Weekly Update 9.12.17
By carrievaughan In News & Updates On September 12, 2017
Tuesday Folders are FULL today of student work samples, school forms, and more. Please take time looking through and responding to paperwork. Most student work samples will come home graded with a 1, 2, 3 or 4 after this week. You may see a checkmark or a star on items graded on a completion/effort scale.
Be on the Lookout for…
- 3rd grade students will take the Beginning of Grade (BOG) assessment tomorrow. This is a reading test which shows what students already know, sets a benchmark to measure growth against this year, and serves as a Read to Achieve exemption if students score high enough. To learn more about Read to Achieve, please see the white handout in the Tuesday folders this week.
- Our school will be participating in International Dot Day this Friday, 9/15. Please sent your child to school in dots to help us celebrate:) Mr. Moore will be looking for spirit all over our school!
- Today, an xtramath.org flyer came home with an access code for your child to begin using this essential tool at home. The expectation is that students spend the 5 minutes to do a session of xtramath daily! I have used it for 2 years and think it’s the best tool for fact fluency out there. If you did not receive your access code sheet, or need another one, please email me!
This week in Literacy:
- We will start weekly reading/activity buddies with Ms. Liberto’s 1st grade class on Friday this week. I can’t wait to watch our “mature” 3rd graders serve as a mentor to these young owls and maybe even learn something! IF your child does not have a reading tote yet- please send asap!! Students need this for traveling around the school with their reading choices.
- Students are finishing literacy assessments this week in the areas of fluency, comprehension and context clues. These will help give us an idea of what students know and give us a baseline on how far students will grow this year.
- We are also learning about characters- their traits and motivation, and how their actions impact the story. Students will practice telling basic story elements and answering right there questions.
- In writing, we are having a great time writing a personal narrative about an injury we have had. The more details, the better the story!
This week in Math:
This week students are working on rounding and estimation. Students have learned a few rounding strategies including the hundreds board, number line, mountain, and of course the rounding rap! The hardest part of this skill seems to be reading carefully to find tens or hundreds when rounding, so pay close attention!
We are moving on from addition and subtraction strategies, but that is not to say all students are proficient with these yet. I will continue to spiral in review of these skills all quarter.
Subtraction, particularly with multiple borrowing pots or across zeroes is extremely difficult for 3rd graders. I will teach them a variety of methods so please be open minded to what strategy will work best for your child. If frustration levels are reached when doing homework, write me a note or send me an email. I want to address it asap! Here is a helpful tutorial that may assist your child with getting on track with difficult subtraction. Some practice games can be found here. Word- rounding
A year long “Scope and Sequence” which lays out our math curriculum pacing for the year can be found here
