Weekly Learning Targets and Important Information

Week of 9/25
IMPORTANT INFORMATION:
BUS SCHEDULE
Bus 231- running
Bus 233- running
Bus 235- off

SPECIALS
Art 

ROOM PARENTS 
Please see the letter (attached to my weekly email) from our amazing room parents. They are collecting a $40 donation from each family to support our classroom parties and activities. 

WOLF TIME 
We have Wolf Time this Thursday. Please make sure your child brings/wears their tennis shoes.

AGENDAS 
Please make sure your child is getting their agenda signed each night. It lets me know that they have completed their homework and that you have seen any important information.

CONFERENCES
Conferences will be held the week before Fall Break. A conference Sign Up Genius will be sent to you within the next couple of days.

PTO
The latest PTO minutes are attached to my weekly email.

LEARNING TARGETS:
READING
This week in reading, we will be continuing our study of argumentative text and author's claims. Within our texts, we will be working on asking higher level questions to think beyond what is stated. The students will also be using relevant details to identify the central idea of what they are reading. Towards the end of the week, the students will be learning how to construct written responses to text. We will be using the RACES strategy (Restate the question. Answer the question. Cite text evidence. Explain the evidence. Summarize your information.) 

WRITING
The students are finishing up their favorite birthday 5-paragraph pieces. This week, they will be revising their first drafts for word choice, transitions, and details. The students will then edit and publish these pieces by the end of the week. Throughout the week, we will also be studying compound sentences.

MATH
We are finishing up topic 3 in enVision over patterns and properties of multiplication. We will take our assessment on Wednesday, and it will be sent home on Thursday for you to sign and your child to return to school. The students will also be taking the topic 4 pretest, which will help me place them in math groups for our upcoming topic 4. In Topic 4, the students will be using the inverse relationship of multiplication and division to generate fact families and learn division facts.

SOCIAL STUDIES
This week in social studies, the students will be continuing their study of the United States and its regions. They will be researching a region and learning about what makes that region unique. The students and I will also be studying agriculture and industry.


Week of 9/18
IMPORTANT INFORMATION:
BUS SCHEDULE:
Bus 231- running
Bus 233- running
Bus 235- running

SPECIALS:
P.E.
PTO 
Please see the flyer in my email about our upcoming Timberwolf Trot. All students who register will get to participate in CrAzY Hairy Day on Thursday, September 21st!

LEARNING TARGETS:
READING

This week, our focus will be on reading and understanding a variety of nonfiction texts. We will be studying nonfiction text structures and learning how they can help us better understand what we are reading. The students and I will also be identifying important details in texts and using those details to determine the central, or main, idea. We will also be comparing two different texts on the same subject and using information from both pieces to enhance our comprehension of a specific topic.


WRITING

In writing, the students will be working on their first draft about their favorite birthday. Our main learning targets this week will be centered around making our writing more interesting to the reader. We will be working on varying sentence structures and  incorporating stronger adjectives and verbs.


MATH

We are finishing up our current topic on multiplication patterns and properties. The students have done such a terrific job on using and understanding the distributive property to solve basic multiplication problems. We will be reviewing this topic towards the end of the week and will be taking our assessment at the beginning of next week.


SOCIAL STUDIES

This week in social studies, we will be shifting our attention to the United States and the regions within. The students will be researching a specific U.S. region and creating a banner to share their region's geography, weather, agriculture, and industry.


Week of 9/4
IMPORTANT INFORMATION:
BUS SCHEDULE:
Bus 231- off
Bus 233- running
Bus 235- running

SPECIALS:
Art
BEGINNING OF THE YEAR ASSESSMENTS:
In this week's Thursday folder, you will be receiving information regarding your child's beginning of the year assessments in reading and writing. This includes their iReady scores, guided reading level, oral fluency rate, and their 3rd grade math readiness assessment results. Please be sure to look over this information and let me know if you have any questions.

LEARNING TARGETS:
READING
This week in reading, we are continuing our study of realistic fiction. Our main focus will be on summarizing stories, character development, and character perspective. We will also be working on identifying context clues in stories and using them to help determine the meaning of unknown words. In phonics, we will be studying closed syllables (syllables that end in a consonant and have a short vowel sound). 

