Thanks for visiting my website over the summer! Whether you are a former family or an incoming family, please consider sharing the link to my current Donors Choose project. The project I've created is centered around the importance of reading high quality picture books, in addition to novels and other texts, aloud every single day. Read more about the project by following the link.
www.donorschoose.org/project/help-us-rock-the-classroom-book-a-day-ch/3411112/?rf=facebook-dc-2018-07-teacherhub-teacher_4528210&challengeid=20954740&utm_source=dc&utm_medium=page&utm_campaign=project&utm_term=teacher_4528210#_=_ We began our fractions unit earlier this month. The work is challenging as students learn how to grapple with numbers less than 1. So far we have learned fraction notation, practiced creating equal pieces, added fractions to equal 1/2 as well as 1, learned about equivalent fractions, measured to the nearest 1/4 inch, and modeled fractions with rectangles, hexagons, number lines, and paper "brownies." We wrapped up our Natural Hazards science unit with a hands on mini-project. Students took on the task as head contractor in charge of making a prototype to reduce the effects of flooding during a hurricane. Look how engaged they are! Thank you for sending in materials! Students are progressing through the process of writing a nonfiction informational text. This trio of girls are peer reviewing. In this stage writers catch many editing errors, find places to revise, and learn from their classmates.
Last month we finished up our weekly swimming lessons at the Y. The kids had such a great time! As a teacher it was so neat to watch the kids navigate a different type of instructional setting. This picture was taken on the last day. As you look at it I want you to imagine a lot of laughing echoing off the walls. :) Some of our readers have decided to take part in some book review blog tours that were set up by publishers. This is an exciting opportunity for students to share their voices and thoughts with a wide audience! And the bonus: Some students WON copies of the books! During Mindful Monday lessons students have taken part in an array of activities. From mindfully eating and listening to meditating, observing, and creating. The images below were created after students listened to The Wreck of the Edmond Fitzgerald. The depth of their creativity and observation never ceases to amaze me. This is a special time in our week. Flying Falcon awards were giving out at out last whole school assembly. Sam and Nevaeh are the proud recipients from our homeroom! I was handing out pins and didn't get a picture! Breakfast & Books photos: Kids enjoying food and books before school. Sounds like a win to me! In science we have been studying four types of hazardous weather: hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, and lightning. In social studies we have been learning about which states are most impacted by these four types of weather. In writing students are beginning to write their own nonfiction books on one (or a combination of) the things we have been studying in science and social studies. In reading we are looking at the types of features found in nonfiction as we read nonfiction texts. Student readers are reading with a writer's eye to see how they can make their own nonfiction writing the best it can be! Several students have completed the 30 Book Challenge so far. With a few weeks left of school there is still time for others to finish. Talk to your child about this challenge!
When the students were given a quick poll on what genre they were having a hard time getting interested in, it turned out that biographies were getting overlooked! To remedy this I set the kids up with a biography book pass. In a book pass the students are given a few minutes with a small stack of books. Their objective is to skim through, find one from the bunch that looks interesting and record the title and author for later reading. When the timer goes off the books are passed to their neighbor. We did several rounds with a variety of biographies. Turns out there are some pretty intriguing biographies!
Evie and Emma are so proud to have completed the 30 Book Challenge!! Both girls worked hard at locating books within the genre requirements. Sometimes it was frustrating when they realized that they had read a book that they thought was one genre, but turned out to be a different one. In the end, the girls pulled through by meeting the requirements!
