| From the Teacher's Desk | | Dear Parents, It makes us sad to think our time with your children is flying by. They are a great group of children who always enjoy whatever activities we have planned for the day. Their enthusiasm for learning inspires us to teach. You should be very proud of their accomplishments. They are the result of your good work as parents. Sincerely, Melanie Gekas Natasha Nikitina Jordan Chaffman |  |
| Extra! Extra! Extra! Read All About It!  | | In the next few weeks, we will be exploring the theme “Animal Habitats.” As we learn about places where animals live, we will discover some ways in which people and animals interact. We will continue to develop several reading strategies such as fact and opinion, compare and contrast, summarization, and making judgments. We will integrate the skills of syllabication, word endings, and identifying prefixes and suffixes. We will continue using dictionary skills to identify parts of speech and multiple meaning words. Our study will form a cross curricular connection with our social studies project: African animal research. The children will be able to integrate and apply their reading skills with using multimedia resources and taking notes. They will further apply these skills as we focus on our March/April nonfiction book report and writing a news article. | |
| Writer's Corner | | The young writers will be busy this month. Taking the opportunity to write more entries in their journals, we will continue to focus on using a strong beginning that draws the reader in, and an ending that sums up the entry’s main ideas. Writing a well organized paragraph that includes examples and vivid details that effectively communicate the writer’s thoughts, opinions, and feelings moves us closer to becoming strong and confident writers. Also, becoming speech writers for the biography book parade will bring their famous Americans to life, presenting their hard work to an audience. As we move into our study of Africa and animal habitats, the children will begin their research reports on a chosen African animal. The report will be clearly organized with main ideas that are supported with many factual details that show good research. Our pen pal exchange will continue, getting us ready for Ruth’s April trip to India. | |
| Math, Math, and More Math | | We are proud of the way the children have mastered the use of large numbers. They are excellent at reading and writing numbers that extend in the millions. Our work with decimals was truly challenging as we extended our understanding of place value to the thousandths. March brings a look at geometry. We will be learning about rays, segments, angles, polygons, and 3-dimensional shapes. Continued practice of basic multiplication and division facts will also take place each week. | |
| Where in the World Is...? | | In March we will travel to the awesome continent of Africa. We will define the meaning of contrast as it relates to this vast and diverse continent. Students will become immersed in studying different geographical regions using map skills and group activities. Enriching our study of Africa will be the students’ connections to art. We are eagerly anticipating a trip to the African Art Museum to further enhance the students’ observations of African cultural artifacts. Explorer Friday will gladly take us outside to our special “Explorer Woods” as the weather begins to change and get warmer. Listening to the chatter of birds, feeling the first warm breezes of spring, visiting our class tree, and looking for signs of new life will be our focus as we welcome March. We will continue to look at the qualities of an explorer and how they relate to the many explorers of the world. It will be soon time for each student to pick an explorer that they want to research. | |
| Science | | In Science,
the students study the functions of plant parts and plant needs. The students make observations, identify and describe plant parts. The students plan simple investigations based on
formulated questions, communicate and explain their results. They explain the role of each plant part and explain what plants need. The students describe, compare, and contrast changes in the life
cycle of plant and discuss the ways plants help the environment. | |
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| | Upcoming Events | | - March 2nd-Written form for the biography book report due
- March 3rd-1:30 Dismissal
- March 4th-Family Fun Night
- March 8th-Book float due for biography book report
- March 10th-Biography Book Parade at 1:30
- March 18th-Noon Dismissal for Spring Break
- March 21-25- Spring Break
- March 28th-Classes resume
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| Spanish | | This month third grade will be learning one new song and learning new Spanish greetings vocabulary. | |
| Art | | We have finished up March by doing a short unit on Matisse. The children enjoyed learning about Picasso's Blue and Rose Periods and most importantly how he incorporated African masks in to his concept of distorted heads and Cubism. I'm looking forward to a field trip with third grade in mid April to the African Art Musseum in preparation for starting our 3-d African masks made with box cardboard structures. | |
| Physical Education | | Third grade is on a roll!! They have been working hard on handball stations; improving their throwing, catching, and teamwork skills. They have been improving their Presidential Fitness scores throughout the various tests this month. They will be hitting the mats this month, working on different gymnastic movements. We will be using the balance beam, vault, and floor mats to work on a variety of skills. | |
| Music | | The students in Grade 3 are working on recorder playing techniques, especially the use of breath control to produce a pleasing sound on this basic, ancient, venerable, and pure, clear-sounding musical instrument. They are also learning how to clean and take care of their recorders. They have been listening to string quartets--#1 by Charles Ives, and Opus 59 #2 by Ludwig van Beethoven. They also continue to work on singing skills and repertoire. In honor of St. Patrick's Day, we will be enjoying participating in Ireland's delightful, sometimes whimsical, musical legacy to the world--songs, poetry, and children's "street chants".
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