Written by Lincoln and Caleb :)

We had a really fun week in school! On Wednesday we got to go to a special science presentation that was presented by people who work at Ecovative. They taught us all about mushrooms and how they can be used to make packaging materials instead of using foam. Using mushrooms is much better for the environment! We got to help make our own bowls using the mushroom material. We will keep them in our classroom to hold supplies. It was awesome! In Math this week we learned how to multiply 3 factors using the Associative Property of Multiplication. We also learned how to multiply with multiples of 10. We had our first Mad Minute today and did great! In Reading we finished Gooseberry Park. It was a really cool book! We learned how to compare and contrast two things. We compared and contrasted two characters from the story and we also compared ourselves to one of our classmates using a Venn Diagram. We finished our Narrative final copies in Writing. We compared our Narratives to the story we wrote before we learned about Narrative writing and couldn't believe how much our stories improved! We can't wait to share our stories with you at the Holiday Party! In Social Studies we continued learning about Australia. We learned all about the animals that live there and made a book out of them. We are excited to pick an animal to research!

Written by Julia and Charlotte C. :)

We continued learning multiplication in Math this week. We learned the Commutative, Distributive, Identity and Zero Properties of Multiplication. We also practiced facts and learned a new game called "Multiplication Roll'Em". In Writing, we learned how to add quotations to the dialog in our stories. We also learned how to make paragraphs. We finished editing and began writing our final copies of our Narratives. We are excited to share them with our families at the Holiday Party! In Social Studies we read a book called "Are We There Yet". It was about a family who traveled along the coast of Australia. We traced their route on our own map of Australia and learned about each place along the way. One place we thought was really cool was Uluru, the immense rock in the outback. In Reading, we continued to read Gooseberry Park. We continued to study character traits and write summaries of the chapters. We love the book and are almost at the end.

Written by Rowan and Audrey :)

We had a spectacular week! In math we continued to learn multiplication and Miss Saburro taught us some cool tricks! So far we have practiced 0, 1, 2, 4, 5, and 10's facts. We love multiplication! In Social Studies we finished our continent research and presented our posters to the class. We began our unit on Australia. This week we learned about Australia's geography and flag. Did you know that Australia is a continent, country and island?! We can't wait to learn more. In Reading we have been enjoying listening to Gooseberry Park. We also have been working hard at our literacy stations and in our guided reading groups. In Writing we are working hard to make our Narrative stories sound better. We are continuing to add detail and dialog, and are almost ready to begin our final drafts. We really enjoyed having our parents come in on Wednesday to work with us at stations. It was so much fun showing them what we have been learning in school! We are super excited for our Turkey Trot today. Our class has 100% participation! We get to have an extra P.E. class for having our whole class participate! Next week is a short week of school. We only have 2 days then it is Thanksgiving break. We hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving with their loved ones!

Written by Angie and Sophie :)

This week has been an awesome week in school! In Math we started Multiplication! We learned three strategies to solve multiplication problems. We learned how to use repeated addition, how to make groups, and how to use arrays. We continued our continent research in Social Studies. We found facts with our groups and used them to make a poster of our continent. In Writing, we worked on using a drafting booklet to separate our stories into pieces. We started by drawing different scenes of our narrative stories from beginning to end. This will help us learn how to make paragraphs. Miss Saburro continued reading Gooseberry Park to us. We used graphic organizers to describe the traits of the characters in the story. We also worked on summarizing what we have read so far. Today, we had a visit from Happy and her dog Oliver. He is a Bernese Mountain Dog. She taught us all about New Zealand and showed us a really cool power point. She also told us all about her dog Oliver and how he helps children. It was a really fun!

