Questions about Halloween in 3B

Here are some quick comments in reference to our fall celebration in 3B:

1.  Students do not wear or bring their costumes to school in 3B on Halloween. Usually that is just something  Crestwood kindergarten and first graders do but I am not even sure they are doing that this year.  So save the costumes for trick or treating at night.
2.  We will be having some fun activities throughout the day on Halloween:  various stations with all of 3rd grade as well as a movie in the afternoon.
3.  Students may bring some treats to hand out to their classmates at the end of the day, but it is not required or necessary.

Stay safe and happy Halloween!!!

Book It ....Better Late than Never!

I am sure many people are familiar with Book It, the reading incentive program sponsored by Pizza Hut. Sadly our local Pizza Hut shut down recently so there was a lot of question on whether to participate in Book It or not.  The school decided to have the students participate if they would like, knowing that the coupons for pizzas could be used nearby at the Pizza Hut in Decorah or even Rochester.    So here is the information.  Please read carefully.

October is the kick off month for the reading incentive program of "Book - It". Because the school's decision to participate was made after October 1st, we will be starting this reading incentive program November 1st.  While I am not requiring all students to participate in "Book-It", sponsored by Pizza Hut, I am encouraging everyone to do it.  Why not get a free pizza out of reading at home?  Seems silly to pass it up.  I will a calendar home today with each 3rd grade student asking them to record his/her reading each night working towards or past the goal written on the calendar.  At the end of the month, please return the calendar, with a parent's signature, and your child will be given his/her coupon for a free pizza.  A new calendar will be sent home at the beginning of every month with the "goal" increasing each time. 

In the past, those students who participated in the Book-It program every month and met their goal were treated to a pizza lunch with me, Mrs. Kerian, at the end of the reading incentive designated time (usually March or April).   With the Healthy Kids Act in place in schools, we are not able to do that any more.  Third grade teachers will meet soon to come up with something just as fun and yummy.  So, stay tuned for information for those students who participate, meet their goal or pass it, and turn in their calendar every month.  Last year the students who read every month returned their reading calendar celebrated by having "dinner and a movie" with Mrs. Kerian over lunch period, with some extra snacks provided by me as well.   

So for now.....GET READING! :)

What's going On in 3B?

Hopefully everyone saw the great article that was in the newspaper about Crestwood Elementary's 3rd graders!  Mrs. Jurgensen and Mrs. Grimm are encouraging all staff to submit articles for the newspaper to show the great things happening in our school so 3rd grade teachers jumped right in.  Together, the 3rd grade teachers wrote the article and submitted it to the newspaper.  Even though many people already knew about the activities that were included in the article, it is nice to share information with the community about the fun learning in 3rd grade!

As usual, we continue to be very busy in 3B. Here is a quick update:
1.  We finished unit 1 in math and took the unit assessment.  I will be sending home information tomorrow or Wednesday about how each child did and suggestions of what to continue working on.  Please look for that information in the coming days.  We have started unit 2 which focuses on addition and subtraction.  Just a reminder that there are many activities on my blog page (students know) to work on at home to build addition and subtraction facts as well as working through Moby Max, which students have been working through already.    Keep working on those addition and subtraction facts!!!!
2.  We are also wrapping up our unit in science on Plant and Animals.  Students will be starting a project based assessment this week to show what they have learned within our science unit and applying it.

3.  Our focus strategies in literacy currently are determining important information, main ideas, recognizing prefixes of "not",  synonyms, and making words plural.  We will also be moving into making inferences this week as well.   Guided reading is going well, and we will be starting "Cadet Time" this week.  This is a time where students are grouped across the classrooms and focus on areas of need in literacy.
4.  Much of our writing time has focused on getting ideas.  Now we are ready to take one of our stories and publish it through the writing process.  I will be walking students through the writing process this week, giving them time to apply it to one of their pieces of writing, and then publishing their stories via an online app.  Along with this, students will be finishing up their "time travel" stories for Mrs. P's writing contest as well.

We also have more Skype sessions schedule for the Global Read Aloud, which we are loving!  So far we have made connections with Wisconsin, an "unknown state" the students still need to figure out, and more to come!  We are learning from each other across the US!

