This Week in CC-3

We've had a busy and productive week here in CC-3!  We hope your child shared with you all about our special "Day in the Dark" celebration on Monday.  It was a great day of learning and celebration.  We were so proud of all of our students and their ability to get a lot accomplished as well as have some fun at the same time.  It is crazy to think that the first quarter of the academic year concludes this week!  We've completed a lot of projects recently and are moving on with exciting new units of study.  Below is an academic update.

Kindness Projects
Our kindness projects of the year continue with great success!  This week CC-3 students carried out our Trick-Or-Treat for UNICEF project.  Students collected and counted all the money submitted by EMES students.  We are happy to report that the EMES community donation to UNICEF was a little over $400!  A few donations are still trickling in, we will let you know our grand total soon.  Our students separated all of the coins, counted them, and rolled them.  We were able to get in a lot of practice counting coins this week in math.

Literacy
We've recently concluded our first reading and writing units of the year.  It has been exciting to see students develop wonderful reading and writing habits over the course of the past two months.  Now it's time to set new goals and conquer new heights!

Today, we launched our new reading unit.  It's all about MYSTERIES!  Throughout this unit students will be introduced to the "big" ideas of the mystery genre while working on the important foundational skills of  story elements, predicting, envisioning, retelling, summarizing and analyzing author's craft.  Before you know it, your child will be devouring many popular mystery series!  We will also begin writing more about our reading with the important goal of finding evidence to support ideas and theories.

Please encourage your child to transport books they are reading between home and school.  We want students moving through chapter books.  The best way to do this is to read the same text at home and school.  Remember, your child should be reading independently for a minimum of 20 minutes each night!  We have an easy process for signing out books to borrow in our classroom that all students know.

In writing class, we'll be working on several skills during the next three weeks before we move on to our informational writing unit in early December.  Our skill work will include: spelling instruction, sentence structure, grammar, punctuation and parts of speech.

Math
We have been spending a lot of time on solving word problems that include repeated addition.  Many of these problems have multiple steps to solve.  When given a word problem, students are working on reading the problem and determining what is the important information, what operation(s) to use, what strategy would work best, and labeling their solution.

This week we began to investigate equal groups.  This will lead us into our work with arrays and area. These are all models of multiplication.  Kids are always so excited to learn their multiplication facts.  Well, third grade is their year!


Discovery
As we all know, the election is next Tuesday!  In class we've been learning a bit about the election process.  We continue our study of the United States, its symbols and landmarks.  Students are working in partnerships to research  a specific national symbol or landmark.  They will then share their learning with others.  Teams are working on learning about the following:

• The Bald Eagle
• Liberty Bell
• White House
• The Great Seal
• The American Flag
• Statue of Liberty

Technology Integration
This week we began a new project with Ms. Arlyn.  We'll be using a program on iPads called   as a story retelling tool.  We're working on reading picture books, creating a written summary for the text, building scenes with Legos and inputting it all into the program.  We'll be working on this project for the next several weeks.  It was incredibly exciting to see partnerships go to work this week and demonstrate successful collaboration skills.

We look forward to meeting with families next week for conferences.  We've got a busy Thursday afternoon/evening scheduled as well as Friday appointments.  You should have received both a hard copy (bright orange) confirmation notice as well as an email.  If you do not know when your conference is, please let us know, we'll confirm your time.  We're excited to share your child's progress with you and set new goals for the future. Have a great weekend!

Tidbits

• New book orders are due on Thursday, November 10th.
• Indoor and outdoor shoes are needed each day!
• No school next Friday, November 11th due to Parent Conferences!

Have a great weekend!
Christine and Kathy

Day in the Dark Celebration!

Students have worked hard demonstrating positive behaviors this fall.  Today we celebrated filling our 5th PBIS bucket with a very special "Day in the Dark" celebration.  Please ask your child to tell you about what our classroom looked like and some of the special festivities that took place.  We hope all of our students enjoyed this special celebration!

Reading a Halloween story, and problem solving comprehension questions together.

Reviewing nouns, verbs and adjectives with Halloween Mad Libs!

