Rainy Weekend Ahead

Rainy stormy nights, usually mean great sleeping weather for me. Until my kids crawl into my bed, that is! :) 



This Wednesday, there is a lot going on. First, we have an early (1:15) dismissal. Second, it will be a day where the kids can bring in a non-motorized scooters, roller blades, roller skates, skateboards, and heelies can be used around the track during recess. Please send your child with helmets. Helmets and "wheels" can be brought to our classroom to be stored when they are not in use at recess. This is a whole school reward for filling our red ticket jar. Third, we are asking all the students to wear orange as a way to show we are against bully behavior. If your child does not have anything orange, please have them wear their red PBIS paw print shirt. 


I have a lot of papers to pass back. In the process of grading, the program I use to keep grades decided to not longer be able to be used with the operating system we have on our school computers. This left me no choice but to look for something else. Thankfully, I have a written record of all the scores so far, but wanted to get the others in the new system before I had a chance to loose everything. It is much easier to keep track of a basket of papers then a few single sheets at times. :) 


One last note- All 3rd and 4th graders are invited to join the FMI Reads Book Club. This club meets from 3:20-4:00, usually in Mrs. Wicke's and Mrs. Donohue's rooms (depending on the amount of kids). When students sign up for book club they receive a copy of the book as well a snack and a drink at each meeting. All of my students who were involved last year loved Book Club. There are usually a few offered through out the year. Information was on a purple note sent home on Thursday. If you are interested your permission slip is due no later than next Friday, October 11th. 

Here are some of the things we did this week: 
 
Math- This week we did a lot with subtraction. We worked on basic subtraction facts, learned how to regroup by taking one from the tens place and moving it over and adding ten ones. We started to learn how to regroup and borrow with place value blocks and moved on to just paper and pencil. I am still working on reminding students to cross out their numbers so they made sure they followed the steps. :)

 Next week we will continue working on regrouping/ borrowing with 3-digit numbers and across zeros.

Reading- This week we took some time to work with our Text Talk books as our new curriculum keeps our reading block pretty jammed packed.
 
Text Talk is a program that provides robust vocabulary instruction tied closely to comprehension. With this program, I will read aloud a picture book stopping at key places where we will discuss comprehension questions, check for understanding, or review vocabulary words. Each day of the week, we will complete some fun short activities using these vocabulary words in and out of context with the book, then take a multiple choice quiz. 

At the beginning of the week we read Wolf! by Becky Bloom. In the book, A wolf trades in his "growl" for "spoken words" in order to impress a group of educated farmyard animals he has met. He goes to school and shows a lot of perseverance to become a great reader whom everyone wants to listen to.  Vocabulary words we discussed this week are concentrate, industrious, achieve, passion, confidence, and emergency.

Towards the end of the week we read  Rats on the Roof by James Marshall. This book is a compilation of seven different stories. We focused on a story about a brontosaurus who begins to eat an oak tree which is the home of an owl. The owl asks her bird friends for help and eventually the brontosaurus leaves them alone.  Vocabulary words we discussed this week are collaboration (work together), steadfast (loyal), ferocious (mean and scary), queasy (feeling sick), relocate (move), and lumbered (move slowly).  

Writing- This week we worked a lot on the Word Choice writing trait. We discussed how the words we use can be more entertaining, more detailed, and can paint a better picture in our minds. 

With this lesson I introduced our "Flower Power" words. These flowers give options to replace some words that might be old, tired, or worn out. Here is a small sample as we have 20 flowers full of words to use in our writing.

After practicing making better sentences by changing our word choices, we read the story Moosetache byMargie Palatini.

Science and Social Studies- Today we took our plants off the water system and out from under the lights. We will allow them to dry out through out next week so we can take the seeds out of our seed pods. 

I am including pictures of the orange study guide which should have came home in purple folders tonight. Our Science test over this unit will be on Thursday, October 10th.

I am also including a lot of the vocabulary we have been using during our science unit.

Our little root view jars aren't doing so hot. Our lima bean somehow started to mold, our onions didn't grow, but we have carrots to watch! :) 

Our lima bean was healthy and green last week, this week it turned brown and mushy. I decided to throw it away. :(

Upcoming dates: Tuesday, October 8th- FMI Night at Wendy's, Happy Birthday Breanna and Rayna!   Wednesday, October 9th- 1:15 Dismissal, Recess on Wheels
Thursday, October 10th- Fundraiser Pick-up day

Monday, October 14th- Field Trip to Gallagher-Bluedorn (10:00 am- 3:00 pm) *I will send a reminder note about lunches
Wednesday, October 16th- Our student teacher Ms. Wild starts
Thursday, October 17th- America Reads Day!
Friday, October 18th- No School, Professional Development All day
 
Tuesday, October 29th- Happy Birthday Justice and Vincent!
Wednesday, October 30th- Mrs. Yuska's birthday
Thursday, October 31st- Fall Party (usually 2:00-3:00) *I will send home more information as it gets closer.


Have a great weekend!
Mrs. Jodie Yuska