Great Stories for Mrs. P's Time Travel Competition

Everyone has been working hard and writing some great stories hoping to enter them into Mrs. P's Writing Challenge.  We had the pleasure of skyping with Mrs. P a while ago and now everyone is drafting up their perfect "time travel" story!  It is great for me, as the teacher, to see that they don't want to stop writing when it is time to move on to something else.  From what I have read of their stories so far, they are all wonderful!!!!

Stay tuned for some great stories of traveling to the past to the land of dinosaurs, Egyptians, and cowboys or the future in space.  Exciting!!!  Here are some pictures of my little writers.....

More Global Read Aloud and Mystery Skype!

We made another connection through Skype with some students.....well...I won't say where they are from as the students in 3B need to figure that out themselves.  We will be doing a Mystery Skype with them soon, asking them questions to determine where they live.  These students did a super job asking 3B questions and determining that we live in Iowa!  Now it is our turn!

After they determined we were in Iowa, the students all participated in a great discussion for our book we are reading for the Global Read Aloud.  The book, as I mentioned before, is The Mysterious Journey of Edward Tulane.   They asked us questions as did we them, and the students shared a lot of thoughts about our book.  It was a wonderful discussion to celebrate reading a great book together!

Pie! Oh My! Challenge

Watch this video to get excited about a caring project for Character Counts week next week!  Do your part and give to others!!!

Loving the Global Read Aloud

In a previous post I mentioned and shared information about the Global Read Aloud, a world wide collaborative project where schools around the world read the same books and collaborate virtually about their reading.  We are currently reading The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane.   To say the students are loving it would be an understatement!  They are so into this book and never want me to stop reading!  As I said in the previous post about the Global Read Aloud, it is one of the best collaborative projects I have been involved in, and it is living up to that this year as well.

skyping with 3rd graders in Wisconsin

Yesterday we had the pleasure of skyping with some 3rd graders from Wisconsin and sharing our thoughts about what we have read.  Both classes had read to chapter 9 so we prepared questions beforehand to ask one another.  Of course, as this sometimes happens, when we were ready to Skype, our computer and Apple TV froze up and would not work in the classroom so we just skyped on our iPad, which worked fine.  We were ready with a backup plan!

The students on both ends shared a lot of deep thoughts about the reading and are all excited to continue reading and share more of our thoughts along the way.

Last week, we chatted virtually with Mrs. Malphy's class in Wisconsin through on online program called TACKK.  Teachers post a question and students can sit and type answers, reply to one another, and communicate without opening their mouths or really seeing one another.  The focus question, of course, revolved around the book we are reading.  You could have heard a pin drop in the room as the students were so quiet and engaged.

Students chatting with Wisconsin students using TACKK

 It was great in the fact that as some of my students in 3B were typing their answers and thoughts, some of Mrs. Malphy's class were also on and responding to my 3B students instantly. Their faces were priceless.  One student even commented, "This is so great.  I am chatting with someone about a book and she is not even here!".   We plan to do more TACKK discussions in the future as well.

Virtual Learning!

Hopefully you heard Crestwood 3rd graders talking about the great experience we had last Friday skyping with a zoologist from Knoxville Zoo in Tennessee!!!  It was so awesome!  I had been searching for a zoo that might do virtual field trips and came across Knoxville Zoo's site listing different programs they do virtually. I contact him, we skyped to meet each other and discussed what we would like to do, and set up the date.  All 3rd graders were involved in the Skype session, which was super!   Many students in 3rd grade had never been to a zoo, and while this was not a tour of the zoo, it was neat to hear and learn about animals that are not common in the Midwest.

Jason, the zoologist we skyped with, shared three interesting animals with us. They were the chinchilla, the toucan from the rainforest, and a ball python.  His lesson connected perfectly with what we were learning in science as he taught us about their habitat and their adaptations.  Jason was full of energy, full of information, and allowed students to ask a variety of questions at the end of his virtual zoo Skype.  He was full of information about all sorts of animals!!!

Thanks Jason!  Maybe some day one of us will visit the Knoxville Zoo and Tennessee and meet Jason face to face!

Stomp Out Bullying!

Yesterday was "Stomp Out Bullying" day!  A very important day to recognize the importance of standing up to bullies and being the one to make a difference in doing the right thing.  I was so happy to see so many students dressed in blue, the color representing "Stomp Out Bullying"!  We had wonderful and powerful discussions on being "The One" to stomp out bullying!  Along with our discussions, we read a book titled The One, which focuses on the power of a bully and the power of words to change a bully into a friend.

