September 23

Upcoming Dates/Reminders:

• Reading Minutes are due Monday.  The expectation is 125 minutes with at least 4 days of reading.  Make sure your child totals his/her minutes and gets a signature from you.  Everyone did a fabulous job with this last week!
• Math Test- We will be taking a test on Unit 1 on Friday, September 30 .  To help students prepare I have sent home a practice Math test.  This is due back to school by Thursday, September 29.  If your child is struggling with a problem, simply circle it and I will reteach this concept to your child.  
• Work work will begin again on Monday with our test on Friday.
• The class pizza party from the Walk-a-thon will be on Wednesday, September 28.  Please have your child bring a caffeine free drink and any other items they would like to eat with pizza.  If your child doesn't want pizza they are free to order hot lunch or take a lunch from home.
• I will submit the book order on September 28.  If you care to order any books simply click on the "Scholastic Book Order" link at the top of this blog and it will direct you to my website.
• Grandparents day is Thursday, October 13.  We will begin our time with the grandparents at 12:45 in the gym.  
• Advanced Dates:  Conferences will be held November 7-9 from 3:40-5:40 and November 10 from 5:00-7:00.  Sign-ups for this will be coming out soon.  However, if you have a concern please don't wait to ask.  I am happy to meet with you anytime!
• Thank you to Carol Stewart for helping our class this week in the library!  
• You are invited to attend Coffee Connections next week, Wednesday, September 28.  Parent Team is hosting an hour of time set aside for you to drop in to Pine Ridge and meet and visit with other parents of third graders.  Grab a snack while having the opportunity to socially connect with other parents.  Little ones are more than welcome!  We will gather in the extra classroom in the third/fourth grade hall.  Please plan to stop by following morning drop-off (8:15/8:20am).
• On Wednesday we gathered for Prayer by the Pole.  However, we got rained out so we moved indoors.  What a privilege to gather together to pray for our nation and our school.
  
• Prodigy- One of the apps that we use during our Math time is called Prodigy.  This app allows students to work at Math problems at their own learning level.  Several students have expressed interest in playing at home, so today I sent home a letter with your child's username and password.  
•  Psalm 8 is due on Friday, September 30.  Many students have already said it to me.  :)

Curriculum Highlights:

Reading:  This week we learned how to retell a story using a retell rope.  The students are getting into the habit of jotting down important details in their story on sticky notes as they read so they are able to recount their story to others when they are finished.

Writing: We have committed to a story, written a final timeline of our event, and have practiced telling this story to many friends this week.  A copy of your child's timeline came home today in his/her homework folder.  Please have them them tell the story to you as well with as much detail as they can remember.  We will begin writing these stories next week into a 5 paragraph narrative.

Math:  This week we focused on the distributive property (Ex: 8x8=(5x8)+(3x8).)  As you can imagine, this is a tough concept for many 3rd graders, but most of us have it down!  We also looked at multiplication and area (another new concept!) and added our 4's to our multiplication and division facts.

Bible: Much time this week was spent learning about Bible maps, the importance of spending time in the Word, looking up verses that are important to us, using our concordance and table of contents, and then taking a final test on all of the different features of the Bible.  This group of kids LOVES spending time with their Bibles and our "Favorite Verse Rings" are quickly growing!

Science:  We looked at renewable vs. non-renewable resources this week.  One of our experiments was on how farmland is a renewable resource, but there is not much of it and we need to be careful to care for this special part of God's creation.  We also finished making our bricks!  However, the highlight of the week was taking our rocks out of the rock tumbler.  We talked about how the rocks look new and how God does the same thing with us....polishing us and refining us into something beautiful when we continue to spend time with Him each day.

Blessings!
Lynae