WRITING
We will be finishing our personal narratives on our favorite summer memory this week. We have taken our time with this piece, as it is important for students to understand the planning and process of writing before moving on to larger pieces. This week, we will be revising, editing, and writing our final copy. We will be working on adding adjectives to make our sentences more interesting, using a variety of sentence structures, and identifying words that require capitalization. The students and I will also be reviewing the personal narrative writing rubric so they are aware of expectations and can set writing goals. These graded pieces will be sent home at the beginning of next week. 

MATH
In math, we will be using number relationships and patterns to help us with our basic multiplication math facts. The students will be explaining their thinking with words and picture representations. We will be finishing this topic at the end of the week and reviewing on Monday of next week. Our topic assessment will be next Tuesday. 

SOCIAL STUDIES
This week in social studies, we will be studying how physical features affect communities. We will be discussing landforms, climate, natural resources, and natural hazards. The students will be "traveling" to other countries through an online linktivity, which includes using Google Earth. 


Week of 8/28
IMPORTANT INFORMATION:
BUS SCHEDULE:
Bus 231- running
Bus 233- running
Bus 235- running

SPECIALS:
P.E.

LEARNING TARGETS:
READING
This week's text set will focus on how traditions can teach us about different cultures. We will be reading a variety of realistic fiction and focus on story elements, character perspective, character development, and visualizing. We will be using text evidence to support our thinking. Our class will also be starting small reading groups this week. These reading groups are flexible and skill focussed. Our Fundations phonics focus this week is on digraphs and blends.

WRITING
All students are working on writing a personal narrative about their favorite summer memory. This week our focus will be on using a flow map to plan our writing and using quality supporting details to make our readers feel how we felt. We will also be studying different sentence structures (simple, compound subject, and compound predicate) to make our writing have a good flow. Our spelling focus is on long vowels.

MATH
We will be taking our first enVision math assessment on Tuesday over understanding multiplication and division of whole numbers. The students will be bringing home their graded assessment on Wednesday for you to see, sign, and for your child to return. Our new math topic begins on Wednesday, which covers using and understanding patterns of basic multiplication facts. As with every topic, the students will be taking a pretest over this new topic and be placed in a small math group.

SOCIAL STUDIES
This week, we will be learning about different communities and cultures around the world. We will be mapping their location and discussing their human, physical, and cultural characteristics. Our class will also be learning about how these characteristics affect communities. 


Week of 8/21
IMPORTANT INFORMATION:
BUS SCHEDULE:
Bus 231- running
Bus 233- running
Bus 235- off

SPECIALS:
Music

LEARNING TARGETS:
READING
This week in reading, we will be looking at narrative nonfiction. Our big focus will be on mapping story events in chronological order (using a flow map) and using those events to summarize a variety of texts. We will also be studying theme, main idea and supporting details, and asking and answering questions.

WRITING
In writing, the students will be practicing how the writing process looks in our classroom with their first piece about a favorite summer memory. We will be reviewing single paragraphs and move into multiple paragraphs most likely by the end of next week. There will be a lot of modeling this week, with our mini lessons on paragraph organization and word choice. Our grammar focus will be on identifying and writing a variety of sentence structures.

MATH
This week in math, the students will be learning and practicing a variety of ways to solve unknown multiplication problems. We will be starting groups this week based on this unit's pretest which the students took last week. The main emphasis in the first semester of third grade is multiplication and division. It would be great if your child could begin memorizing their basic multiplication facts at home through games, flashcards, online games, etc. I will be sending out a couple of links at the end of the week for optional practice at home. 

SOCIAL STUDIES
We will be starting with our study of communities this week. We will be looking at what makes a successful community and how other communities around the world are similar and different to ours. The students will also be learning and reviewing map skills.  



Week of 8/8
IMPORTANT INFORMATION:
BUS SCHEDULE:
Bus 231- running
Bus 233- off
Bus 235- running

SPECIALS:
P.E.

LEARNING TARGETS:
Our big target this week is to build our classroom community! We will read and discuss several back-to-school picture books and work on getting to know one another. The students will share about themselves and together they will participate in several team building and collaborative learning activities. We will also work on classroom routines and expectations. Additionally, our class will review a few thinking maps (circle map, bubble map, and double bubble map) used at TTE, write "I Am" poems, and review place value through a variety of activities and games. This is going to be a terrific year!