Wouldn't be Christmas without...

Singing for the Rotary.  On Tuesday the third grade classes traveled to Freedom Security Bank to sink for the Kalona Rotary.  Thank you to Ms. Swartzendruber our guest conductor for the day!

The fourth grade play "A flea on Santa's tree!"

Science

We shared our flashlights on Wednesday with the class.  Many unique ideas!  The kids' next assignment is to create something that will do work with solar, wind, or water power.  Some of the kids are trying their hand at more challenging battery ideas.  The kids are to think about their ideas over the holiday break

Noah shared his volcano project with the class earlier this week.  The students wanted the directions posted on our blog.

120 ml water
2 tablespoons baking soda
1/2 cup vinegar
orange food coloring
few drops of detergent
small square of toilet paper
empty water bottle

Place the water, food coloring and the vinegar in the water bottle.  Wrap the baking soda in the toilet paper, drop the toilet paper into the volcano.  The model will erupt.

Reading with Mrs. Bender

We wrapped up our skill work this week that went with our "Raising Dragon" story.  The kids worked on identifying the main idea and at least four supporting details.  The kids took the opportunity to find a huge lizard to research.  They found out where it lived, what it ate, the size, something unique about their lizard and how it defends itself from its enemies.

We also continued working on Little House on the Prairie.  The kids worked in groups to brainstorm what would be good about living on the prairie, what would be bad about living on the prairie.  Most of them thought they would enjoy living in the outdoors, but weren't too sure about dealing with wild animals.   We then worked on what 10 items would they take in their cover wagon.  Lots of interesting ideas!  We hope to have these posted on the blog after Christmas.

Math

Not many math lessons this week due to many special events.  Please take some time over the Christmas break to practice the multiplication facts!

Holiday Happenings {Next Week's Events}

We’ve got a fun and busy week ahead as we prepare for winter break.  Here’s what’s happening:

Monday

– a “regular” day J

Tuesday

– Third graders will sing for the Kalona Rotary on Tuesday afternoon.  Students are encouraged to dress in “spiffy” clothing for this event.  

- When we return from singing for the Rotary club, we will have our third grade holiday party.  Students may bring a treat to share (we’ll place all the goodies on a table and provide paper plates for students and allow them to choose snacks to enjoy).  We plan to play board games and work on our (surprise!) holiday gifts.  Students can bring favorite games from home to play.

Wednesday

- 2 hour early dismissal (teacher in service meetings)

Thursday

- Grandparents Day/Last day of classes! 

Grandparents Day is from 8:50 – 11:00.  During this time Grandparents can participate in a carol sing and visit students in classrooms.  We are trying something new this year and having 2 shifts for the carol sing to alleviate the issue of an overcrowded gym. This day is not an official early out day, but students wishing to go home with grandparents at 11:00 may do so if we have received written permission from a PARENT (an e-mail is fine).  We recognize that many grandparents have traveled from out of town to visit their grandchild(ren), and will allow students to leave early without being counted as absent.  It is very helpful for us to know in advance if your child plans to leave early. There are usually very few students remaining at school for the afternoon, so we typically watch a holiday movie together.  If you have any questions, contact your child's home room teacher.a

Stations

tgif!  It's Friday, so we spent our afternoon rotation through several stations, including creating a (surprise!) holiday gift, reading Time For Kids and blogging about an article that we read, catching up on math and language work, making cards/gift bags, working on our weaving/hotpads, and playing math/reading games online.

Completed hot pads!

Decorating gift bags

 

A sneak peek at our holiday gift making

Catching up

Reading TFK/Blogging

Social Studies

We're learning about communities in our current unit.  Students have compared/contrasted our community of Kalona with several other communities across the US, as well as Timbuktu, a community in Africa.   We have found that all communities have certain elements (things to do for fun, homes, jobs, etc.).  It has been interesting to see which communities are like ours, and which are much different. Students also brushed up on the map skill of using scale.

Students use Venn Diagrams to compare Kalona with El Paso

Language Skills

Spelling words this week were tricky!  The words are not so hard, but it can be a challenge to figure out which word one is meaning to spell -- all of this week's words are homophones (words that sound the same but are spelled differently and have different meanings). Our grammar focus was again on verbs, and students learned to use past time and future time.  We found that it is important for the verb tenses in a piece of writing to be the same (all past tense, for example), and learned to identify and "fix" verbs that are in the wrong tense. We also reviewed correct use of quotation marks, and corrected sentences in which there were punctuation mistakes.

Mrs. Hartsock's reading group

Our shared story this week, The Garden of Abdul Gasazi, has us all a little confused!  This fantasy story leaves the reader wondering what REALLY happened.  Ask your child to explain . . . It was interesting to discuss our thoughts, and students wrote their opinions via Kidblog and were able to virtually "discuss" what they believe happened in the story.  Skills that we focused on this week include story mapping (identifying the characters, setting, and plot), and decoding words with the un, dis, and non prefixes.

 Blogging . . .

Buddy Reading . . .

We also have been enjoying learning more about pioneer life as we continue to read Little House on the Prairie.  We all agree that pioneer life would be much different that life today!