Weekly Updates 10/24-10/26

NEWS/EVENTS

• Our Parent Teacher Conference sign up is live! Please visit www.SignUpGenius.com/go/4090B4DACA82FABFF2-fall to schedule an appointment.
• This Friday October 28th is Family Friday! The theme of this month's session is visiting math centers to reach our math goals. The kids will teach you how to play a game from a center that has helped them review/prepare for the post assessment.
• Tuesday 11/8 is a non- attendance day for students (Election Day).
• Friday 11/11 Is Veterans Day (no school)
• Next Thursday 11/3 is a half day. Dismissal is at 11:50 sharp. We will have third grade play practice all morning- book bags are not necessary that day.

CURRICULUM

Reading- This week we are launching Mystery Reading with our students! Today we are launching with a real world mystery. We will take a look at how the presentation of evidence helps us grow ideas about our stories.

Writing- This week we are launching our next writing unit- informational writing! Students will select a nonfiction topic start to develop a table of contents covering all subcategories of their expertise. Then, they write long within that sub-topic.

**Most students have finished publishing their Narrative pieces. If they have not, I told them it could be a HOP option. I would like all work returned by Friday.

**We are celebrating the end of their narrative unit with a 2 part session on Friday. We are reviewing and complimenting each other's work AND decorating their writing and reading notebooks. I will send an email about this later.

Math- Friday all math groups are taking the post assessment for unit #1. On Monday we are launching the next unit- multiplication and division of times tables 0-9. 

Social Studies- This week we are exploring different ways to take notes about various Maps, and will work on a performance task involving map reading skills.

Weekly Updates 10/10-10/14

NEWS/EVENTS

• IMPORTANT: Next Wednesday October 19th is the rescheduled date for our trip to Stoneledge Farm. Please drop students off to PS 11 no later than 7:45 am that morning as the bus is leaving at 8:00 sharp. Tomorrow I will email announcing parents joining us for the trip. We are expected back at PS 11 at 5:00 pm. Please make sure that all individuals arriving for pick-up are on blue cards. Students that attend afterschool until 6:00 will be dismissed to afterschool.
• This week we are continuing our residency with Circle in the Square from now until the holidays! We will meet with actors every Tuesday and Thursday.
• We are visiting the Scholastic book fair Friday October 28th.

CURRICULUM

Reading: Now that students are assigned to the right "Just Right" books after weeks of running record assessments, we are spending the last few days of our first reading unit thinking about author's purpose and deeper questions that texts trigger. We will celebrate the end of this unit by reflecting on our jotting structures and goal setting.

Writing: This week we are walking through the revision and editing portions of the writing process. Students will use checklists and meet with partners to discuss their writing. We will focus on the correct placement of quotation marks and commas, and step back and look at our pieces with to consider the heart of the story.

Math: This week math groups are continuing to review regrouping (especially while subtracting and across zeroes). Groups will also start to investigate multistep word problems, and will use bar modeling as a strategy to identify operations needed in a given problem.

Social Studies: This week we are continuing to explore regions of the United States. 

Weekly Updates 10/5-10/7

NEWS/EVENTS

• A big thanks to Priya and Courtney for sending a Farm Stand reminder! Our kids had a great time today!
• Our rescheduled trip to the farm is Wednesday October 19th. Trip slips were sent home today. 
• This week we start our residency with Circle in the Square!
• We started differentiated math groups!
• Courtney and Priya had the great idea of setting up a class mailing list for the "Remind" app. I will look into this and send out more information shortly.

CURRICULUM:

Reading: This week we are moving into bend three of our current reading unit, which focuses on ways to challenge more complicated texts. We will study context clues and figurative language to determine meaning.

Writing: This week we are learning sophisticated ways to revise and organize our writing by paragraphing, integrating different types of details, and using various forms of punctuation (including punctuating dialogue).

Math: Students have started switching to differentiated math groups. Ms. Mackenzie and I studied student preassessment data and grouped students by areas of needs. We are in the midst of engaging in rounding center word practicing strategies like using a number line to plot a number and determine the nearest 10 or 100. Next week all groups will explore regrouping.

Social Studies: Students are starting to explore the different regions within the United States, starting with the Northeast.

Our Next Scheduled Farm Stand Date- Next Wednesday 10/5 from 8-8:50

Hi Families,

Just a friendly reminder that next Wednesday (10/5)  3-509 is running the farm stand from 8-8:50 before school. I forgot to add this to our upcoming events/dates from last week's post.

See you there!

Weekly Updates 9/26-9/30

NEWS/EVENTS

• Our rescheduled trip to the farm is Wednesday October 19th. If you are interested in chaperoning, please email Ms. Bouchard. More info to come next week!
• Next week we start our residency with Circle in the Square!
• Our first day of swim is tomorrow first period (remind kids)
• We started differentiated math groups this week!
• Family Friday is tomorrow! Come join us from 8:50-9:35 to learn how to use a narrative toolkit to help students lift the level of their writing.
• There is no school Monday and Tuesday in observance of Rosh Hashanah.

CURRICULUM:

Reading: This week we are moving into bend three of our current reading unit, which focuses on ways to challenge more complicated texts. We will study context clues and figurative language to determine meaning.

Writing: After brainstorming and focusing on a wide variety of pieces, we committed to one narrative piece to take through the writing process. After many oral rehearsals we are looking at ways to pull our audience into our stories and lift the level of our preliminary drafts.

Math: This week Ms. Mackenzie and I launched differentiated math. We studied student preassessment data and grouped students by areas of needs. This week all groups explored rounding. Next week our topic of focus is adding and subtracting with regrouping.

Social Studies: This week we focused on legends, keys, compasses, and other tools to read maps. Students engaged in a cross curricular activity of planning a trip on route 66 and using rounding to calculate the total distance with a partner.

Weekly Updates September 19th-23rd

Hi Everyone,

Each week I will post weekly class updates by Wednesday morning! A huge thanks to Courtney and Priya for helping our parents stay informed. Please double check the distribution list and let us know if anyone else should be added to emails.

NEWS/EVENTS

• Our farm trip date has changed to October 19th! More information about this is on the way in the upcoming weeks. Mark your calendars- we will not be home that day until around 5pm.
• Next Friday September 30th is Family Friday. I will be sending a note with further details next week with more specifics.
• Next Friday September 30th is 3-509's first day of swim class. Please send swim materials to school that day-towel, bathing suit, etc. Swim will be 4th period that day.
• Our weekly special schedule is the following:
• Monday: Computer
• Tuesday: Music
• Wednesday: Science
• Thursday: Science
• Friday: Gym (swim)

CURRICULUM

Reading: This week we are continuing to work on goal setting, building reading habits, and increasing stamina. We are also learning about ways to share ideas with others.

Writing: This week we are generating ideas for our writing pieces by making lists and then writing long about those ideas.

Math: This week students will use place value as a means to compare, order, and rank numbers.

Social Studies: We are continuing to learn about continents and major bodies of water.

IMPORTANT NEWS: NEW DATE FOR STONELEDGE FARM TRIP

Hi Everyone,

After carefully considering families that will be observing Yom Yippur, we decided to move our trip to Stoneledge Farm to Wednesday October 19th!

Please update your calendars!


Thank you!