Students then looked at their book log from school or their book log from home, and chose a fiction book. Then, students had to illustrate the problem and the solution and write about each. They turned out wonderful! Some students are still working on them, but here are a few pictures of them working and a few of the finished products.
Using the book that we finished for read aloud, Fantastic Mr. Fox, we discussed that almost all fiction has a problem and a solution. We talked with our tables what we thought the problem was in our book and then what the solution was.
Students then looked at their book log from school or their book log from home, and chose a fiction book. Then, students had to illustrate the problem and the solution and write about each. They turned out wonderful! Some students are still working on them, but here are a few pictures of them working and a few of the finished products.
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We have been working on the following learning targets:
The other day the students watched as I decided what the heart of my story was- what was the most important part of my story or what do I want my readers to take away from my story. After I determined what that was, they watched as I zoomed in with even more detail so that my readers could paint a picture in their head of the event that I was writing about. Then, students worked with a partner to help each other add detail and description to the heart of their stories. Our discovery drafts have been combed through for proper use of quotation marks after we learned about those, and now we taped a piece of paper into them to add more details. They are stating to look like wonderful rough drafts that prove just how hard we are working. We have some great active listeners in our classroom. I just love to walk around and hear their great discussions. We are still working on not just saying, "your story is good," but actually being a helpful partner and helping people have the best story they can have. Way to go writers!
At the end of last year, I gave my students a survey like I do every year to find out what they liked and disliked about our year together. One statement that kept coming up was their love of Literacy Work Stations. They said this year's third graders MUST do them, so I listened. Even though it is a lot of work to get them up and running, once the students get the hang of it, it is a wonderful experience. They are so engaged in their learning and beg for Work stations. During this time there is a low mumbling of talking and reading. I love it! One way I keep them asking for more is to keep them short (about 15 minutes per station and we only do 2) and I also don't do them every day. We do them only two to three times a week. We started our Literacy Work Stations today and the students did wonderfully! They were on-task, cooperative, and used their level one voices. In a couple weeks, this Literacy Work Station time will allow me to meet with a small group of students and read with them at books that are at their levels. Right now, I meet one-on-one with students during our Reading Workshop time, but it will also be nice to hear more readers a day and be able to give them some more strategies for the level they are at. During Literacy Work Stations time, students travel with one other student to different stations in the room. Each station has a choice of two or three activities. Below are some pictures that I will use to introduce you to the different stations. First, the picture above is the Non-Fiction Work Station. At this station, students read non-fiction (data shows that students lack exposure to non-fiction. There are many kid magazines at this station that the students love. This is the Interactive Board Station where students work in pairs to edit paragraphs. These are paragraphs that we have already gone over and corrected. They are suppose to see if they can put their brains together to find all the mistakes. The answers are posted face down for them to do a self-check. Later we will have interactive board literacy games up there. This is the Creation Station where students get to exercise their creativity by drawing, tracing, coloring, gluing, cutting, and creating. The creation or craft normally is tied to a season, holiday or book we are reading. This is the Poetry Work Station where students can write a Haiku, a rhyming poem, or a free verse poem. They can also read the poems that go in our poem binder every week. Here the girls are using a cookie sheet with magnetic poetry words on it to create a poem. They then can write it in their notebooks. Brooke's partner was gone today, but Brook is at the Pocket Chart Work Station that is located out in our hallway. Here, students can sequence stories written on sentence strips or they can find all the words they can using specific letters as they try to discover the "mystery word." The mystery word is the word that uses all the given letters. During Literacy Work Stations, we open the closet doors and we have the Buddy Reading Work Station! I know, kind of crazy, but we have to use every part of our room to spread out all 29 of us! Here students can get cozy and take turns reading aloud with their partner. Soon, they can also choose to do some fluency activities. This is the Listening Work Station. At this station students become a more fluent reader by following along while they listen to a story. There are choices of what story they want to listen to. In the Classroom Library Work Station, students can read any book that is in our classroom library. This is very different from the reader's workshop time because they can rad any book, even if it isn't at their "Just-right" level. They can also talk during this time, unlike reading workshop. They can look at I Spy books, read non-leveled Halloween books, buddy read, and suggest books to friends. This is the Letter Writing Work Station where students can write letters to friends, family, teachers, authors, characters, and pets. They can also read books that are made up entirely of characters writing letters to one another. Soon, students will be asked to bring in addresses so that they can send post cards to family and friends. This is the Puzzle and Games Work Station where students get to play word games and do word puzzles. Currently there are three choices in there of things to play. We also have the Handwriting Work Station where students will work through their cursive books and practice letters they already know on magnadoodles or laminated paper. The Word Study Station is one where they will practice their spelling words by playing spelling games, speed sorting, or completely words searches of their spelling words. And the Writing Station is a station where students can write anything in their notebooks, from plays, to chapter books, to comics, to letters.
