October 28

Upcoming Dates/Reminders:

• November 2:  Our P.O.D. groups will be heading out to serve in our community.  Your child will be out of the building from approximately 12:35-2:30.  
• November 7-10:  Conferences.  I look forward to meeting with all of you! Feel free to come a bit early so you can scan the QR code on your child's locker and see his/her book review.  I will have ipads sitting out so you can use our QR scanners in you need one.  
• November 23: No school due to Staff Development
• November 24-25:  Thanksgiving break
• December 5-16:  Swimming lessons at Holland Aquatic Center.  We will be at the pool from 1:25-2:10 p.m.
• December 26-January 8:  Christmas Break
• Reading Minutes are due Monday.
• New Work work will be given Monday with a test on Friday.  We practice our words each day in class but some students may need additional practice at home.
• Our Math test has been moved to Tuesday due to the fact that we needed a few extra days to practice. :)
• Girls on the Run- This program begins in 3rd grade.  A letter came home today explaining the details.

Curriculum Highlights:

Reading:  We continue to relate to characters in our stories.  As we read each day the students respond to a teaching point in their journals.  This week we focused on revising our ideas about our characters as our stories progress.  We are able to understand challenges our characters face and explain why our characters are acting certain ways.  

Writing:  This week everyone was busy publishing the final copy of his/her personal narrative.  There was a lot of work in remembering the importance of complete sentences, looking up correct spelling in the dictionary, remembering to indent, and still write neatly!

Math:  We have moved into two step story problems.  This requires very careful reading and a lot of perseverance!  We also learned how to multiply with multiples of 10 (Ex. 8x60=480).  We have been busy reviewing as well and decided as a class to take our next unit test on Tuesday so we had a few extra days to review.

Bible: We have moved on to the stories of God calling Abram.  This week we traced the path that Abram took when God called him to the land of Canaan.  We see how God promises to make him into a great nation and we talked about how Abram had a heart that desired to serve God.  We also saw how God loves his children even when we doubt in Him.  

Social Studies:  We have begun our first unit called "The Geography of Michigan".  This week we learned about the location of Michigan as well as many of the natural characteristics that make Michigan unique.  We spent a lot of time talking about peninsulas, dunes, islands, and mountain ranges in Michigan and then looking them up on Google Earth.  We also researched different bodies of water in Michigan.  What a blast!

Blessings,

Lynae

October 14

Upcoming Dates/Reminders:

• Conferences sign-ups are happening now!  Click here to reserve your time slot.  The master password is "gohc".  I am looking forward to meeting with all of you!
• School pictures came home today.
• Reading Minutes are due on Monday.  
• No word work this coming week.
• Math homework will come home on Monday.  This will be due back by Wednesday.
• Psalm 23- Most students have completed this.  If your child still needs to say it I will have them do so on Wednesday, October 19.
• Report cards will come home on Wednesday, October 19.
• No School on October 20 or 21 due to the CEA Convention

Curriculum Highlights:

Field trip:  We had so much fun today!  Be sure to click on the "Class Photos" link to see some of our adventure!  

Reading: We have been digging deep in our unit called "Following Characters into Meaning."  As we read we are trying to empathize with our characters and notice details about them that we didn't see before.  As a class we are reading the book Because of Winn Dixie to model our teaching points.  

Writing:  This week we completed editing our personal narratives and we began writing our final drafts.  This will take us into next week as we remember to incorporate all that we have learned!

Math: We have officially learned how to multiply and divide from 0-11!  Keep on having your child practice their facts at home to make them more fluent.  We also learned about square numbers and how to write our own multiplication and division problems.  

Science:  We completed our keynote presentations this week and had a lot of fun sharing them to both the class and our grandparents.  You should have received an email from your child with his/her presentation.

Bible:  This week we saw how sin entered the world and God's people begin to make some poor choices.  We studied the stories of Cain and Abel, discusses genealogies, and moved into the story of the flood.  We talked a lot about God's plan of salvation and how we see His faithfulness to His people over and over again.

Have a wonderful weekend!
Lynae

Grandparents Day!

This is always a favorite day of mine.  I love listening to the kids and their grandparents sing praises to the Lord.  I love seeing the kids show off everything they are doing in 3rd grade.  I love seeing the pride of the grandparents as they spend time with their grandchild.  Today was just such a blessing!

October 7

Upcoming Dates/Reminders:

• Grandparents day- Thursday, October 13 at 12:45 in the gym
• October 14- End of Quarter 1 
• October 19- Report cards go home
• No School on October 20 or 21 due to the CEA convention
• Swimming Lessons- We are scheduled to take swimming lessons at the Aquatic Center from December 5-16 at the time slot of 1:25-2:10.  A permission slip came home with your child today.  Please return this to school next week.  
• Reading Minutes are due Monday.  The expectation is 125 minutes with at least 4 days of reading.
• Word work will be given on Monday with a test on Friday.
• Math homework comes home on Monday and is due back by Friday.
• Conferences:  November 7-9 from 3:40-5:40 and November 10 from 5-7.  An email will be coming out on October 10 telling you how to sign up and allowing you to pick your time slot.

Curriculum Highlights:

Reading:  We worked on writing book reviews this week and then recording our review on imovie.  These will be placed with a QR code which the kids will be able to view next week!  I will have the reviews hanging on lockers as well for you to enjoy during conferences. 

Writing:  We wrote our leads and endings for our personal narratives this week.  We also began editing our work for capitalization and punctuation.  Much of this work involved discussion and practice on what makes a complete sentence.  

Bible:  This week we completed the story of creation and talked about the importance of the seventh day when God rested.  We see how he has set an example for us of the importance in taking a day of rest in our Savior.  We played "Creation Jeopardy" to review this unit (which the class just loved!) and then dove into our next unit dealing with the fall.  Our Bible memory is a review of Psalm 23.

