Oct. 30

 

We have had a fun week with our science stations and Halloween themed activities! We had a lot going on this week... so this post is filled with photos!

We finished up our science stations which revolved around animal life cycles, adaptations of animals, habitats and endangered animals. Students worked both independently and with small groups to research information, learn to draw animals and apply their knowledge for these tasks. One of the favourites was reading about some "Dangerous Or Not" animals on Epic and creating a wanted poster for some pests and predators. 

Another station that students really enjoyed was creating a trading card for an animal. They researched and read about animals and then used what they learned to create a fact card with a realistic drawing of an animal of their choice in its habitat. It was a fun time for students to grow in their independence, have some choice in their learning and show what they know about animals!

In math, we focused on skip counting and looking for patterns in numbers this week.  In grade 3, students should be able to:

 Say the number sequence 0 to 1000 forward and backward by: 

• 5s, 10s or 100s, using any starting point 

• 3s, using starting points that are multiples of 3 

• 4s, using starting points that are multiples of 4 

• 25s, using starting points that are multiples of 25.

This is a very important skill for students, especially as we start to move into multiplication and division later in the year. This is a concept that will be reviewed regularly in the year. If you want to practice at home, you could take turns skip counting from any number until someone makes a mistake and make it into a game! Or you could use an online hundreds chart and have your child colour the skip counting pattern of your choice on the chart. https://www.primarygames.co.uk/pg2/splat/splatsq100.html

In writing, we are working on adding adjectives to our writing. To have some fun with this, we drew some  haunted houses. We then planned and write a house listing using some descriptive writing, imagining that we would try to sell this house to a spooky client. They practiced using adjectives as well as transition words like:

• also 
• in addition
• next
• lastly
• finally

We had some fun on Thursday by taking some time to share our Time Capsule projects and videos. These videos are all available on our Google Classroom for you to see. Students shared their box with another student and in return, students practiced asking good questions and giving compliments. We used a free app called "Puppet Edu" to create these videos. Students wrote a script to help them organize their ideas before recording their videos. Although the videos are short, I hope you notice the effort and time that your child put into making them so that you can see what they are doing at school

Lastly, we celebrated Halloween on Thursday afternoon by playing some Halloween math games, doing some step-by-step drawing and completing a digital escape room! This escape room coincides with what we have been learning about in math and is a really fun way for students to practice skills and concepts. This is available on our Google Classroom if you want them to show you!

We hope you have a safe Halloween weekend! See you Monday :)

Important Upcoming Dates

Oct. - 30 - No School

Nov. 9 - Photo Retakes

Nov. 11 - No School. Remembrance Day

Halloween

Just a reminder that this Friday is a non-instructional day. For this reason, we will be celebrating Halloween on Thursday!

Students are welcome to wear their costume to school and wear their costume for the whole day.  Please make sure that costumes are not too scary or violent and that they don't interfere with students wearing their protective masks. 

Because students will be wearing them all day, including recess and lunch, there is a chance that costumes could get wet or ruined playing outside.  Please take some time to talk with your child about this before school Thursday. 

Our morning will be a regular learning day, but in the afternoon we will be playing some fun games, doing some step-by-step drawing, and even completing a digital escape room!

I will post some pictures and more information about our week, including Halloween on Friday so be sure to check back in!

Home Reading Update

We are ready to start our Home Reading Program on Monday, October 26. We know that some families would prefer reading their own books from home or using an online reading program to avoid sharing any school resources. However, we also recognize that some like having school levelled books available.  For this reason, we will allow families to choose which option they prefer as long as students are reading for 15-20 minutes each evening. Please email me if you would like to have school levelled readers. Students will be responsible for bringing back and exchanging their books when they have finished reading the book.  Students who choose to use Epic, will be able to independently log in as they have been practicing at school. https://www.getepic.com/sign-in

Oct. 21

 We hope everyone is keeping warm during this unexpected cold and snowy streak we are getting. It was great to see that all the students were prepared with their winter clothes. The kids were so excited to get outside and jump and play in the snow and they came in from recess all smiles! Today we took advantage of that sunshine and fresh snow by taking a walk through our neighbourhood. We try to get out for a walk every week or two and we noticed so many changes in the landscape since our last walk. 

In science, we have been learning about the needs of animals and how animals adapt to their habitat in order to meet their needs. For example, we learned that a giraffe has a long tongue because they eat leaves from a prickly tree. This allows them to wrap their tongue around the branch and avoid the prickles. We also learned that polar bears have black skin and hollow hairs to help them survive. Ask your child how these two adaptations help the polar bear survive. 

We started some fun science stations today. We will be applying our knowledge about animal life cycles, adaptations and animal needs to complete some fun tasks. We will post more about this next week! 

In math, we have been using our new knowledge about numbers to help us complete some open ended tasks. For example, we completed a math problem "How many even numbers can you make from these digits? 2, 7, 5, 6, 8". Some students listed all the numbers they could make and then circled the even ones and others just listed the even numbers. This is a problem you could try at home by changing the digits and making it either even or odd. 

We have also been using what we have learned about numbers to help us with  a "Number of the Day" challenge. This requires students to put together their knowledge about numbers to show their understanding. You can easily do this at home by switching up the digits. As students practice using numbers in different ways they become more confident and start to see different patterns in numbers. They start to connect with how numbers are flexible and can be moved and manipulated in different ways. 

Next, we will be moving into some strategies we can use for estimation. This is always really fun for kids! We would love to see if your child is doing any of this learning at home! You can always post on our stream on Google Classroom!

Important Upcoming Events

• Oct. 29 - Students can wear their costumes to school this day for the whole day. (More info to come next week)
• Oct. 30 - No school

 Happy belated Thanksgiving everyone! We hope you had a great long weekend and you had some time with family and some time to rest and rejuvenate after the busy back to school season. Students definitely seemed rested and ready to learn today!

Last week, we had some fun with thinking about Thanksgiving turkey. We read the story "The Plump and Perky Turkey" which is about a town who tries to trick a turkey into coming for Thanksgiving (of course to eat him). After we read it, we did some whole class guided writing where we wrote a letter to a turkey.  We wanted to persuade him to come to our house for a party or competition, but in reality we wanted to trick him to come over so we could eat him! After some guided writing, students wrote their own letters to persuade turkeys to come to their own house. Check out some of the creative ideas they had!

Continuing with the autumn and fall theme, we did some guided drawing.  We created some beautiful fall pumpkins and leaves using ArtHub. Students practiced following a guided drawing and used pastels to add colour, making them look more realistic. We practiced art elements such as line, shape, and colour. These pumpkins add some beauty and seasonal cheer to our hallway!

This week in math, we are reviewing our knowledge of even and odd from grade 2 and applying it to larger numbers (up to 1000). Ms. Wolfe gave students some concrete strategies to use when trying to figure out whether any number is odd or even.  Ask your child to show you! We have also been playing math games such as 100 or Bust or The Greatest Number. These are easy math games you could also play at home! Your child should be able to show you how to play. All you need are dice or cards and a hundreds chart (Click here for one you can use digitally). 

Lastly, a reminder that tomorrow is picture day. I don't know what time we will be but students will have their individual pictures taken tomorrow. Due to Covid, we will not have a class photo. 

Important Upcoming Dates:

• Oct. 14 - Picture Day
• Oct. 30 - No School Day
• Nov. 11 - No School. Remembrance Day