Along with our discussions, we talked about how every day should be "Stomp Out Bully Day" and not just today.  So this week, and throughout the year, Mrs. McCabe and I will be reading various books that focus on bullies and bully behavior so that the students are aware of the power of words.

Below is a link that also shows videos with questions and discussion after each video.  We watched a view and discussed the actions shown in the video.  Feel free to watch them at home or anywhere and discuss them with your child.

www.stopbullying.gov/kids/webisodes

I am also posting the link to the page of information about today's "Stomp Out Bullying".  We can all be "The One" to stand up to bullies.

http://stompoutbullying.org/

Here we are at the end of the day.... a little crazy and having fun!

MAPs testing

As listed on the calendar for the month of October that the school sends out, we are taking our MAPs/MISIC assessments this week.  Today, Monday, the students completed the math portion of the assessments.  Tuesday will be reading, and Wednesday will be language.

These assessments, as you know, are done on the iPads and are not timed. Students have as much time as they need to work through the given problems individually.

MAPs assessments will be given in October, again around January, and again in April or May.  The information from the assessments is used to gather data about the students, set up groups for RTI time, and find students' strengths and weaknesses.   It is only one part of the puzzle to best meet the needs of every student.

If you have any questions, feel free to contact me.

Changes in Plant and Animal Populations

My scientists are loving all the learning and observations we are making with our "special guests".  Science continues to be a favorite time for many students.  They have been learning about aphids, damselflies, and daphnia.  We will be introducing ladybugs and fruit flies as well this week with the purpose of observing how populations change with there are predator-prey relationships.

So far, we put the damselflies and daphnia together and guess what!  The population of the daphnia changed and today....they are GONE!!!!  The damselflies are alive and well.  HMMM????

image of damselfly

image of daphnia

The aphid were placed on our plants and guess what! The bean plants are wilting but the pea plants are still alive and growing.  Are they picky eaters????  We also have a lot more aphids!

aphid

Tomorrow we will be putting ladybugs with our aphids on the plants.  Can anyone predict what will happen???  I think you are getting the idea of our science and observing changes in populations.

In between all of these observations, the students are learning how to do a mini research project.  Each student selected a strange insect or arachnid to learn about (and some of them are VERY strange).  After modeling about how to determine what is important, writing brief notes, and putting information into our own words, the students began gathering facts about their interesting insect.  This was a great introduction to research and how to use information on the internet that is written for kids, which will be handy for the end of the unit assessment. Stay tuned....

Students will soon be sharing their insect inquiry facts on their blog pages.  Science involves reading and writing too!

Global Read Aloud.....Excited to Connect!!!

October 6th is an exciting day (besides being my birthday...which the students lavished me with birthday hugs, pictures, and kind words...wonderful!!!).  We started our day off with donuts and are ending with treats to go home!  Aren't birthdays fun??? It is also the kick off of the "Global Read Aloud".  Here is a clip taken from the Global Read Aloud webpage:

Why the Global Read Aloud?
Global Collaboration is necessary to show students that they are part of something bigger than them.  That the world needs to be protected and that we need to care for all people.  You an show them pictures of kids in other countries, but why not have them speak to each other?  Then the caring can begin.

My classes have participated in the Global Read Aloud now for 3 years.  I can honestly say that I have never participated in something so powerful with a read aloud as this activity!  The book selections are amazing and engaging, the collaboration with other students in wonderful, and the thoughts provoked and discussed are powerful.

I am excited to announce that today we kicked off the Global Read Aloud with the story of The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by Kate DiCamillo.  This is an award winning book about a rabbit's journey, and after reading just one chapter, the students are hooked as to what is going to happen to this rabbit and where his journey will take him as of now, he just belongs to a 10 year old girl.

Along with this, as the Global Read Aloud encourages, I have set up connections with schools thus far from Wisconsin and Pennsylvania (sshhh!  The students don't know where they are from yet as we may start with a Mystery Skype first).   The teachers from these classrooms and I have connected and ready to start this wonderful collaboration as we read aloud a book together.

Stay tuned for more blog post and Facebook posts about our journey with Edward Tulane!