Science and Math Tools lesson

As part of the state requirements, third graders must know

when to use certain tools in science and math.  What 

better way to learn than to do a little experiment with 

each one.  So that's exactly what we did.

They tried out a balance scale, goggles, thermometer,

microscope, and magnets.

Using a balance scale to weigh.

Finding out what part of your body goggles protect.

Testing the temperature of water with a thermometer.

Looking at things with a microscope.

December 5 - Ornament Day

Thanks to the parents who volunteered their time

to come to the classroom one day and help us out

with Christmas ornaments.  The kids made 4 ornaments

and one adorable reindeer pin that afternoon.

Thanks to Nicole Vaughn, Amanda Maples,

and Jill Grisham!  You ladies were a huge help.

The students rotated through stations and completed

each ornament. 

1.  beaded candy cane - these looked great on our class tree

2.  reindeer pin - made from puzzle pieces and a pin attached to back

3.  Christmas wishlist ornaments - super cute!

4.  glittered personalized ornament

5.  quilled wreath - also looked great on our class tree

Shoe Math

The students and I read a poem about

shoes one day for math.  We talked about

poetry, rhyming words, and adjectives before

we started our actual math lesson.

We then all took one shoe off and put them in the

middle of the floor.  Students then had to determine

the best way to sort these "stinky shoes".  

They came up with color, brand, type, and size.

We ended up with brand and then created a 

tally chart and bar graph for each.

Pretty neat and stinky!  LOL

Believe it or not - my shoe is in there too.

I had to really search for it because it's about

the same size as theirs!

Elapsed Time

The students have been using a T chart to solve

word problems with elapsed time.  It has proven to 

be very helpful and helps them organize their work.

Veteran's Day

We were honored to have Mr. Lee Aldridge speak to

us on Veteran's Day.  He did an excellent job and it

was extra special to speak to 2 of his grandchildren.

Caroline and Catherine Vaughn

Shapes

We've been studying 2D and 3D shapes.

We brought this lesson to life with marshmallows

and toothpicks.  The students were able to construct

a cube, rectangular prism (that one took a little creativity),

and a pyramid.  Students then had to count faces, edges,

and vertices.  What a fun lesson and wow! a turn of 

learning and engaged kiddos in room 105 @ WES.

Love days like this one!

MIA...missing in action

I've been "in action", but not in blogger land.  So sorry for no posts

about your wonderful kiddos and my amazing students.

We (hubs and I....and Alora too) have been frantically spending spare

moments at our new home cleaning and wrapping up loose ends.  We are

ready to move, but continually find more to do.

We also took a short, much needed vacation to DISNEYWORLD.

Mickey and Minnie missed us and we missed "Fantasyland."  It was

wonderful, but I am also glad to be back.  It was so sweet to see the kids'

smiling faces after being gone.  They are all just so sweet.

They wanted to know if we had fun.....of course.

But anyway.......let's get back to school.  The next few posts will be

playing "catch up" from before Thanksgiving.  Enjoy

Grids

Coordinate grid lesson....

We headed outside to practice coordinates on a life size version

 of a coordinate grid.  Students took turns choosing a pumpkin

and plotting them on our graph.  Once plotted a large E appeared.

EXCELLENT job kiddos.  We then had a quick mini lesson on

synonyms for the word excellent and using a thesaurus.

Afterwards, partner worked together to create a 

Mad Monster coordinate grid of their own.

COOL LESSON!

Adjectives

I totally saw this idea somewhere on the net, but have

no idea who or where it originated.  Kuddos to whomever

created it in its original form.

We popped popcorn and used our 5 senses to describe

that yummy, buttery goodness.  SOOOOO guess what -

the kids learned about adjectives in a fun way.

We of course made a cute art project to tag along.

Field Trip #2

We headed on a cool, crisp autumn morning to Montgomery

Bell State Park in Dickson.  The kiddos were excited to hear

a "bird" program about birds of prey and enjoy the warm sun.

Ranger Tim talked and discussed birds of prey, adaptations,

habitats, and more.  At one point, the students were asked to

create an imaginary bird and make special adaptations to fit

in a particular environment.   

Scott and Case were in the group that created the "Christmas bird."

They then had to present their bird to the group.

Good Job guys :)

Ranger Tim with the owl during his talk.

It was a beautiful bird.  We were lucky enough to

see it turn it's head and hoot.

We ended the day with a game called Duck Migration.

The kids were the ducks and the teachers were the hunters.

The kiddos had to run to hula hoops "habitats" and a

avoid the hunters.  If they didn't make it - DEAD DUCK!

Halloween!

Halloween - thankfully we cut down on the madness a few

years ago and the students no longer wear costumes!

We still try to make the day a "little" more entertaining than

other days.  We read Halloween stories (Monster Goose), did a

little Halloween math (Shapely Witch-covered patterns and 2d

shapes), and then of course the big Halloween party.

My parties ALWAYS have 3/4 stations.  I learned this great idea

from a PREK teacher in our building a few years back.

PRE-stations:  parties were loud, annoying, and soooo stressful

POST-stations:  parties are calm, educational, and a lot less stressful

I actually get to enjoy the kiddos enjoy the party.

Because of low numbers in 3rd grade this year (oh my...it's amazing),

I had 3 stations.  The stations were:

1.  EATING - simple.....they just eat and talk

2.  PUMPKIN ESTIMATING - estimate number of seeds in a pumpkin,

empty the guts, and group by 10s to count

3.  SPOOKY HAND - use a plastic glove, candy corn, and popped

popcorn (we discussed bones and adjectives)

What a smorgosboard we had on Halloween!