Rolling dice to create sentences about Halloween characters and creatures!

Math problem solving.

Creating equal groups in math and writing equations with repeated addition.

Teamwork on word puzzles.

Brr and Author's Chair!

Well, the weather has certainly turned and cold air is here!  We're at the point when coming to school with multiple clothing options is essential.  Please make sure your child is well prepared for outdoor recess each day.  Also, leaving a second pair of shoes in lockers is a great idea for all students.  As boot season approaches, having indoor shoes for PE is also necessary.

When the weather turns, we inevitably get requests from students to stay in for recess.  We believe it is essential for all students to get outside and enjoy fresh air each day.  We also do not have any flexibility in our job schedules to accomodate these requests, so please help your child be ready for the outdoors everyday.

Below are some pictures of our "Author's Chair".  This week students are finishing up "polished drafts" of a narrative story they chose to publish.  Each student takes time in the Author's Chair to read aloud his/her piece.  The audience (other classmates) listen carefully, look at our narrative writing checklist, and make positive comments about what the author did well.  This is an important part of our end of unit celebration.  We'll be finishing up our narrative writing unit this week with a post assessment.  We'll be able to share the results of that assessment as well as other writing progress at parent conferences.

Using the microphone helps author's practice using a presenter's voice.

Sharing writing allows students to practice their reading fluency.

It's exciting and rewarding to share a piece that you've worked really hard on!

It's important to review writing checklists so that you can give specific feedback to the author.

Sitting in the "Author's Chair" adds more importance to sharing polished pieces!

Parent Conference Sign-Up

Hi Families,
Just a reminder...please send in the parent conference sign-up choices with your child tomorrow.  We have several scheduled, but would like to get things confirmed and get back to you with your exact time as soon as possible.  Thanks so much!
Kathy & Christine

Important Highlights for the Week!

• Field Trip:  Wednesday, October 19th, we will be traveling by bus to the Barre Opera House this for the play, "Jigsaw Jones".  We will board the bus promptly at 9am.  Please make sure you child arrives at school on time.
• Picture Retake Day:  Thursday, October 20th.  Please let us know if you plan on having your child have their picture redone.  Send in any paperwork needed for this process.  This is also a day to have your son or daughter's picture taken if they were absent/did not have their picture taken on picture day in September.
• Open House:  Thursday, October 20th. Come visit our classroom with your child from 6pm-7pm.  Students will be able to show you what 3rd grade is all about!
• Recorder Forms:  Friday, October 21st. Please return the music forms regarding recorders to Ms. Gelfon by this date.

This Week in CC-3!

We've had a great, busy four day week here in CC-3!  Students have been working on writing short opinion pieces about "assets" they think should exist in East Montpelier Village.  Please ask your child to tell you about his/her asset.  These ideas will be shared at next Thursday's Open House.  We also continue to work on narrative writing and reading skills.

In reading this week, we continued to focus on envisioning and predicting as well as reading fluency. When it comes to reading fluency, we're concentrating on reading accurately with expression that demonstrates an understanding of what is being read.  Fluency is a critical skill to be developed and practiced as students continue to grow as readers.  In class we concentrate on reading in a voice that sounds like a conversation, rather than reading like a robot! Here are a few of the big ideas we're working on:

• When I'm reading, I sound like a storyteller.
• I read with expression, like how it sounds when adults read to me.
• I read at a comfortable pace, one that matches the text I am reading.
• When I read it sounds smooth, like talking.
• I pay attention to punctuation and pause at commas, dashes, and end punctuation.
• I work on changing my voice a bit when a different character is speaking.
• I scoop up words in phrases, smoothing out parts when my reading gets bumpy.
• I go back and reread tricky parts to get it just right.
• I sweep my eyes ahead of the word that I am reading now. I try to scoop up as many words as I can, in a phrase or sentence, using just one breath.

When reading with your child at home, all of the above are great things to encourage and practice!

Sharing

We're seeing a few struggles when it comes to students being prepared for their share day.  Some students do not come ready to present on his/her assigned day.  This causes a backup on the subsequent days. When we have a long list of presenters, it effects our schedule, as well as the quality of sharing.  It is expected and important that your child come ready to share on his or her assigned day.  You can access the sharing calendar to see this information and the week's topic using this link: Sharing Calendar.

