December 5 Scholastic Book Orders Due
December 5 Night of Traditions (5pm - 6:30pm)
December 7 All School Meeting and Spirit Day - Dress Like Your Favorite Character or Celebrity
Homework - More details posted on the Homework Page
1. Read for at least 20 minutes per day and fill out your reading log each night. Your parents must sign your reading log.
2. Write sentences for at least 12 of your spelling words.
3. Complete your math homework.
Optional: Bring in a clean plastic or glass container with a lid for an upcoming project (clean salsa or deli containers, peanut butter or spaghetti sauce jars, mason jars or yogurt tubs would work best)
Upcoming Out and Abouts
We will have an In and About this week to learn more about natural resources, energy, recycling and waste disposal.
Book Orders
December book orders are due this Wednesday, December 5th. Books will arrive before Winter Break. If you plan to give books as a gift and do not want your student to see them, I can place your order in a paper bag or set them aside for you to pick up. Please send me an email if you do not want your child to see the order. Visit our class book club page to see this month's selection, including the Holiday Gift collection: https://orders.scholastic.com/L79X9.
Weekly Review
We had another great visit to the Forest Grove Library last week and students checked out materials to help with our next writing project - informational texts. Each student will create an "All About Book" to teach the class about a topic of their choice, like a favorite animal, place, hobby or person. Students completed graphic organizers last week to help structure their writing and we will begin writing rough drafts this week. We will incorporate features of nonfiction texts, such as a table of contents, headings, diagrams, fact boxes and a glossary, into the All About Books and students will publish their final draft.
Our Out and About to the Goodwill Outlet and e-Commerce store was a great success! Plovers behaved wonderfully on the TriMet bus and our tour guide said we were the best group he's ever had (including groups of adults)! The students were interested and fascinated by all the work happening behind the scenes and everybody was surprised by the amount of material the Outlet store and e-Commerce site is able to keep out of the landfill! To follow up our visit, I read The Lorax by Dr. Seuss and we discussed similarities between the story and the information we have learned in class and through our Out and Abouts. Students created and performed skits from the book and we are working to create a collection of Lorax-inspired watercolor paintings to share at the All School Meeting on Friday. Parents are welcome to attend the All School Meeting at 9:45 in the Grove Room (Central School) and I will also try to post photos and video of our class presentation.
Math Notes
We will spend the next three weeks studying geometry in Third Grade Math. Students will describe and compare 2- and 3-dimensional shapes, as well as learn to identify right, acute and obtuse angles. We will also continue to review 3-digit addition and subtraction. Students are expected to easily add and subtract within 1000 by the end of third grade. Your Puffin or Plover should be able to use the standard addition and subtraction algorithms (which involve re-grouping, also known as borrowing or carrying) to add and subtract large numbers. We will continue to practice these strategies in class and you can provide additional practice at home. Dad's Worksheets is a great resource for free, printable math worksheets. Click here for subtraction worksheets: http://www.dadsworksheets.com/v1/Worksheets/Subtraction.html
For Homework, students should complete the Polygon activity. Students must find and label at least 10 examples of polygons. Please let me know if you Puffin or Plover does not have access to magazines or newspapers that he or she may cut up. I have extra material that can be sent home for this project.
Last week, the majority of Fourth Grade Math students demonstrated their proficiency with the array model for solving double-digit multiplication problems. This week we will focus exclusively on mastering the algorithm. We will also continue our fluency and automaticity with 0-12 multiplication facts and continue our in class goal work this week.
For homework students are required to complete Explore Six.
Questions/Comments/Concerns, please contact Becky at [email protected]
Communication
Please contact me with any questions or concerns. Parents and students can e-mail me at [email protected]. You can also leave a voice message on the class phone, come into the classroom before or after school, or call me before 8PM at home.