Week of May 25th

Bike Safety

Thank you to Mr. Henderson for a great week of Bike Safety. The students had a great time!

Children's Festival Field Trip

On Friday, the grade 3 classes went on a field trip to the St. Albert Children's Festival.  Thank you so much to Mrs. Galloway, Mrs. Spottiswood and Mrs. Beynon for volunteering for the day.  It was so much fun!

Language Arts

This week during writer's workshop we focused on finishing up our All About Me booklets.  The students have written one paragraph per month on a specific topic about themselves.  Each paragraph includes a topic sentence, 5-6 supporting sentences and a concluding sentence.  The students have illustrated a picture to go with each paragraph and will be put together to form a booklet.  

Reader's Theatre

During Read to Self time, a group of students have been working on the readers' theatre script called "Lousy Rotten Stinkin' Grapes" by Margie Palatini.  

In this story, Fox is trying to figure out how in the world he can reach to get the grapes off the tree. He turns to his friends Bear, Possum, Porcupine, and Beaver for help; but allows them to only follow his plan. Fox tries to stack everyone on top of each other to become tall enough to reach the tree. Because he is “sly, clever, and smart,” his plan will work and no one else’s will. Fox’s plan doesn’t work, and each of his friends have their own way of getting the grapes. Fox is the only one who doesn’t get to eat the grapes in the end.

The students did a great job of presenting the 'Lousy Rotten Stinkin' Grapes" to the class.  Benefits of performing a reader's theatre include:

• developing fluency through repeated exposure to text.
• increasing comprehension.
• integrating reading in an authentic context.
• engaging students.
• increasing reading motivation.
• creating confidence and improve the self-image of students.
• providing a real purpose for reading.
• providing opportunities for cooperative learning. 

Math

This week we began our measurement unit. The outcomes covered included:

• Relating the passage of time to common activities, using nonstandard and standard units (minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, years).
• Relating the number of seconds to a minute, the number of minutes to an hour and the number of days to a month.

Science

In science, the students finished typing their Diary of a Animal entries.  Next week the students will finishing illustrating their diaries and presenting them to the class.

The class was so excited on Tuesday to find caterpillars in our classroom.  As part of our Life Cycle unit, we will witness the transformation of caterpillars (larva) into butterflies.  The caterpillars should complete their life cycle by the end of June so we can release the butterflies before we leave for summer vacation.  

The students really wanted to name the caterpillars.  But we decided that it would be too hard to give each caterpillar a different name because they all look alike.  So we brainstormed all of the names that would be suitable for a boy and a girl and gave all 10 caterpillars the same name.  Please feel free to come into the classroom at any time to meet Rylee or Rylie!

Social Studies

The students finished their Peru research and started to put their information into their suitcases.  We will be having our Peru day shortly.