It is also important to remember that a component of our listening and speaking skills, is coming prepared (as a presenter) to speak with well thought out pieces of information.  Many children find it helpful to have their 2-3 pieces of information (about their share) written down on a sticky note(s), or on an index card.  In the case of this week, children found it helpful to have bookmarks or notes that marked the dialogue they were going to share with the class.  We hope helping your son or daughter prepare for his or her sharing is a fun activity for your family.  It should not take more than 10 minutes. Your child can even prepare early and bring his or her notes and/or items to school for safe keeping until his or her share day.

If you or your child are unclear about the sharing focus for the week, or need more support for this expectation, please do not hesitate to contact us.  We would be happy to clarify and help.

Next week

• Wednesday-Trip to the Barre Opera House!  Please make sure your child makes it to school on time as we need to start loading the bus at 9:00 a.m.!
• Thursday-EMES Open House 6:00 p.m. All students and families are welcome!  We hope to see you then!
• Reminder that the grass is often wet in the morning now, and the cool air is settling in.  Please remember to send in a second pair of shoes for outside PE and recess so students can have a nice, warm, dry pair of shoes ready for the rest of the day.  It is also that time of year to remember layers, like fall jackets.

Have a great weekend!

Reading Updates & Important Dates

WOW!  It's hard to believe that October is already here and moving along quickly!  We're so proud of how hard our 3rd graders are working.  They have become a great community of learners.

Reading Workshop
We continue to work on reading and writing narrative stories.  In reading workshop, we're currently reading the book Stone Fox by John Reynolds Gardiner as our class read aloud.  Ask your child to tell you about it thus far.  This book is a key anchor text in regard to our work within the "Narrative Reading Learning Progression" for 3rd graders. (A copy of the complete progression is in the booklet we gave out and/or sent home at parent night).  We are currently focused on three parts of the progression-envisioning/predicting, checking comprehension and fluency. These goals are great to review with your child as you read together at home. Here are the goals for third graders in regard to their development in each area.
(Courtesy  © 2015 by Lucy Calkins and Colleagues from the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project from Units of Study for Teaching Reading (Heinemann: Portsmouth, NH)

Envisioning and Predicting
I make a mental movie as I read. I imagine the setting, the characters, the events, and characters’ reactions to them. I predict what the main character will do, say, and think (and how the character will react to things) based on earlier parts of the text. I can explain the reasons for my predictions.

Checking Comprehension~Monitoring for Sense
I expect the story to make sense, and when it does not, I use fix-up strategies such as rereading and asking questions, including the 5 Ws. To regain my grip on the storyline, I recall the sequence of events, often trying to sort through what the main character really wants, the problems he or she confronts, and ways the character rises to those challenges.
(The 5 Ws-Who? What? Where? When? Why?)

Fluency
I can read in my head and aloud in ways that help my listeners and me understand the story (e.g., changing my voice to show dialogue or a character’s feelings). The new work I’m doing now is that I can do this even when I’m reading longer sentences.

In regard to reading at home, we hope that you are encouraging your child to read daily for sustained periods of time.  Reading with and to your child is also terrific! Students have developed excellent reading habits at school and are ready to read many texts for extended periods of time.  This is truly how they will grow as readers!  We welcome students to borrow books to bring home from our extensive classroom library.  We have a simple system for signing the books out.  We are also always happy to help out with book selections. We've been doing some class "Book Buzzing" when we talk about great books that we think other students might enjoy reading.

Important Dates

• Friday, October 7 is a WCSU Teacher Inservice Day~No School for students.
• Monday, October 10 we are all off for the Columbus Day Holiday
• Monday, October 10-Scholastic Book Orders are due.  Online-search for Mrs. Christy's class, the code is DXCXK.
• Wednesday, October 19~Trip to the Barre Opera House-all permission slips are in!  We will be back in time for lunch.
• Thursday, October 20  EMES Open House for students and their families~6:00 p.m.