Mrs. Cranley's 3rd Grade : Our First Week of Third Grade

Greetings 3rd Grade Families!

Welcome to our classroom blog. Please tune in each Sunday for a recap of our week.

MEET OUR CLASS

It has been an absolute pleasure getting to know your children this week. They are a lovely group!

Our week started out with a story fit for the First Day of School. It was pleasing to learn that many of the students didn't feel they had first day jitters

Next, we completed a classmate scavenger hunt so we could learn how our classmates spent their time over the summer.

Classroom Library

We took time to visit our classroom library...

and choose our first book to read.

The students get to keep this book on their desk to read during silent reading.

Now that we each had a book to read it was time to make personalized bookmarks, using stickers and art supplies. To add a layer of art education to this activity, I demonstrated the design principle of repetition.

They then had to practice this technique somewhere on their bookmark.

I laminated the bookmarks so they'll last all year.

They turned out great!

Classmate Interviews

As part of our getting to know each other focus this week, the students were paired up in order to conduct classmate interviews.

The assignment had 4 parts.

1. Interview a Classmate

2. Write a description of your classmate.

3. Publish your description neatly on a "megaphone".

4. Present your classmate to the class.

The students took their interview job very seriously.

On Thursday and Friday we spent time presenting our classmate to the class. The presentations stimulated some great conversations as we acknowledged various things we have in common, and unique experiences that make each of us special.

We will finish our classmate presentations on Tuesday. Our megaphones will then become our first bulletin board display of the year.

MATH

Our first math lesson of the year revolved around getting to know each other as math learners.

The students were shown this Math Glyph Legend and asked to think about their preferences when it comes to learning math. They were then asked to create a self-portrait, so to speak, of themselves as a math learner. They used paper plates and other supplies to create their glyph.

They had 4 attributes on their glyph to consider: the hat, eyes, nose, and mouth--each symbolizing a different aspect of themselves as a math learner.

The next day, after everyone's glyphs were made, we began sorting them in various ways in order to analyze the information.

We had time to sort and record the results for each of our attributes, and we practiced organizing the information in a mathematical table.

On Friday we began the process of graphing our data.

On Tuesday, we will spend more time analyzing the data shown above before the students then practice creating a second bar graph on their own.

In addition to discussing what type of math learners we are, we also discussed what type of classroom community would best support us during our math learning. The students had some excellent ideas.

In addition to discussing what our math community should look like, we also spent time thinking about our new learning community as a whole. Students worked in pairs to respond to 6 questions.

This activity helped us begin a conversation about what our community of learners should look like. The students had more excellent ideas!

We took time to discuss each question and their responses, and then used these ideas to create our classroom agreements.

The students also learned all about the new school-wide expectations that are posted throughout the school this year.

The expectations for all areas of the school revolve around four values. Be Kind. Be Safe. Be Responsible. Build Community. We took a walking field trip around Llewellyn to learn more about how these values look and feel in various common areas: hallway, playground, cafeteria, and bathroom.

LITERACY

Our first lesson of the year revolved around genre. We took a moment to review various genres of literature before we played a fun matching game.

Guess that genre!

After reading a clue that is characteristic of a particular genre, the students took turns guessing which genre I was describing. We then placed that clue below the correct genre poster. They did a great job and had fun!

This week we will define the characteristics of each genre in more detail as we add this information to our interactive notebooks.

Please be sure your child comes to school with their 3 subject notebook on Tuesday. We will be using this important learning tool to organize our literacy skills each day.

ART

We ended our first week of school with a fun art lesson centered around techniques artists use to create visual interest in a work of art. Students had already practiced the technique of repetition, so I introduced them to a few more design principles: variation, off-the-page, and overlapping.

The students watched as I completed the design above, centered around the letters of my name, and using all 4 of the design principles mentioned. They seemed very interested in these simple techniques, that when used together, create a visually interesting design.

The students then began practicing these design principles as they created a design of their own centered around the letters of their name.