in 3C!

LITERACY

This past week we have:

• started one-on-one reading conferences during read to self time
• continued our read alouds introducing "good reader" strategies (we've been focusing on checking for understanding and backing up and rereading)
• participated in some working with words activities (Making Words)
• wrote in journals twice
• started our first of five weekly writing lessons focusing on ideas (Students learned to start their writing with a strong, specific idea. The convention that we focused on was using periods.)

NUMERACY

This past week we:

• focused on learning Touch Math to help us with our addition and subtraction facts in preparation for our patterning unit that we will be starting this week

Here is a video of me explaining the use of Touch Math with addition. In order to use it for subtraction, students just need to count backwards instead of forwards. 

SCIENCE

This past week we:

• discussed the properties that we examine when classifying rocks and minerals (light {translucent, transparent or opaque}, streak colour, feel, smell, magnetism, lustre, hardness, shape)
• learned the difference between a rock and a mineral
• worked on organizing the information we have learned into our lapbooks

ART

This past week we:

• learned about Brazillian artist, Romero Britto, and his style and techniques
• completed a guided drawing of a fish
• filled in the Cubism inspired spaces with different designs
• outlined our drawing with Sharpie bringing bold, black lines to our pieces

We will finish them up this week! Stay tuned!

PE

This past week we:

• focused on locomotion games and following the rules and expectations of PE class

PHOTOS

Click here for individual first day of school photos!

Reminders . . .

September 18th - RBES SCHOOL COUNCIL MEETING - 5:30 pm

September 18th - RBES Fundraiser Meeting - approx 6:30 (follows council meeting)

September 20th - NO SCHOOL - PD DAY

September 25th & 26th - Picture Day

September 27th - Terry Fox Run

September 8th Update

Wow! What a fantastic first week of school! The students are settling into the routines of 3C really well and we are already on our way into regular school work and covering curriculum.

LITERACY

This week we have:

• established the routine of read to self
• participated in multiple read alouds, focusing on several reading strategies
• chosen our first set of read to self books
• participated in our first journal writing class
• learned three clock climber letters in handwriting (c, a, d)

NUMERACY

This week we have:

• completed our first daily graph activity focusing on birthday months in 3C
• completed our first How Many Ways activity, writing multiple sentences that equal 5
• completed our first addition and subtraction All the Facts You Need to Know practice (addition facts to 9+9 and subtraction facts to 18-9)

SCIENCE

This week we have:

• completed a KWL chart showing what we already know and what we want to learn about rocks
• discussed the concept of properties (special characteristics of an object)

ART

This week we:

• played around with writing our names on the diagonal within a triangular shape, stretching our uppercase letters 
• chose our favourite colours to complete our project with pencil crayon. 
• talked about how when you are colouring in a large area in pencil crayon it is best to use a shading technique instead of trying to colour by pressing really hard. 

PE

This week we:

• focused on listening and cooperation games

SUPPLIES

All of our school supplies have now been sorted and labelled. I have placed each child's extra supplies in a ziploc bag with their name on it.

Team 3C students are already participating in a Pencil and Eraser Challenge. Each month students start the month with a pencil and eraser with their name on it. If they manage to keep the same pencil and eraser for the entire month, they will receive two stickers on our chart. If they need a new pencil mid month because theirs is too short, I simply give them a new pencil from their supplies and write their name on it. As long as they show me their old pencil, they are not penalized in the challenge. At the end of the year, I will count up everyone's stickers and reward our most responsible students with a few prizes. Last year, each student was able to take home an entire box of pencils that they didn't get around to using! The purpose of this challenge is to teach the students to be responsible for and respect their supplies. 

WATER BOTTLES

Students are encouraged to bring a water bottle to school each day. Trips to the water fountain are very disruptive. I will be encouraging students to bring home bottles each day to be washed and refilled for the following day.

GRAZING VEGGIES

Students need nutrient-rich foods in order to maximize learning. The Grade Three classes will be continuing the Vegetable Grazing experience that was started in Grade Two. Students are welcome to keep a container of fresh vegetables (NO DIP) on their desk and may snack on them throughout the day. Happy munching!

PARENT HOMEWORK

The students loved the fact that you received the first homework assignment of the year! Please complete the In A Million Words or Less sheet and return it to school ASAP. If it didn't make it home, let me know and I'll send home a new one!

UPCOMING EVENTS

• SEPT. 16-19TH - Rock Walk to Voyageur Park
• SEPT. 18TH - Parent Council Meeting 5:30pm
• SEPT. 20TH - PD Day (no school)
• SEPT. 25 & 26TH - Photo Day
• SEPT. 28th - Terry Fox Walk
• OCT. 4th - ADmazing Savings Ticket Back orders due

My door is always open to our 3C families. If you have any questions or concerns at any time, please bring them to my attention at your earliest convenience.