Homework

Tonight's homework:

- Read for 20 minutes (or more!) with a good book
- Reading packet (due Friday)
- Math:  Geometry perimeter activity (due Friday)
- Science:  Moon calendar (due April 30th)
- Return signed report card envelopes

Current units:

Language Arts:  In addition to our normal diet of independent reading and book group work, we are reviewing long and short vowels this week.  Students have been searching for words that contain, for example, the long /a/ sound ("apple").  We have started lists in our word study journals and will be adding to them all week.

Writing:  We are developing ideas for personal narratives (true stories told by the author, from the author's life).

Science:  We are studying soil!  Today we learned about the 4 different ingredients of soil (humus, silt, sand and clay).  Our plastic bottles did a great job of separating the ingredients into layers so that we could see real life examples.  We also learned about weathering and erosion.  Soon we will be studying the effects of different soil types on the growth of a kidney bean!

Math:  We are learning geometry!  Yesterday, students used toothpicks to show different geometric concepts like parallel lines, intersections, line segments and more!  Today we used mini-marshmallows and toothpicks to build 3-dimensional shapes.  We learned about and counted the vertices (corners), edges, and faces (sides) for the pyramid and cube.

Parents, SOL tests are coming up soon (mid-May).  Please be on the look-out for information about how you can help your child study for these end of year tests!  There are also helpful study links on our 3rd grade portaportal site (link).  Thanks for all that you do!

Best,

Mr. B