Oh yeah and an entire fruit tray that the kiddos devoured.

Thanks Room 105 parents.  YOU ROCK at parties!

FALL

A quick impromptu lesson one day in October.

We had been studying patterns and students created

a color pattern on the leaf, then we wrote a quick topic

sentence about fall.  It was followed with 5 details.

Anchor Charts

An example of anchor charts used in the classroom to 

help students "anchor" their learning.  Makes a great

reference tool and super quick mini review from time

to time.

My poor tree was bare.  Thankfully the kiddos made these

adorable owls in Art and now my tree is perfect!

Animal Reports

Again, my kiddos have uuuuumazed me!

I asked each student to choose one animal book

from the library.  They then followed the same 

sequence of events used in our penguin study. 

Step 1:  Read the book and harvest facts.

Step 2:  Write a topic sentence and 5 sentences about your animal.

Step 3:  Revise your writing with your teacher's help.

Step 4:  Rewrite (this time type) your report.

Step 5:  Draw an illustration.

I wasn't sure if they could handle the typing part of this

project, but they accomplished it with flying colors!

Tops and Bottoms retold by:  Janet Stevens

Love, love, love this story!  One of the first I bought for

my classroom during college.  There are so many great ideas

and lessons that work so well with this story.  We focused

most of the week on cause and effect.  Our final lesson

consisted of a quick SmartBoard mini lesson, quick partner

match up of cause/effect, and then wrapped up with a 

vegetable activity.  I ran out of time and ended up doing it 

whole group, but each veggie has a cause listed on it.  Students

helped me identify an effect to go with each.  

They did awesome!

Friday Morning Fun!

We love Friday mornings in our room.

That's the time we break out Alan Katz's crazy

and hysterically funny songs.  He's written several

books in which he takes familiar tunes and rewrites

the words that make you laugh!

My personal favorite is Stinky, Stinky Diaper Change.

(sung to the tune of Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star)

It goes a little like this:

Stinky, stinky diaper change.

Boy my brother smells so strange.

He made something in his pants.

I sure hope it won't attract ants.

Stinky, stinky diaper change

Boy my brother smells so strange!

SILLY, DILLY SONG.....

But guess what everyone this is a great teaching

tool.  I've used these songs to cover new vocabulary,

contractions, rhyming, rhythm, beat, stanzas, 

compound words, and many other language skills.

IT'S been a great reading fluency tool and the kids

don't even realize it.....that's even better.

Now, for anyone who knows me, knows I don't sing

well and can't carry a tune in a bucket.  However, Alora

and Alan (hubs) know that I love to sing loud in the car.

Thank goodness my kiddos don't care if I can sing or not.

We have a blast trying to make these silly songs turn out

right.  It's a HOOT!

Check out this book and more for some laughs!

  

Penguins....

Our journey with penguins began with a great non-fiction

story in our Reading Street Basal for 3rd grade, Penguin Chick.

Like any good 3rd grader, we first made a KWL chart of

our schema about penguins together.  Wow, we actually

knew quite a bit about this flightless bird, but still had plenty

of questions!

After reading our story and learning so much we embarked

upon our first, but not last "research" project this year.  

Mrs. Scholes took us to the computer lab where we were

assigned a particular breed of penguin.  After a quick lesson

on using google and how to search for "good information" we

were on our own.  We needed to find 8 facts about our penguin.

This was certainly not a one day project.  It was completed over

a 2 week period with lots of work.  Once we collected all of our

facts about penguins, it was time to get busy writing.  OHMYWORD

Mrs. Scholes made us write about these birds, and you won't believe

it, but they had to be in complete sentences with correct 

capitalization and punctuation!

The pictures below demonstrate our 4 step process:

Step 1:  Research about penguins and write them down.

Step 2:  Write a short paragraph with a topic sentence and

5 supporting details. (correct capitalization and punctuation)

Step 3:  Bring to Mrs. Scholes and she will correct any mistakes.

Step 4:  Rewrite the paragraph with changes and create an 

illustration of your particular penguin.

WHEW!  That was a lot of work Mrs. Scholes.

A note from Mrs. Scholes:

I was so very proud of the students' focus and attention

to this "BIG" project.  I hope you learned about patience

and how a project is one step at a time.  I was truly amazed

at your writing abilities and can't wait to do more with you

in the future!  GOOD JOB!

Owl's Hill Sanctuary Field Trip

A fun time was had by all today.

Ms. Helen was a great tour guide and talked to 

us a lot about sooooo many of our Science standards.

We discussed habitats, seeds, roots, plants, 

wildlife, predators, dwellings, food, natural resources,

and even more.  We also hike a good little hike.

Enjoy the pictures!

We even spotted 2 turtles along the path!

 Monkey Brains.....there's an official name, but

I wouldn't even begin to try to say it, much less spell it.

How many 3rd graders does it take to wrap

around a 400 year old oak tree?  13 plus the teacher.

Very large tree......

We even got a sneak peek at one of the

owls they are rehabilitating at Owl's Hill.

 The kids were great and very well behaved.

Also, the parents were a huge help too!  Thanks.

 We had to do a goofy pic!

Almost forgot, Hunter, our class mascot, made the

trip with us as well!  What fun!