Ms. B. in Class

I hope you and your family had a wonderful winter break!  I enjoyed the time I was able to spend with my family and friends.  I missed your students, though, and I can’t wait to see them tomorrow.

Upcoming Fun Events

On Valentine’s Day, we do a heart healthy Valentine’s Day Party.  We have a buffet of heart healthy items.  We also do Minute to Win It Games with other classes on a rotation.  We’ll need some volunteers for this day.  If you volunteer you will run one of the stations with another parent.

We will have a Lake Mead Field Trip in March.  I’m confirming days with our grade level and forms will come home soon.

Last year I took students to see a movie right before the holidays.  We saw Spider-Man into the Spider-Verse.  I was worried that there wouldn’t be that movie this year. I was tempted to caravan to Frozen 2, which I know the kids would have loved, but I felt that may have been a family thing and we could possibly get spoilers.  But, I found the perfect movie for us.  It is called Onward!  It is due out in March.  Last year I picked two dates and we went to the Town Square Theaters.  As tickets become available, I’ll start planning which days we will attend.  It will be on a Saturday.  You’re welcome to stay and watch the movie with your student or pick them up after it is over.

Curriculum

This week, we will review some of the things covered in the last month of 2019. We will also work on classroom community and behavior expectations. We will revisit our chrome book classroom policy as well our student created classroom rules and expectations.  We will also start working on the more complex reading standards.  Students will work on text features, and we will build those projects for which I requested magazines.  Thanks so much for sending them in!  In math, we will wrap up addition and subtraction before we start moving into fractions.

Our homework will look a little different this week.  I have changed up our reading homework.  I will provide students a typed copy of our planner and review what they should do each night.  I’ve also provided an example of what is expected in the homework packet.  Math homework contains standards we’ve previously covered as well as what we are working on currently.   2020-01-06 Homework

Students will have fluency each night. They should read the passage aloud for 1 minute. Review unknown words and record correct words per minute and errors on the bottom of the page. They should do this each night for one minute. They see their growth each night and over the course of the week.

Report cards will come home on Friday. If you have any questions, please feel free to reach out.

Dates to Remember

• 1/17 Be Kind Assemblies and 100th Day of School
• 1/20 No School – Martin Luther King Day
• 1/21-1/24 Peace Week
• 1/24 Muffins with Moms
• 1/31 Free Dress Day – Football Day

I can’t thank each of you enough for your support and for allowing me to spend time with your students.  I remind them a couple of times a year that we only get 180 days together, and that I want them to be the best days ever.  Thank you for your wonderful and thoughtful gifts.  Thanks for giving me a caring group of kids who have made an incredible community in room 2016.  I am thankful for you and for your families.  You make all that I do easier.  It is so much easier when we do it all together.  I will see you on the flip side.  Enjoy your holiday season.  ❤

In closing, Baby Yoda is life.

Thank you so much for sending in frosting so quickly! I am sending home a packet today for winter break. It contains math fact practice and reading comprehension and fluency practice. Students who complete the entire packet will get a free recess and a surprise. This helps prevent that slide that can happen during break. Thanks for your support!

This is a reminder that we will have our holiday cookie exchange on Friday and you should send your student with 24 cookies on Friday for the exchange.  If anyone would like to send in additional containers of frosting, we could use a few more.  Thanks!

This week will be a great one!

This week students will wrap up the reading standard in which they work on distinguishing their own point of view from that of the narrator or those of the characters.  In writing, we will finish up our performance task in which we write about going on an African Safari.  In math, we will close out a unit on 3 digit addition and subtraction.  We will also close out a Social Studies unit on how Olympic athletes have overcome social justice issues in order to compete.

Each day this week is a themed dress day.  If students do not choose to wear the themed dress, they must dress in standard student attire.

On Tuesday all students who have completed 24 days of homework and have had their parents sign their Go Folders for each day  (since our last homework party) will enjoy lunch with me.  These students names are on the board.  Thanks to all the parents who chipped in as well, with pickup and with gift cards!  We will enjoy a Canes luncheon and have a dance party for lunch.

On Friday, we will have our cookie exchange.  Please remember to send in 24 cookies from the recipe you and your student picked out and gave to me.  We will also decorate cookies on that day.

Friday is also our last day of this semester’s report cards.  If students have missing assignments, they will have a time each day to complete them.  Also, I’ll be in my classroom at least 3 days this week at lunch and students are always welcome to come up and complete unfinished work.

I’m likely forgetting something, and if so, I’ll send another email. Thanks for making 2019 so amazing!  You have raised such great kids, and I’m incredibly fortunate that you’ve trusted me with their education.  I am ever thankful!

