This week passed in a flash! We’ve had lots of different reading, writing, and math opportunities integrated with art and technology. This is our third week of Artist-Writers workshop and our second week of blogging. The questions that come with all new things are beginning to lessen as the class becomes more confident in what they are doing. There are more and more times of quiet focus as the learning happens in our room. The class is learning more about the strategies readers use to understand. They are learning note-taking strategies to guide research both from print and digital texts. We are thinking about “how we are smart” as we learning about the Theory of Multiple Intelligence and growth mindset.

Multiple Intelligence Theory – Knowing Ourselves

After reading about many different people we feel we have a clearer sense of what the different intelligences are and how they looks. We read about Snowflake Bentley, Michael Jordan, Patricia Polacco, Alan Rabinowitz, Henri Rousseau and Jane Goodall. As we read about their lives we tried to connect anecdotes in the stories with the different ways we are smart.   We discovered it is more challenging to recognize some of the intelligences because they are ways of thinking. They don’t easily show on the outside. As we’ve been reading, we’ve been thinking about our interests and strengths. We completed a questionnaire that might help us see how we are smart in all eight ways. We are looking forward to discovering more about ourselves and all the ways we are smart.

Keeping a Record of What We Read

This week we began recording what we are reading. There is a group of children who take a new pile of pictures books each day. There is another group of children who have settled into chapter books series and are reading from 1 to 2 to 3… And there is another group who read a little of this and a little of that, not quite yet able to settle in. Over time the record will help children see who they are as readers and will help us be better able to make a plan encouraging them to choose wisely and to think about which strategies will help them understand more.

We also began to think about how reading grows. We learn new words and fancy vocabulary. We become more fluent and more accurate as we read. Understanding grows too. We are learning about “activating schema” (using what we know and background knowledge) so we are able to understand more by making connections.

Next week each student will be making a video of “a just right” book and set goals for how they would like to grow as a 3rd grade reader.

Numbers of the Week Routine

We have begun a math notebook as a way to explore different aspects of number work throughout the week, along with our unit of study, which for us happens to be multiplication. This week our numbers were 17 for the students in 3E and 46 for the 3rd Graders at NHS. We wrote and recorded these amounts in different ways. We found the sum and the difference using these amounts. We generated number patterns and found ways the amounts could be represented through coins.

We continue to learn more about multiplication. Each week the children are showing their growing confidence with this new operation. They are more often using it when solving problems rather than drawing out and counting. I can see their understanding of multiplicative reasoning growing as I review their daily work. “Do I have to write out 5+5+5? I just know 5×3=15.” We are ready to create a multiplication chart as a class to identify how many facts we already know and to discover the ones we must focus on so we are able to know they all automatically.

Bits and Pieces –

• We are nearing the part in The Trumpet of the Swan where Louis goes to the Philadelphia Zoo. We’ll use that connection to launch a second research project about an animal from the Franklin Park Zoo as we explore habitats around the world.
• In science we are learning about insects and microhabitats. We are learning how to research on the computer and note taking. We will be creating an insect museum as a way to share our research with you.
• This week the class worked to create multiplication riddles following the format shared in the book, Each Orange Had Eight Slices. Most of these got posted on the children’s individual blogs this week. Thank you to so many for checking out your child’s blog and for sharing them with family and friends from away. Children were so excited to find a comment from their parents, grandparents or friends. It gives the children a real authentic purpose for writing when they know they have a wider audience for their work.