Canada's National Ballet

Canada's National Ballet is coming to Beddington!!
Your student had a consent to participate notice in their backpack.  Please return it first day back to school.  The Ballet Company will be with us April 4 and 5 so the turn around time with this is awkward but this is an excellent opportunity for our students.

April calendars also went home today in backpacks.

Have a great holiday everyone😎
See you Tuesday April 3😎

Happy First Day of Spring

Social Studies homework tonight due back tomorrow.  Students are asking one question and making one connection to the article, "Boat Ride to a Better Life"  I'm looking for evidence of deep thinking. We read, 'The Three Questions' this morning.  The young boy is asking his friends for the answers to this three questions.  We learned that the answers to his questions weren't right there in front of him, that not all questions have answers and those are probably the best ones of all!!

Creating and solving problems that involve multiplication was our task this morning.  We pulled numbers from the problem, estimated, wrote the equation and then solved in more than one way.  Experience connecting with real-worl situations is important to help students through the process.  Students then had the opportunity to write their own problems and have a friend solve.
Multiplication test Thursday morning.

No school Friday - system wide Professional Development Day

March Madness

Did you know that basketball was invented by a teacher who had a bunch of rowdy boys he didn't know what to do with?  We do!!  We were busy today brainstorming what we already knew about basketball and then asking questions about basketball and creating a plan to find the answers to our questions about basketball.  We had some fun too watching a few videos that showed the skills some other children have with the basketball.

We are trying our hand at multiplication story problems this week.  In grade three we need to be able to create and solve problems that involve multiplication.  We are aiming to have our multiplication unit test Thursday morning so we can begin division after Spring break.  Please continue helping your child with multiplication facts to 5x5.

Mr. Weins sent home a notice to purchase recorders $6.00 please.

Spring Break March 23 - April 2 (First day back is the Tuesday)

Cancellations

The warm weather that we have had has melted the community rink and our skating lessons have had to be cancelled.  Thank you to everyone who volunteered to help tie skates.  This will free up your mornings to have coffee!

Parent Council has cancelled tonights dance due to weather.  No word if they will reschedule.  Again.

We are working hard at asking deep questions.  Questions that matter and make us think beyond the book.

Pillars of Care assembly Friday 8:15

Annotating

We continued working on asking deep thinking questions today surrounding the story If...
Ask your child what sentence stem they are working with and how their questions are coming along.

We have been trying our hand at annotating while we are reading.  Think of it as reading with a pencil.  We started by highlighting facts in a newspaper article about swimming to school in India.  Today we made the infinity symbol on the article, 'Boat Ride to a Better Life' when we had a connection and a ? mark when we didn't understand a word or had a question.  Your student is working on making their thinking visible and interacting with the text.  This works with pictures and text.

We have begun solving story problems using multiplication.  Some of us are creating chocolate boxes for packing while others will begin tomorrow.  This gives students experience connecting real world situations to multiplication.

Pillars of Care assembly Friday March 16 8:15 am all welcome

Springing forward is for the birds...

This business of springing forward is hard on the short people in this classroom!  We are all in need of a nap - some of us by recess time.  Consider making bedtime just 15 or 20 minutes earlier for the rest of the week as we all adjust to the time change.  Studies show that sleep deprived children work 2 to 3 years below their grade level.

We looked at how children in Peru go to school today.  On Lake Titicaca some children go by boat.  We observed things in the photo, wondered about the photo, made connections and tried to ask deep thinking questions.  We watched a short video about the picture and going to school by boat in Peru and tomorrow we will do some reading.  We are activating our brains to get ready for the thinking by using some of these strategies.  Some of us are able to annotate as we read also.

Scholastic book orders due tomorrow -

Consider putting extra socks and pants into the backpacks as our playground and compound are going to be underwater any day now.  Children and water ...

"I can ask appropriate questions"

Good readers ask questions before, during and after reading.  Some questions are quick surface questions and their answers can be found right there on the page other questions are deep thinking questions and the answer has to come from the reader and the world around them.  I want your student to be aware of their thinking and be confident readers.  I will be directing them towards asking meaningful deep questions.  We started by playing with some play-doh which generated a lot of questions.  We then read 'Sami in the Times of Trouble' and marked all of our questions with sticky notes.  With a partner to read with everyone used sticky notes on their own books. We were so amazed with all of our questions in our books!

Science tests are in backpacks.  Ask your student.

Skating

Our class will be going ice-skating on March 19, 20 and 21 as long as the weather and rink conditions remain.  Kidsport is providing all of the equipment for us.  Students who own their own skates and helmet are welcome to bring their own gear.  Please note: a bike helmet is NOT a skating helmet and is NOT safe on the ice.  We will be skating at the Beddington Heights Community rink, which is a short walk from the school.  There is no cost for this activity.  Our class will be skating from 8:15 - 9:00 am all three days.  If you can help out with getting skates on and off I would really appreciate your help.  If have a volunteer clearance form in the office and you are free all or some of those days drop me an e-mail.  You don't need to be able to skate but do feel free to join us!

Scholastic book orders due Wednesday March 14

This and that...

Jump Rope For Heart due in tomorrow.
Sound and Hearing Test tomorrow.  Don't forget to review the study notes that were sent home last week, all the answers are there.
We took some of the facts we learned about the Iditarod and dog sledding to write about Akiak this afternoon.  We embedded some opinions in our writing also.  We are working towards being able cowrite strong paragraphs with topic sentences and 4 - 5 supporting sentences.
Last week Mr. Hebert was offering a popcorn incentive to the classroom that had the fewest 'incidents' and we were the winning group.  Popcorn will be served tomorrow morning and we are very happy with ourselves!!

Our Band of Guitars, Drums, Kazzos and Can on a String

We saw some fantastic musical instruments today!!
Great care and attention to detail was evident.  We brought Mr. Weins up to see our work and he too was impressed -

Science test Friday - please use the notes that were sent home for review - all the answers to the test lie there.

Iditarod

I am super excited to see the musical instruments students have made at home come to school tomorrow.  I've heard some great things.  Animal hearing cards are also due tomorrow.

We were counting by 5's today - nickels, fingers, other items that come in groups of five.  Those that felt comfortable added the 5 times tables to their multiplication chart.  In grade 3 we are responsible for being familiar with strategies to determine products so explaining an array, equal groups, repeated addition, or a number line.

Sunday the 2018 Iditarod race began in Alaska.  We had a look at a couple of videos about the race and then read the book 'Akiak' sorting facts and opinions and asking topic appropriate questions.  Ask you student about the Iditarod and the question they have about the race.

Jump Rope For Heart due Friday March 9

Baby it's cold outside!

Good Canadian children need to be dressed for outside.  Many of us were caught today without our mitts and hats.  Boy were we sorry!

We played another round of Circles and Stars Bing this morning and then we started a journal piece about the game.  Students are writing about the game so they can teach someone at home to play the game.  Writing about math gives us insight into how well students understand the concept.

We are proud to say we wrote another class book today.  Ask your student.


Musical instruments and animal hearing cards are due Wednesday, March 7
Jump Rope for Heart fundraiser ends Friday, March 9

Animal Hearing Research

Animal hearing cards came home today to be finished.  They are due back at school Wednesday, March 7 with the musical instrument your student is making.  Two animals must be completed and they are: bat, owl, frog, elephant and dolphin.  I am looking for complete answers - that means full sentences with two or three important points.  Drawings should be colored.  We used the following steps to help ourselves:
BGRS science grade 3
Hearing and Sound
Animal trading card

Beddington Heights Olympics wrapped up today - ask your child how their team finished up.

We are becoming very knowledgable of our multiplication tables - ask us!