Week of January 30-February 3rd

• The students have published their non-fiction books, and they should be very proud of their hard work!  They were diligent at following the writing process to create books with various non-fiction text features.
• In math, we are moving on to multiplication and division.  If your child still does not know the x1, x2, x5, or x10 tables, then nightly math fact practice would be beneficial. 

Week of January 16-20

W.A.L.T.:

• identify the key text features in non-fiction books (table of contents, index, pictures, and captions)
• use non-fiction books to read for fun and for learning
• skim and scan for information about a main idea
• write a non-fiction 'book' by applying what we learned in October about expository paragraphs
• write captions for pictures/illustrations in our non-fiction book
• name some of the key geographic landforms in Singapore
• label a map of Southeast Asia
• recognize the difference between a developed and developing country
• use specific websites such as maps101 to find information about countries

REMINDERS:
No school on Monday, January 23rd and Tuesday, January 24th due to the Chinese New Year

WELCOME BACK!

Snail Photovisis

Photovisi Collages by: Mrs. Buxton's 3rd Grade Class on PhotoPeach

Students demonstrated their learning from our snail unit by making photovisis, a collage of words and photos.

'Juicy Words' Popplet by: Janna Lee

Here is one student's example of a popplet made during our Readers' Workshop lesson.  The students were reading poetry and finding juicy words that poets used to be very specific with their writing.

Week of November 28-Dec 2

W.A.L.T.:

• decide "what makes a poem?"
• respond appropriately and meaningfully to poems
• read poems with 'white space'
• notice 'juicy words' that a poet uses
• write different kinds of poems (white space poems, poems about everyday objects, and color poems)
• place value with decimals to the tenths and houndredths place
• take care of our land snails by making sure they have water, food, and keeping their cages clean
• observe their structures and behaviors

Week of November 21-23

This week is a short week due to the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday break.  I hope you enjoy the time with family and friends.

Week of November 14-18

W.A.L.T.:

• write paragraphs from a brainstorm 'tree' to build a mini-essay
• identify red herrings while listening to the story Mystery at the Club Sandwich
• recognize that mysteries teach readers valuable life lessons
• read, write, and order numbers through ten-thousands and explore place value to millions
• study crayfish behavior and adaptations

REMINDERS:
Field Trip to Hydroponics Farm on Friday.
Library is Friday.

Photo Peach

Click on the link (title of post) to go to Photo Peach, a tool that can be used to make slideshows with pictures.  Log in with username: mrsbuxton and password: g3 to watch the photo slideshows students created from pictures taken on our Science Center field trip.

Week of October 31-November 4

I hope everyone had a great holiday break!  This week began with a very fun day celebrating Halloween.  Thank you to all of the parent volunteers who helped make it a success.

Other highlights from the week are:

• learning about mysteries
  (students have enjoyed discovering new vocabulary associated with this genre and identifying the story elements of a mystery)
• checking out mystery books from the library to begin an at-home project (due Nov 21st)
  (project guidelines will go home in Friday Folders...I will also add them to the blog)
• exposing the students to a mini-essay through a Brain Pop video
  (students will apply what they have learned about paragraphs to begin a five paragraph essay)
• investigating if seeds can grow with just water and setting up mini-sprouters
• moving on to multiplication and division in math

REMINDER:
Monday is a public holiday so there is no school

Complete the jigsaw puzzle below and then guess the topic of our next reading unit.

Field Trip to the Science Center

Our field trip today was a huge success! Thank you to the parent chaperones who helped out.  The students thoroughly enjoyed every aspect of the center and IMAX theatre.