Mrs. Levesque: Emma, what did you learn about yourself as a reader throughout this challenge? Emma: I think my favorite genre was probably realistic fiction because I like things that can actually happen in real life, especially if they're happy. I didn't really like fantasy because there were not many that I was interested in. The only ones that I was actually interested in was the Eva Owl books. They were the ones that helped me start to get better at keeping track of what was happening in the book. There are pictures in them in and that makes it a lot easier to read. And they were big chapter books. Mrs. Levesque: It's so awesome that you could see yourself growing as a reader! How do you feel now that you have finished the challenge? Emma: Awesome, because now I can read whatever genre I want, and I don't have to struggle on reading genres that I don't like! Mrs. Levesque: Yes, enjoy that freedom of choice! Anything else you want to say? Emma: For the people that haven't finished the 30 Book Challenge, if they don't like sticking to chapter books that are in a certain genre they could take a break from that one and read from a genre they do like. They shouldn't push themselves to read a lot in a genre they don't like or they might not finish it. Mrs. Levesque: That's great advice, Emma! Congratulations on all your hard work! Mrs. Levesque: Hi Evie, your turn! What did you learn about yourself as a reader during this challenge? Evie: I learned that I could read more than like 20 or 10 books in a year. At first I didn't really want to read. All I wanted to read was graphic novels. And now I am reading a lot of realistic fiction, and this kind of helped me get into that. Mrs. Levesque: That's awesome, Evie! This whole challenge is designed to do exactly this: show readers all the different types of books out there that they might fall in love with. How hard was it to push yourself to try out those genres you might have avoided without the challenge? Evie: Pretty hard because I was really into graphic novels and all I wanted to read was them. And then I looked at the realistic fiction and thought that wow, this is really good. I think that other people should try out more realistic fiction! Mrs. Levesque: So, you found a new favorite genre! What genre was hardest for you to enjoy? Evie: Probably historical fiction because the books were kinda long and I couldn't really get my mind into it. They are pretty hard to read. Mrs. Levesque: I would agree with you that historical fiction is a heavy genre for 3rd grade. There are so many wonderful historical fiction picture books in our classroom library, don't give up on that genre yet! (It's one of my favorites!) Is there anything else you would like to say? Evie: I would push readers to read chapter books or novels so they will get better at reading, bigger words and longer stories. Mrs. Levesque: Thank you, Evie! I am so proud of you. It was nice to hear your thoughts! Keep up the good work! Nevaeh and Gracious have completed the 30 Book Challenge! Gracious was so excited to have finished it so that she could dive into a pile of graphic novels that she has been wanting to read. Her dedication to completing this reading genre challenge was strong. Nevaeh kept a solid list of books she wanted to read, so she always had a title ready to go. Her organization and commitment to reading helped her complete this challenge!
Gracious struggled with finding a mystery that she would enjoy, but found that she loves realistic fiction! Gracious says: "I actually liked a lot fantasy books before the challenge but now I really like realistic fiction. Actually finding a book and having to stick with it was sometimes a challenge. Now that I'm done I feel really good. And also, I found that poetry was really fun to read because you got to pick a big poetry book and just read, and the pages were really short so you could just speed right through it, and a lot of the poems made me laugh! My favorite book was The War that Saved My Life." Nevaeh says: "I didn't think I would like biographies but I ended up liking those. My favorite biography was Growing Up Pedro. I found it challenging to read all of the fantasy requirements. My least favorite genre is historical fiction. Now that I'm done I feel happy because I don't have to worry about what genre I need to read next. My favorite book overall was A Tale Dark and Grimm." Mini STEM activity: build the tallest tower using the few materials given, with only 15 minutes on the clock! It was interesting to observe how students began the process. Some loved the freedom of few rules and a clear objective, while others seemed to desire more explanation or examples. Eventually all dove in, and success was had by all these marshmallow engineers! After our STEM activity students decorated Valentine bags and then exchanged cards. A sweet end to the day!
Students collected, organized, and represented various data throughout this unit. Students worked solo and collaboratively through this unit. In the picture above students show off their double bar graph, a comparison between our class data and Ms. Roy's 5th grade class data.
Students are graphing annual temperatures, snowfall, and rainfall in 10 major US cities. They are then tasked with the objective of describing or comparing and contrasting the climates in those cities.
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October 2018
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