Some questions you may want to ask your child-
On a beautiful, sunny fall morning, we walked to the Nuveen Center for a science lesson, to view original artwork, to listen to story time, and to paint a treasure map that showed the flow of rivers and lakes. Then, we headed to the shores of White lake for some hands-on scientific field work that relates to the water theme. We had a perfect day for this At the Nuveen Center, Erin read us a hilarious story called A Pirates Quest for his Family Heirloom Peg Leg. As she read it, we walked around the room following the story by looking at the original artwork. If you are around the Nuveen Center, I highly recommend going there. You can read the story posted on the wall as you look at the artwork. The story had me laughing! Then Erin discussed with the students the concept of water shed (which ties into the peg leg in the story). Students then created an awesome treasure map using water color pencils, and brushes with water. I have never seen these water color pencils. They were so cool. Students colored with them, but they didn't have to fill in all the white space. Then they brushed plain water on it and the color blurred together. Students tore the edges, and crumpled up the map to make it even more old looking. It was a very neat experience. It is difficult to see in the above picture, but that is a model of water shed. Two students used squirt bottles to "rain" on the model of land and then the students could watch how the water begins to flow and collects in the lakes. There was even a model of how a storm drain works. We discussed what would happen, then, if a child threw a wrapper on the ground. Where would it end up? Then, it was back to the tables to finish up our treasure maps. Now we are on our way to White Lake for a science lesson. Students became scientists as they used their observation skills to look at plants, surface water, animals, and human creations. Mrs. Woller's class saw two bald eagles. We were not as lucky, but we did see a lot of wild life. Alyssa, a natural resource educator, talked to the kids about animal habitats and the effects of humans on those habitats. She also reinforced how we are connected by water to many places and people. Thank you Erin, Alyssa, and the Nuveen Center! Thank you notes from the students are coming to you soon!
After a long morning taking both parts of the MEAP math, we turned on the music, got the paint out, got some Q-tips, ans started working on these Autumn Trees. They are now hanging down the main hallway. It took some patience as the students had to fill in their white circle one Q-tip dot at a time, but they turned out beautiful! Because our class earned 10 Wildcat hero tickets, our class gets popcorn from Mr. Henderson! As we walk through the halls, sit in special, line up at recess, eat our lunches in the cafeteria, and use level 1 voices in our classrooms, there are adults watching for students acting like Wild Cat Heroes and for whole classrooms acting like wildcat heroes. In a school our size, it is so important to walk through the halls quietly and orderly because there are always classes in the middle of learning who do not need to be distracted and there are always classes walking in the halls so we need flowing traffic of students! Way to go, Kids! Way to be heroes! To help our popcorn celebration be more of a celebration, we are watching the movie Saltwater Moose. We actually started it on the last popcorn Friday, but we need to finish it. Students are so anxious to watch the rest of it. . . and they earned it! While we are watching it, we are focusing on the Lifeskills that the characters are using. Lifeskills are skills that people need to have in order to be a successful, contributing part or our society. Ask your child which Lifeskills the characters used and some evidence of how they used them. Here is a list of the Lifeskills:
Thanks to all the parents, aunts, and grandparents who came to listen to our Haiku poems and enjoyed donuts and cider with us.. It was exciting to see the kids so excited. It's amazing what a big screen, microphone, and an audience does to a third grader. I think many of the students felt proud for being brave and felt proud of their writing and hitting their learning targets.
This was a great week to take a break from writing our personal narratives and enjoy the autumn weather around us, but now we must continue on with our personal narratives next week. Your child's personal narrative will be shared with you at the student-led conferences in November. It gives you something to look forward to! Here are just a few examples of the Haiku poems, which are now hanging in the main office. After a whole morning of taking the MEAP test, I thought the kids could use a little art project that allowed them to talk, walk around, and have some fun! We reviewed what it means to be an O.W.L. when we read. We need to Observe, Wonder, and Link whenever we read anything. We can't just read, we need to think while we are reading. We read a fabulous story, Owl Moon, and then we set to work. Students had many choices of what kind of owl they wanted to draw. They could use black paper or white paper, and water color paint, chalk, marker, crayon, or colored pencils. They came up with some awesome owls! I love each and every one of them. They are all so different! In writing, we are taking a break from our personal narratives as we take advantage of the beautiful fall days we have been having. After teaching students what a Haiku poem is, I took both classes out for a walk in preparation for writing their own autumn poems. We focused on our five senses as we strolled around the school and thought about what fall means to us. We then headed back in to the classroom and started counting syllables! In many of the classroom pictures, you will notice that students are counting on their fingers. That is because Haiku poetry has only 5 syllables in the first and third lines and 7 in the second line. Effective word choice is a must in these poems! Please, come and join us on Friday to hear your child read their autumn poem in front of the class. They are only three lines, so it shouldn't take long to share all our poems! After we are done reading the poems, they will be hanging in the main office, so if you can't make it Friday, try to stop in and read some of them. |
Mrs. Ellis's Class
Learning & laughing our way through third grade. Archives
June 2020
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