We WON!!! :)

Our class poster was chosen to hang at the new fire station on Bartram Parkway!  We are so excited!  We have such creative students, we are proud of them!  :)

Field Trip Slide Show!

We had the best time on Tuesday! The weather was beautiful and we learned so much about local history. We explored two snapshots of history:

Pre-European Florida 1565 when the Timucua Indians inhabited what is now St. Augustine. These Native Americans were said to be a handsome people with most achieving an average height of 6 feet or more. They were hunters, gatherers, and farmers. The women took care of the home, children, and cooking while the men provided food and protection for the family. These Indians developed a way of life that enabled them to live and prosper in the world they lived in. Our students took part in dug out canoe making, using Indian tools, grinding corn, gardening and Native American games.

Spanish Colonial Ft. Mose 1565-1763: Students sampled a soldiers life in Spanish Florida, and learned how hard it was to start a new colony. We took part in fence building, weaving, dipping candles, smashing shells for tabby, and wood working.

Check out the slide show!!

Free slideshow design generated with Smilebox

Week of February 24th-28th

We will head to St. Augustine for our field trip on Tuesday, please remember a bag lunch and your BSE T-shirt!

Thursday is spirit night at Zaxby's from 5-8!  Help Bartram Springs PTA by enjoying some chicken!

ELA:

Two Days in May is realistic fiction. This story is about a young girl, her father, and a group of neighbors, who launch a peaceful protest to help five deer that have wandered into the middle of their big city neighborhood. This is the perfect text to use to focus on the reading skill of making judgments:

- considering all the facts

- looking at all sides of an issue

- considering personal experiences and beliefs

We will also look at author's point of view / author's perspective...

•An author's words enable you to see the topic from his/her point of view or through his/her eyes.

•In many instances, you will be able to tell if the author feels strongly about something or disagrees with it.

Author's Perspective Practice: Click on the photo

Math:
We will begin our discussion on congruence and symmetry.


These shapes all have one line of symmetry!
Which of these shapes have more than one line of symmetry??

Congruent means that shapes MUST be the same size AND same shape!

Science:
We will discuss how temperatures differ based on shady or sunny conditions.

Resources:
Tiberio
Tuesday- Field Trip (will miss Media)
Wednesday- Computer Lab
Thursday- Music/ Teacher directed P.E.
Friday- Art

Kluge-
Tuesday- Field Trip
Wednesday- Music/ Computer Lab
Thursday- Teacher directed P.E. (wear tennis shoes)

Best wishes to all our 4th grade friends as they take the Florida Writes on Tuesday! :)

Wanted: Headphones

Mrs. Kluge & I got 2 new Mac computers but unfortunately, did not receive headphones for these computers.  If any of you have extra headphones or happen to be out near the dollar store and can find a pair, we would love the donation!  Each class needs one additional pair.  Thank you in advance! :)

Saturday Baseball Fun

Mrs. Kluge and I got to enjoy a little fun at the baseball fields cheering on one of our students!  We had a great time and even got to see him hit a home run!  Thank you for the invitation! 

Feeling the love...

We had a great Valentine's Day... Students chose positive character traits to describe each classmate and then delivered them. Everyone left with a little red bag full of how their friends see them. Lots of fun and smiles!

Week of February 17th-21st

                     

Thank you for all of the wonderful Valentine cards and treats!

No school Monday, in observance of President's Day!  Early release on Wednesday.

All field trip money is due this Friday!  Progress reports will be sent home on Friday.

Next week, we will go to St. Augustine on Tuesday, students will need to pack a bag lunch!!

Math:  We will look at combining and separating shapes this week to make new shapes.  We will have a test on topic 11 on Friday!

ELA:
This week, we will read a Chris Van Allsburg story,
The Garden of Abdul Gasazi.
        

Our lessons will focus on the following:

1. Student led discussions of text dependent questions. Students will work in small groups to answer questions that require locating and quoting evidence from the text. An example of this type of question would be:
Reread page 398. What evidence from the text can you cite to defend the idea that Alan takes pet-sitting Fritz seriously? 

2. Revisiting elements of plot... character development, setting, problem, and the solution as a series of events. 

3. Reading informational text and identifying the text structure (how the author organized the text) by using text clues and signals. We will read several pieces of text tied to a common topic and see how an author can organize the text in a specific way.
  