Written by Charlotte H. and Liam :)

This week was so much fun! In Math we reviewed adding and subtracting larger numbers. We practiced regrouping and learned how to subtract across zeros. In Social Studies we began studying the continents. We got into groups of 2 and 3 and picked a continent to study. We began researching and taking notes on our continent with our group. Once our research is finished, we are going to teach the class about what we learned. In Writing, we continued using the third grade checklist to help us edit our Narratives. We also talked about good leads and made sure the beginning of our story was interesting, and included information about the setting and the characters. This week Miss Saburro started a new read aloud, "Gooseberry Park". It is awesome so far! We are studying the characters through the story and summarizing the chapters in writing after we read. During Literacy Stations, we started our guided reading groups with Miss Saburro. It was a great week!

Written by Audrey and Charlie :)

The past two weeks were a blast! In Math we continued rounding and learned how to estimate using compatible numbers. We also learned how to solve for missing numbers in addition and subtraction equations. We finished our Plant Unit in Science. We looked inside the seed pods and found tiny new seeds. It helped us see and understand the whole life cycle of our plants. We got to take home our observation packet and growth graph today to show our families. We really enjoyed the pumpkin activity we did on Halloween. We read "How Many Seeds in a Pumpkin?" and then estimated how many seeds were in our class pumpkin. After estimating, we scooped out the seeds and counted them to find the actual number of seeds. Our pumpkin had 509 seeds and Connor's estimate of 572 was the closest! We learned that the number of seeds can be predicted by the number of ribs on a pumpkin and its color. Pumpkins with more ribs and a darker orange color are known to have more seeds because they have been on the vine the longest. In Writing we learned to use a checklist to edit our narrative stories. We focused on spelling and punctuation this week. Our narrative stories are getting better each week! We continued to work on Main Idea and Details in Reading. We also read Non-Fiction and Fiction stories about Fall, Pumpkins, and Life Cycles.

Written by Connor and Julia :)

This week in Math we practiced rounding numbers to the nearest ten and nearest hundred. We learned a rhyme to help us remember how to round: "Find your place, look next door, five or greater add one more. All numbers in front stay the same, all numbers behind zeros your name". In Science we read a book all about bees. We learned that bees make beeswax inside their bodies. We also learned how bees pollinate flowers. We are going to use our bees to pollinate our flowers next week! Our plants are immense now! They also have sprouted pretty yellow flowers. In Reading we continued finding the main idea and details in stories. We also continued to work on writing our small moment narratives. We worked on adding details and dialogue to our stories. We are excited to teach the school about being responsible at our assembly on Monday!

This post was written by Jack N. and Elle :)

This week we had an amazing time learning about a lot of cool things. In Science we observed bees (we will be using them to pollinate our flowers soon!) and measured our plants. They are getting really tall and are growing buds! In Reading we began to learn how to recognize the main idea and supporting details in a story. We read some short articles and stories and worked on finding the main idea and supporting details using a graphic organizer. In Writing we learned how to tell a story using a storyteller's voice. We wrote a class story to practice using our storyteller voices. We worked harder on picking a small moment and completed story maps to organize our ideas to write our first narrative piece. In Math we finished Unit 1 and had our first test. We began Unit 2 and learned the Properties of Addition. The properties are the Commutative Property, the Associate Property and the Identity Property. We also began practicing our song "Really Be Responsible" for our Character Education Assembly that is going to be on October 21st. Our class, along with Mrs. Sirianni's and Mrs. Szczech's class are going to share a song and teach the other kids in the school what it means to be responsible!

We had a very busy week in third grade! In Reader's Workshop we continued to read more stories and tried to decide what genre they were, based on the characteristics we have been learning the past couple of weeks. The kids were very excited to put together their Reader's Notebooks! They learned how to log their books and tally the genres. They have also been practicing "Read to Self" and "Read to Someone" at their Literacy Stations, along with listening and responding to stories using a retelling graphic organizer. In Writing, we have been "mapping" our memories using sketches and labeling. The kids have been picking small moment memories from their "maps" to write stories. This week we focused on memories we have had at a special place. Many of the kids chose a vacation spot, a favorite beach, their backyards, or a relatives home. Next week we will be working on including details and voice in our stories, so they don't sound like lists or reports. We are still in our Place Value Unit in Math. We learned how to compare and order larger numbers, and continued to practice expanded and standard form. The kids have also been playing games to review their facts. Please remind your children to practice facts at home on extra math and the other websites listed. In Science we have been enjoying watching our Wisconsin Fast Plants grow! The kids love measuring their plants and making predictions about how many centimeters they will grow. We can't wait until the flowers begin to bloom! Be sure to read our blog next week when the kids take over to write about our week in school. I will be choosing two different kids each week to help out! They are very excited! Have a wonderful weekend!