2019-12-16 Homework

Thank you for all of the questions about those things that I like as we turn the corner toward the holiday season.  I’ve had quite a few asks, so I figured a post would be the best way to handle it.  Thank you for your generosity, and again, this is as a result of requests so please don’t feel obligated.

• Favorite Food:  Kneaders
• Shopping:  Amazon
• Scents:  Fresh Linen
• Coffee/Tea:  Starbucks
• Beverage:  Diet Coke
• Adult Beverage:  Red Wine Blends
• Music:  Apple Store
• Author:  Greg Rucka, Neil Gaiman, or Kate Leth
• I am also a huge gamer, board games or video, and love strategy games the most.  Any item from Overwatch, OuterWorlds, FallOut, Hearthstone, or Warcraft would put a smile on my face.  I love all the merch from most board games.  I’ve yet to meet a strategy table top or card game I don’t enjoy.

As you are aware, we are working through a lot of content and experiencing many things in these last few weeks.

MAPs Scores

Your student’s MAPs scores for the fall and the winter sessions are all in their GO Folders after the ST Math progress page.  There is a soccer ball for each subject.  We recorded our Fall scores for all subjects and our Winter scores for reading.  Students will update these as they finish each test.

Text Features (Next Year)

We will be creating text features posters and will need student appropriate magazines and/or articles to cut out and paste onto table top blogs. We will do this at the beginning of the new year, but I am happy to start collecting them now if you would like to send them in.

Themed Days Reminders

 

Read-a-thon

Don’t forget that we are working on our PTA’s Read-a-thon!  This is a great opportunity to promote nightly reading.

Thank you to everyone who has come to read to us!  We’ve enjoyed all of your stories.  On 12/17, we will have a Be Kind Assembly to recognize those students who are always thinking of others.

We have a lot on tap in the coming weeks.  I’ll provide as much information as I can here, but you may also get multiple updates from me during the week.

I am planning a homework party for the kids who have completed their superhero punch cards next week.  I have two or three kids on the cusp of getting their first card punched, so I’ve held off a little bit.  The good news is, I have 17 kids with completely punched cards.  I usually do a Canes luncheon in the classroom in celebration of their hard work.  If you would like to grab a Canes gift card to help out with the cost, I’d be super appreciative.  The great news is that kids are doing their homework most nights, but it can get expensive when feeding a lot of little mouths.

Read-a-thon information went home this week. This is a great opportunity to encourage students to read and a great fundraiser for our PTA.

Here is our class account information:

We had our first guest reader this week.  I wanted to remind you as well that we will have guest readers throughout the holiday season and each reader may bring a themed craft from their home.  Kids have the opportunity to see many different kinds of celebrations through this activity and get to know their friends a little bit better.

Our homework for next week is here:  2019-12-09

Don’t forget we MAPs test next week on Monday, Thursday, and Friday!

 

Hi parents, we’ve agreed to complete our MAPs testing next week.  Students will test Monday, Thursday and Friday.  Please make sure they get a lot of rest and are ready to go!  I know they’ll show great progress because they’ve been working so hard!

I hope you and your students had a wonderful week of Thanksgiving togetherness.  I enjoyed the time I spent with my family and the change in our weather.  As you know, we only have three weeks until the end of the school year.  This time will pass quickly and I will do my best to remind you of all that we have transpiring and we round the corner into our winter break.

Curriculum

This week students will work to distinguish their own point of view from that of the narrator or those of the characters. In writing, we will finalize our first performance task.  In math, we will close out our unit on area and begin a unit on rounding, addition, and subtraction.  As we leave the bedrock of our 3rd grade math structure, please encourage your students to practice their math facts.  I will do the same!  We will use all of it again soon, as we move into fractions in the near future.  In science, we will continue to focus on life structures.

Upcoming Events

We will be celebrating the holidays in our classroom and the focus of that celebration is kindness. To make sure to include all families and cultures, please read and respond to this form in last week’s post.  I’d love to have you come into class and read your favorite holiday book if you would like to join us.

You may have noticed that I sent home a flyer about bringing in a cookie recipe last week. Please send a cookie recipe in with your student as soon as possible (they are due December 2), so that we can start this project. Thank you! Original post:  Winter Things!

Included in that post is information about our cookie decorating event.  When we exchange cookies, we will also decorate some sugar cookies. I’ve created a sign up genius for the supplies for this activity.

https://www.signupgenius.com/go/5080448ACAB2AA0FB6-seasonal

Themed Days

Homework for the week:  2019-12-04