Oct. 15 - 18

We have been working very hard in 3A, but there is always some time for a little fun!

We were so excited to have the opportunity to participate in the Kids Can Cook in-School Field Trip on Tuesday. ATCO Blue Flame Kitchen believes in empowering students with the knowledge of healthy eating, basic cooking skills, and kitchen safety information for lifelong wellness. Through the interactive two hour in-class session, the students were taught about the nutrients in their food, what different nutrients do in the body and the importance of eating a healthy, balanced diet. The students learned new kitchen skills and gained knowledge in the importance of fueling their bodies with nutritious food. Then the students got to apply this information by making salsa and fruit salad. It was so fun and so yummy too!

 

Star Student

We had a wonderful week learning so much more about our Star Student. Thank you so much for your help and letting us get to know you better.

Thanks to our friend who went on vacation to Las Vegas and brought a treat back for each of her classmates. The kids loved the gummy dice! We also enjoyed hearing all about her trip from entries that she wrote in her Travel Journal.

Reading Workshop

This week our focus was on using Elaborative Detail in our writing. I read the story I Need My Monster by Amanda Noll to get us thinking about how to make our writing more interesting by including details. While most of the great description of the monsters occurs through the pictures in this book, there are fabulous describing words and phrases woven throughout this story about imaginary monsters.  We discussed how vivid word choice and specific detail not only make for an interesting paragraph, but become powerful tools for building vocabulary.  

If you are interested in the story, please click on the link below to watch a short film based on the book "I Need My Monster."

I Need My Monster

Writing Workshop

We focused on using adjectives to make our writing more descriptive. After brainstorming different adjectives to describe monsters, the students were asked to complete their "Monster Mad Libs." The students also did a "quick draw" and then wrote two descriptive sentence to describe their monster.

To continue exploring descriptive words the students were asked to write an elaborative piece about their own imaginary monster based on I Need My Monster. First they drew the monster that lives under their bed. Based on their pictures, the students filled in a planning page to organize their ideas and write descriptive words about their monster. After completing the graphic organizer the students began to write their paragraphs describing their imaginative monster. Their paragraphs will be completed next week in time for parent teacher meetings.

Sharing - "Author's Chair"

Each day our Writer's Workshop ends with sharing in the "Author's Chair". This usually takes about 5 minutes where the students are able to share their writing with the class. During this time the "audience" is asked to share what is called "TAG": TAG stands for - Tell one thing you liked about the writing, Ask one question, and Give one suggestion. The students really enjoyed sharing some of their monster paragraphs with the class.

Math

This week in math we covered the following objectives:

- read and write number words for any number between 0 and 99.
- read and write number words for three-digit numbers.

The students enjoyed practicing place value by rolling a 9-sided dice three times to come up with a triple digit number. Then they had to write the standard form, expanded form and draw the base 10 picture for that number.



Social Studies

In social studies we continued to work on our mapping unit. The students learned about the compass rose, map keys, map scales and landforms. A landform is a feature on the Earth's surface that is part of the terrain, such as mountains, plateaus, plains, valleys, rivers and lakes.

The students had the opportunity to use compasses outside. Using the compasses, we were able to identify "landmarks" in various directions from the school.

Art

The students completed their "scream" blow painting just in time for Halloween. Watered down tempera paint was dabbed around the head. The students then used a straw to blow outward as much as possible to get thick and then thin lines for the hair. The students had a great time with this project.