Our Week – October 25

This week we’ve begun to think more about science and what scientists do.  We’ve continued to explore writing with more elaborate, descriptive sentences and we’ve begun a new math center routine.  We are struggling to keep a calm classroom that helps everyone do his or her best.  We’ll keep working on this until we are all able to do the right thing at the right time.

Thank you for taking time for meeting with your children and giving them the chance to present themselves as early third grade learners.  It has been wonderful to see how they were able to take charge of their own learning and share how they see themselves as learners, readers, writers and mathematicians at this point in the school year.

Models of Multiplication

This week, in order to reduce time at the rug, we have begun math centers.  The children are learning about the different models and properties of multiplication.  I think everyone recognizes that the first number in a multiplication sentence represents the number of groups and the second represents the amount repeated in each group.  But this week the children learned about the commutative property of multiplication so they know that they opposite equation has the same product.  3 x 5 =5 x 3.  It seems as though the class fully understands the concept of multiplication.

What is Science?

We’ve been reading about science and about the habits of scientists.  Here’s the way we completed “Science is…”:  cool, experimenting, a discovery, asking why, when, where and how, interesting, fun to do, math, an adventure, trying new things, exciting, biology, geology, astronomy, drawing, finding our about cool animals, always new, amazing, writing, and inspiring.  We’ve learned that scientists ask a lot of questions.  The children are each choosing a science topic they have lots of questions about.  They’ll spend some time researching their topic and then find a way to teach others what they’ve learned.

Bits and Pieces –

  • This week in Open Circle we talked about strategies for calming down when you’re excited and upset.  We’ve more to explore with this topic.
  • Fourteen children were able to complete their first blog post on Thursday.  If you’re reading this on the paper newsletter – go to 3enews.edublogs.org , find your child’s blog in the sidebar, click on it, read, enjoy and comment. If you’re reading the blog, make sure you check to see if your child has completed his or her first post and do the same.  Our goal is to create a new post each week, so keep checking. Share the class website with family and friends and encourage everyone to comment. The kids thrive on knowing they’re being read.  It is very motivating.
  • You may have heard. Humphrey is pretty popular in our classroom right now.  He is the main character and narrator of our last two chapter read-alouds.  On Thursday the children chose to be in part of a Humphrey book club.  They’re excited to start and excited to read together which is GREAT-GREAT-GREAT.  (A three-peat is a Humphrey trait.)
  • I have responded to some families already, but I have not responded to everyone yet.  I have printed photographs you’ve sent for the Spanish pet project.
  • Also, because the children are in the habit of making sure homework is completed for Friday, we postponed the Inquiry Journal project until next Wednesday.  Please send in pictures, mostly flat items, magazine cut out or any ephemera (ticket stubs, programs, brochures) that the children feel are important to them.  We’ll create a collage out of them for the cover of our new learning journal.

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