Math:  Your child brought his/her math test home this week.  I was very pleased with how well the class did.  You will notice that students do receive letter grades in Math in 3rd grade.  We have moved on to our next unit where we learned how to multiply and divide by 6's and 8's this week.  We also did many story problems dealing with finding area when given the length and width.  

Science:  Each child was assigned a topic this week on earth changes.  The class spent much of the week researching their topic and taking notes on what they learned.  We then spent several days placing all of this information into complete sentences (tying this into Writing!) and making a keynote presentation.  This has been a HUGE deal and everyone has risen to the challenge!  We will present our projects next week.

Blessings!
Lynae

September 30

Upcoming Dates/Reminders:

• There will not be school on Monday, October 3, so that all are able to attend the funeral of Kevin Witte. 
• Reading Minutes due Tuesday.  The expectation is 125 minutes per week with at least 4 days of reading.  
• New word work lists will be given on Tuesday with a test on Friday
• Grandparent's Day is Thursday, October 13.  We will begin in the gym at 12:45.
• Advanced Notice:  Conferences will be held November 7-9 from 3:40-5:40 and November 10 from 5-7p.m.  Sign-ups will be coming out soon for this.  However, please don't wait until conferences if you have a question or concern.  I am happy to meet with you anytime!
• Thank you to Amy Alderink for helping us in Library this week.
• We will begin our new Bible memory, Psalm 23, on Tuesday.

Curriculum Highlights 

•  Devotions- Our time in devotions this week centered on prayers for the Witte family, the HS staff and students, our community, and learning what it means to BE the body of Christ.  The students really wanted to DO something, so on Wednesday we wrote out Bible verses for the High School students which were then placed on their lockers.  I love how this group wanted to show their love in a tangible way and I was so touched by their idea.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Pizza Party- Thank you to the parent team for our awesome pizza party!  We really enjoyed it!
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Math- Our first unit test was today!  Our week was spent reviewing the 2's, 3's 4's, 5's, 9's, and 10's in both multiplication and division, practicing story problems, and learning about the associative property (6x3)x4= 6x(3x4).
• Reading:  We are wrapping up our first reading unit and the students have really taken off with their love of books!  Everyone is leveled and should be reading texts at an appropriate level.  This week we worked a lot with jotting down our thoughts and observations on sticky notes as we read.  We then use these sticky notes to retell what our story was about to a friend.
• Writing:  We have written our rough draft of a personal narrative this week.  We have 4-5 paragraphs to our story and are working at composing a solid lead.  Next week we will work on our conclusions and editing our work.
• Bible:  We have begun learning about the book of Genesis.  Each day the students are reading from their Bibles, having a discussion about what we have read, and diving deeper into the text with our footnotes.  This is a favorite time for many kids. We focused this week on the story of creation.
• Science:  This week we learned more about farmland, runoffs, and oil spills.  We discussed our job of being Christian caretakers of God's earth.  Next week each child will begin a research project on a natural disasters that change the earth's surface.

Blessings!

Lynae

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

September 16

The Walk-a-thon was a huge success!  What a great looking group of 3rd graders!  Thank you for your contributions to this event and to our school.  Our class raised the most money with over $2,100 so we have a pizza party coming our way!  I will let you know when that lunch is scheduled.

Upcoming Events/Reminders:

• Reading Minutes are due Monday.  Have your child add up his/her total minutes and get a parent signature from you.  The expectation is 125 minutes a week with at least 4 days of reading.
• Word Work will come home on Monday.  Our test is Friday.  Your child does practice these words each day at school but home practice is beneficial.
• Math homework will come home on Monday.  This is due back Friday.  An optional Math page will be made available to students on Wednesdays if they would like the extra practice.
• The purple homework folders need to go back and forth from home and school each day.  Your child writes his/her homework and any reminders in this folder.  We are working at becoming responsible for our homework as we grow.  :)
• Thank you to  Jana Rigterink for helping us in Library this week.
• I have our Scholastic Book Orders up and running!  Simply click on the red "Scholastic Book Order" link at the top of this blog to go straight to my website.  All books will be sent to me at school.  If you wish for these to be a gift for your child, please let me know.  I sent home a paper copy of this as well today.
• We can always use more Clorox Wipes. Thanks to all of you who are so faithfully keeping our room stocked with these.  

Curriculum Highlights:

Bible:  We continue to learn many important features of the Bible.  This week we looked up many special verses and began writing down ones that are important to us.  We are adding these to a bible ring so we can place these words in our hearts as we read them often.  We also learned how to use the concordance and footnotes in our Bible.

Reading:  The Discovery testing this week took much of our lesson time, but we did learn strategies on how to problem solve words that we do not understood.  Each day your child should be bringing his/her book home from school.  Everyone has a lot of book choices available in their book boxes and they are excited about what they are reading.

Writing:  We have read through all of our small moment stories and everyone has chosen a story that they want to start focusing on in depth.  In order to do this, we read with partners and tried to choose stories that we remembered with lots of detail.  We have created a timeline to place our story in sequential order and are starting to zoom in on a small moment for our focus.  

Math:  We are working so hard at multiplication and division!  This week we added our 9's and 3's and also starting adding variables into our math equations.  All of Math involves careful reading of story problems and slow work as we draw pictures to help us understand what is being asked.  

Science:  Our rock tumbler is a huge hit in our 3rd grade classroom and I wouldn't be a bit surprised if many of your kids ask for one of these for Christmas!  Besides learning about rock polishing this week, we also focused on particle size with earth materials when mixed with water.

Enjoy homecoming weekend at HC!
Lynae