This week we really enjoyed planting our Wisconsin Fast Plants! The kids are excited that they are already starting to grow! We made our first observation and measured the sprouts yesterday. We have many fun lessons in store once they get a little bigger and begin to bloom! The kids have been working very hard in Reading Workshop. They began their station rotations this week and did an awesome job! Each of them got to practice our Reading, Writing, Listening and Working With Words stations. They worked hard and I saw some really great work at the end of each station. We continued to learn about the rest of the genres and are ready to make our Reader's Notebooks. It will be a great resource for the kids, and a place to log their books and keep their responses to literature organized. We began our Narrative Unit in Writing. We thought about a special person in our lives and then made a list of all the memories we had with that person. We then picked one memory from the list and wrote down all of our thoughts, trying to write at least one whole page. We shared our writing and picked a spot that we thought was really great. We call this the "wow spot". Every time we write we are going to try to have a "wow spot" to make our writing sound more interesting. In Math we have been working on place value up to the hundred thousands place. The kids were very excited to work with bigger numbers. They learned the different ways to write numbers...standard form, expanded form, word form and using place value blocks. They had to take numbers in the hundred thousands and practice using all of these ways to write and identify them. It was a challenge to work with such big numbers and we will be continuing to practice this next week. I hope everyone enjoys the weekend. The weather is suppose to be beautiful! I love fall and look forward to doing some fun fall activities!

We had another fabulous week in third grade! I am having so much fun getting to know each child and seeing their personalities shine through more and more! We have had a lot of laughs together! This week we began our Place Value unit in Math. We reviewed odd and even, ordinal numbers, practiced adding greater numbers and learned a few new games to practice place value and addition facts. If you have a deck of cards at home, ask your child to teach you how to play "Mind Reader" or "Addition War". We went to the Star Lab for the first time on Tuesday. The kids were so excited and absolutely loved it! We found the Big Dipper, Little Dipper, North Star and a few other fall constellations. We also began our Plant Growth and Development unit in Science. We observed a dry and wet lima bean seed, and learned to identify its parts. We are getting ready to plant our seeds next week! In Reading Workshop the kids were introduced to the different reading genres. We will be focusing on a different genre each day to get the kids familiar with each one. They will learn how to tally and complete reader's responses for each genre using their Reader's Notebooks. They also learned about each Literacy Station and are ready to start rotations on Monday. In Writing, we decorated our journals and began having discussions about the Do's and Don't's of Writing Workshop, and what third grade writer's should do. The kids wrote three writing goals that they would like to work on in the beginning of the year. Once they have achieved their goals, they will write new ones. Everyone did a great job working hard this week! We had many purple cards and stars! I hope you all have a great weekend and I hope to see everyone at the Fall Family Picnic on Sunday!

Our First Week!

Our first week of school was wonderful! We spent most of the week learning all of the rules and routines of our classroom. The kids were great and each day ran smoothly. We all had a lot of fun playing games to get to know each other. The kids really enjoyed making their "name clouds", learning math games, making a cartoon demonstrating our vocabulary word of the week and getting "paid" at the end of each day. I look forward to next week and a whole year of fun and learning! I am so lucky to have such a great group of kids to work with! I hope everyone has an enjoyable weekend!

Welcome to our class blog! We are going to have a fantastic year in third grade! Please check back weekly for class updates and information.