Category: News

Reading– The Bookworms and Word Sleuths reading groups start work on their Book Reports.  An outline of what will be expected in their Book Reports has been glued into their Reading Book.  An online copy is also available on this site under the category Assignments and Projects.  Book Reports will be due Friday 26 February.Writing– We start work on writing an Opinion Essay.  This week we will be identifying fact and opinion in an Opinion Essay and discussing features used for this type of writing.  A homework assignment linked to this Opinion Essay work has been given to the children and should be in their Agenda.  This assignment is due Friday, 12 February.  Please also check out this site www.eduplace.com/kids/hme for help with the assignment and other writing related projects.Math – We continue to work on improving accuracy and speed when recalling our multiplication basic facts.  We start to look at division this week, relating this to equal groups and sharing.Science – A variety of Science lessons and experiments will start to take place in class to help children prepare for the upcoming SAT tests.

Inquiry – Congratulations to all children on a job well done in presenting their Power Point presentations! The parents and other class mates enjoyed learning about different aspects of Cayman and seeing excellent computer skills in action.  Math/Numeracy – we start our focus on Multiplication and Division.  A focus will be made on quickly and accurately recalling basic times tables of 2, 5 and 10.  Children will also start to develop strategies to solve more difficult times tables.Literacy – In Reading, we focus on determining fact from fiction.  In writing, we work on improving our expressive writing and recounts when writing within a short time frame.  Each writing period will start with a 10 minute speed writing session based on a topic given by the teacher.Homework – It seems that many of the children have forgotten the homework expectations for Grade 3.  I have told the children that Show and Tell will now be banned until all children remember to complete their Homework.  Can I ask that you and your child take time to review the homework page on this Blog to help your child remember these homework expectations.  Thank you for your help in this area.

Literacy – Children will be completing their Literacy Assessment this week.  The booklets will be marked and then sent home so parents and children can go over the results together.  Can I ask that parents sign the cover of the booklet and have it returned to me by Friday, 22 January.Math– We complete our Measurement unit this week.  Revision work will take place in class and extra homework will be given in preperation for the Measurement test on Thursday, 21 January.Inquiry – Children should have completed their research about their chosen aspect of Cayman.  They will start putting this information into a Power Point presentation.  We aim to have all Power Points complete by Friday afternoon so that we can share them with the class and with any parents who wish to view them.  An email invitation will be send home when the Power Points have been completed.

I trust you all had a great Christmas holiday and are enjoying the start of the 2010 year!This week:

• Writing. Children will be writing a story based on the Folk Tale The Six Blind Men.
• Reading. We read and then design a picture book for The Elephant’s Child by Rudyard Kipling.  Other folktales will also be read and analysed during our scheduled Reading time.
• Math.  We continue our focus on Measurement with a particular focus on Area, Volume and Capacity.  Children will take a mid chapter review test on Friday.  This review will also cover previously looked at areas in Measurement such as length and perimeter.

Next Week

• Assessment (Literacy).  Children will complete the Harcourt School Publishers Storytown Grade 3 Benchmark Assessment for Mid Year.  These tests will be spread across the different literacy times during the week.  When all tests are completed, it will be marked by the teacher and then sent home with the child for discussion with parents.  The test booklet will then be signed and returned to class where it will be kept in the Child’s Portfolio.  These test results will be discussed in the next Parent/Teacher meeting or we can arrange an earlier time should this be desired by either parent or teacher.  Let me know if you have any questions about this assessment.

 We used Freeze Frames to help develop our miming skills.  Here are some of our “family portraits.”

Inquiry (Homework assignment) – Each child has been given a specific continent to learn more about.  The assignment requires children to use an atlas, plot points using co-ordinates and find out facts about that continent.  Each child has been given a booklet to complete.  This is due Friday, 11 December.Math – We extend our understanding of length to now explore how a perimeter of an object can be measured.Literacy – We begin to read and analyse a variety of Christmas themed stories.  We also finish writing our Folk Tale story based on The Three Wishes.Important Dates to remember:

• Tag Rugby Festival on Wednesday, December 9.
• Class Christmas Party Thursday, December 10 from 1:30 – 2:30pm.  We would appreciate it if each child brought one of their favorite Christmas foods to share.  An invitation is also extend to all parents of children in Grade 3.

Inquiry – This week we travel to France, learn about world geography (with the aid of a very large blow-up globe!) and create a timeline of important events in Cayman.Math (Measurement) – We will have another week focused on length to consolidate their understanding of inches, feet and yards and mm, cm and m.  Please check out Rainforest Math via the Mathletics website (www.mathletics.com) for some extra practice in this area.Literacy (Reading and Writing) – Children will be reading a variety of Folk Tales as a whole class and within their guided reading groups.  The particular types of Folk Tales we will be looking at are Legend, Tall Tale, Fable and Fairy Tales.  Children will be writing a Folk Tale based on the Three Wishes which is a combination of a Fairy Tale and a Fable.

Inquiry – We start our new Inquiry unit.  Our big overarching question is, What does it mean to be Caymanian?  As well as getting a better understanding and appreciation for Caymanian culture, we will also be “travelling” to other countries to learn about their culture.  Each child has been issued with a “passport” to record their journey’s.  Also for homework this week, children have been asked to look into their family history and identify customs/traditions that are important to their family. Mathematics – We start our Measurement unit this week.  Each week we will take a different area of measurement to explore e.g. length, weight, capactiy and time.  This week we focus on length using both feet and inches and cm and m.Writing – This week we finish writing our first Folk Tale based story using the tale of The Fox and the Stork as a model.  We will begin to analyse the tale of The Three Wishes.  A focus will be made on writing a sequence of events which includes a build up and conflict.  We will also look at how a story can tell a moral.Reading – This week’s comprehension focus is identifying fact from opinion.

HEALTHY KIDS EXPO! This Thursday 5:30 – 8pm at FBCS.  In class we have discussed and watched a movie from Brainpop to help us understand the food pyramid.  For homework this week, the children need to complete the worksheet entitled Steps to a Healthier You.Writing – We have started a new writing unit.  Children will be reading folktales from around the world and then writing their own folktales.  A Strong focus will be made on writing within a narrative (story) structure (beginning, build up with conflict and climax, ending with resolution) and describing the characters and the setting.  We aim to collate our best writing pieces into a Grade 3 Folk Tale book.Reading – Our whole class comprehension focus is comparing and contrasting.  We continue to work on developing fluency and reading with expression.Math – Continued focus on quickly and accurately recalling basic facts.  This week there will be a particular focus on subtracting larger numbers using standard written form, the traditional computation method.

• Reading – We are at final rehearsal stages for our poem “Be Like an Animal” by Mabel Watts.  We hope to have this filmed by the end of the week.  This will then be put on display during our school Expo.
• Writing – FBCS has started a whole school letter writing initiative.  Children will be writing letters to children in other classes as well as teachers and administrators in both the church and school offices.  Each class will have their own mailbox and “address”.  The Brownie girls will be our mail people.  In Grade 3, we have started going over the structure of a letter and the purpose behind letter writing.
• Spelling – Children are reviewing their words for Unit 1.  I will select 20 of these words to test the children on Friday during our weekly spelling test.  Our school Spelling Bee will also be held this Friday at 8:30am in the chapel.  The representatives from Grade 3 will be Nasim, Allan, James and Dinara.
• Math – We have started work on adding and subtracting 2 – 4 digit numbers.  The children are enjoying using the Responders as part of Accelerated Math and Mathletics to help them improve their learning in this area.