Our Classroom News
Mrs. Brown and Mrs. Rabe
Week of November 2-6, 2015
Important Notes and Dates:
Agenda/Planners and Homework Folders: Please look over your child’s planner and Homework
Folder with him/her each day and sign the planner. (Thanks if you are already doing this.) We
have explained to the students that they should be showing you their work and emptying out
their folders each day and bringing back only homework and papers that need to be returned
to school. Many students are already very organized with this routine! We appreciate your
help!
October 26-November 6th - Scholastic Book Fair
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Our classes get to go on Tuesday during our library time.
The book fair will be open during conferences as well.
November 5 and 6th Parent-Teacher Conferences
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We are looking forward to meeting with you.
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Conferences have been scheduled. If you forgot to return your form to request a
conference, please contact Mrs. Rabe or Mrs. Brown by email to set up a time.
November 2-5: Dads and Donuts
November 6: NO SCHOOL for students (Parent-Teacher Conferences)
HERE’S A LOOK AT WHAT WE ARE LEARNING:
Homework for Mrs. Brown:
Monday:
Re-read Chapter 4, Sarah, Plain and Tall and finish character trait
map; Spelling assessment will be on Tuesday, students will use words
in their agenda from last week.
Tuesday:
Finish answering comprehension questions for Chapter 4, Sarah, Plain
and Tall
Wednesday:
Re-read Chapter 5, finish comprehension questions and complete
illustration.
Thursday:
Re-read Chapter 6, finish vocabulary and comprehension questions.
READING:
Story: This week we will be reading Sarah, Plain and Tall. As homework this week your
child will be expected to reread the chapter we are working on in class at home. There will
be a reading log that all parents must sign in order for your child to receive homework credit.
The students will be learning important vocabulary, reading comprehension skills, as well as
writing in a journal. The journal writing will be from the perspective of Caleb or Anna. The
students will pretend that they are Caleb or Anna and write in a diary daily. It is possible
that some of the written work may come home if your child is unable to complete it in class.
Anna is the narrator of the book and she is writing from her perspective as a child who has
lost her mother when she gave birth to her baby brother Caleb. Our focus for the chapter
book will be on plot. Where is the setting of the story? Who are the main characters? What
happened first, next, after, last? What was the problem and the solution in the story? As
your child is rereading the chapters at home please ask your child to orally retell the plot to
you to check for understanding. We will have a summative assessment when we are finished
with the chapter book. We will not be reading in our Journey’s book while we are reading the
chapter book.
Genre: Realistic Fiction
Realistic Fiction is a fiction story that could really happen in real life, but the characters and
pictures are not real.
LANGUAGE ARTS: We will be learning about verbs. Verbs are action words.
SPELLING ASSESSMENT: This week your child will have a spelling assessment over his/her
words in his/her agenda. The five highlighted words in the agenda will be ones your child
should have memorized because they are the third grade CORE, No Excuse words. Your child
will be bringing home a copy as well for you to look over his/her spelling pattern words. I will
be entering spelling assessments into Progress Book this quarter. Please work with your child
nightly to help him/her learn the spelling pattern. Core words will need to be memorized.
These are the highlighted words in your child’s agenda. All students have a copy of the 3rd
grade No Excuse Core Words in their Writer’s File Folder. Please encourage your child when
writing at home to complete homework or writing for pleasure that your child is practicing
spelling skills they are learning as well Core Words. Students need to capitalize all sentences
and all sentences must end with some kind of punctuation. Please have your child read his/her
writing at home. When read aloud when students naturally take a breath, that signals to them
“Oh I need some kind of punctuation”
Phonics Skills: Each student is now grouped according to his/her Jan Richardson Spelling
Inventory test. What does this mean to you? Your child will have spelling words that match
his/her phonics skill he/she needs more practice within. Please review your child’s agenda for
his/her spelling words. Your child will be taking an assessment next week over his/her spelling
pattern words. Please help your child practice his/her words daily
Grammar Skill: Verbs- Are action words in a sentence.
Scoot Pad: There will not be any Scoot Pad assigned this week due to shortened week and
focus is on Sarah, Plain and Tall.
SOCIAL STUDIES:
Students will be learning about citizenship and what their rights, responsibilities and the
common good that we are all capable of in our communities. I.E. Communities: family, school,
and city we live in. Students will be learning about leaders in our local government, state and
country. They will learn who our mayor, governor and president are this week and what their
roles in our government are. Students will be voting this week, which is a right when you turn
18, but we will be voting in class to understand the process of voting on Tuesday.
MATH:
This week, we will be working on and wrapping up several skills/topics including:
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Using and creating picture graphs and bar graphs
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Place value to the thousands and ten-thousands
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Fact Families for addition and subtraction
Absent Addends (Pre-algebra)
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Problem Solving
*We will have a quiz over place value on Wednesday
*Multiplication Unit starts next week. 
SCIENCE:
Scientific Method Quiz on Tuesday: We have been using the scientific method in all our
investigations, so the students are very familiar with the process. They will be bringing home
their Science Binders on Monday to show you some of their investigations and to review the
steps in the scientific method.
To conclude our study of matter, we will be doing investigations involving mixtures, and
chemical changes. We will also be observing matter and describing its properties.
At the beginning of next week we will review what we’ve learned about matter to be sure
we’re ready for our unit test which we will take later next week.