       

Science:
We will talk about what happens in the sky during day time and night time.  A common misconception is that students think stars "come out" at night, we will conduct an investigation that will show them what happens during the daylight.


Resources:
Tiberio
Tuesday- P.E
Thursday- Teacher directed PE
Friday- Computer Lab

Kluge-
Thursday- PE
Friday- Computer lab/ Media- return all library books!

The Winter Olympics!

This week we began learning about the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia. Everyone was very excited and we discovered many things about the history of the Olympics, Olympic traditions, and Russia.
Here is a link to a Time for Kids website to explore.

      

Week of February 10th-14th

Please remember to bring in your Valentine containers by Friday, they do not need to be decorated but they can be.  We sent a list home of student names last week.

Please return field trip permission slip and payment as soon as possible.

ELA: 
       
This week, we will take a close look at poetry and discover how we read it differently than fiction and informational text. We will read many poems and learn that poetry uses sensory words to create feelings and emotions in the reader. Poetry often makes us think differently and deeply.

As we look at poetry this week we will actively read and analyze each poem for better understanding. Below are some of the things we will annotate:

-the number the lines and stanzas

-figurative and descriptive language

-questions we have about the poem

-rhyme and rhythm

-inferences about the speaker and author of the poem

-details that support the main idea

-word, phrases, or parts that confuse us

-text details that lead us to form inferences 

Reading poetry is a great way to revisit descriptive and figurative language. In third grade, we focus on similes, metaphors, and personification. Students do not have to necessarily identify the type of figurative language, but more importantly, they need to be able to determine the meaning and how the author uses this language to describe something by comparing it with something else. 




Don't forget to check out the fluency tab above!

Math:

We are going to discussing types of angles, polygons, and the different types of quadrilaterals.

For our review day (safety nets) we will cover multiplication & division.

Science:

We will continue our discussion and research on the telescope and then begin discussing the sun.  We are working on chapter 2 in the students science workbooks.

Resources:

Tiberio

Monday- Media (return all books)

Wednesday- Music

Thursday- Art/ Teacher directed PE

Kluge

Tuesday- Music

Thursday- Teacher directed PE

Friday- Art

No School Monday, February 17th- Presidents' Day!

Progress Reports will be sent home Friday, Feb. 21st.

100th Day Posters!

Wow!  We certainly have some creative 3rd graders!  Check out the pictures!

Week of February 3rd-7th

Monday is our 100th day of 3rd grade!!

Wednesday is early release.

Upcoming field trip to St. Augustine on Tuesday, Feb. 25th, be on the lookout for a permission slip.


Math: We will wrap up our unit on fractions on a number line, improper, and mixed numbers.  We will have a quiz on Wednesday.  Thursday we will begin our unit on geometry by talking about triangles and quadrilaterals.
Also, on Wednesdays we will start our FCAT review and prep, each Wednesday we will review a topic or two that we have already covered in class.  You will see these papers sent home, please continue to review past concepts with your child.  This Wednesday we will review place value.  Students should also work on multiplication facts, they can do this with Reflex math or by simply using flashcards.

Science: We will focus on telescopes this week, we will do some more research.  We will discuss Galileo Galilei & the Hubble Space station.


ELA:
In READING this week we continue our unit, Incredible Stories. We will read The Mysterious Giant of Barletta written by Tomie dePaola. This Italian folktale is about a real statue in the town of Barletta, Italy.

We will look at the story and create a plot diagram together including (1)beginning information (exposition), (2)rising action including the problem, (3)climax, (4)falling action, and (5)resolution.

This is a great way to organize any story after reading.

I have also added a new tab, Fluency, that has a poem we are working on in class. Poetry is an excellent way for children to work on their fluent reading. Reading the same poem multiple times improves their fluency, intonation, and expression. Repeated readings are one of the most studied and most effective strategies for improving fluency. Feel free to listen to them read it.

Resources:

Tiberio:
Monday- P.E. (wear tennis shoes)
Tuesday- Computer Lab
Thursday- Teacher directed P.E.

Kluge:
Tuesday- P.E. (wear tennis shoes)/Computer lab
Thursday- Teacher directed P.E.
Friday- Media (return all library books)