Arnold

Our Winter Party and November AR Book Club Members!

Small Candy Bar Club: These students read and passed from 7 to 15 tests, with comprehension scores from 70%-95%, and read on reading levels from 3.2 to 3.7: Book Club Members are: Troy, Dasarath, Delaney, Crystal, Spencer, Savannah, and Parisa

 

Large Candy Bar Club: These students read and passed from 16-25 tests on reading levels ranging from 2.9 to 3.6 with comprehension scores from 76% to 96%. The members are: Abby, Anne Marie, Joshua, Carmen, and Julia

 

Large Candy Bar and Ice Cream Club! These students read from 26-39 books with average comprehension scores from 80% to 98% and on reading levels from 3.1 to 3.6. The members are: Lea, Michelle, Alex, Kevin, Andrew, Michael, Mac, Paolo, and Zach!

 

Every student made it into the club this month. I was worried about a few but they pulled it out of the hat at the last moment. Please encourage your child to read every night at home. They check out two books at a time and should be reading those at home and then coming in to test on those in the mornings. They are then allowed to check out two more. Each child should be able to easily read and pass 3 books a week. They also have tubs of AR books in our room that they can read and take tests on whenever they finish up their work early in class. The more a child reads, the more they are exposed to vocabulary, have to put reading skills into practice, and the better readers they will become. Even math involves reading comprehension for story problems.

 

Your child must read in order to improve and widen their horizons! Keep asking them about how they are doing so I don't come to the end of December and wonder if they will make it or not.

 

Don't forget our Winter Party/Half-way Through Third Grade Celebration- on December 22nd. Have your child wrap and bring in a new book they like or a gently used one that we can share and play a game with. This allows students to share with others a favorite book, and will give each child a new book to read over break. Our party will be from 9:30 - 11:00 on that day and will be followed by our regular lunch time. The students have worked, and are working very hard everyday so this celebration will be a welcome break for them. I also want to keep celebrating reading all year long. Thank you for all you do to support me in the classroom.

B Arnold

Graded Papers and Study Island

I have handed out graded papers today and they will be in the binders. Look at skills that your child is weak in and then use Study Island for additional help, support, and practice in these areas. I have printed off your child's Study Island usage report.

 

The way to read this report is:

1. Look at each subject area

2. Within that area your at home use will be found in Test Mode, Game Mode and CRS Mode

3. If you look to the right of each of these areas you will see the number of sessions your child has logged in for that area and then continuing to the right the amount of time they spent total in that area.

4. You will also see a column marked Correct/Total and you will see their results their and then that score has been converted to a percentage score next to that.

5. In the final column you will see a D, M, or E which means Does Not Meet Standards, Meets Standards, or Exceeds Standards

6. The Benchmark tests were administered here at school and those results were gone over with you at Parent/Teacher Conferences. The other usage is at home usage.

 

Study Island has been provided to you free of charge this year and is an excellent tool to help you help your child at home in any areas of weakness. However, just like exercise equipment, it will only be effective if you actually use it! I have found over the years that my gym membership is much more effective when I actually go to the gym! smile......

 

Your child's class work, graded papers, and report cards are intended to guide you to ways to lend additional support at home in areas where they need more practice and work. Study Island is made to align with our CRCT in April so this is an excellent way to prepare for this test. Please make use of this incredible tool that has been paid for you and your child. In these hard economic times, this is indeed quite a gift! It also shows how important we feel this site is for helping students better prepare for mastery in all subject areas.

 

B Arnold

Soil

Humus is the soil that is dark in color and is made up of dead plants and animals that have rotted and decayed. This humus is what helps soil to be rich in nutrients and makes it good for growing plants in. Sand is made up of tiny bits of rock that have been broken up into pieces. It does not hold water well. Soils that don't hold water well are lighter in color and those that are darker hold water better. Not many plants will grow in sand. Silt is made up of very tiny bits of rock that are too small to see with your eyes. Stir up dirt in water and mix it well. The tiny particles you see will be like silt. Clay has teeny tiny bits of broken rock but you can't feel them. They are so small they feel smooth. Clay is sticky when wet and clay holds water better than any other soil. Clay is used to make pottery. Loam is the best soil for farming and growing crops. It is made up of a mixture of humus, clay, silt and sand. The top layer of the soil has lots of humus. It is where leaves fall and die and rot and also animals die and rot to make the humus rich in nutrients. The next layer of the soil doesn't have much humus but it does have small rocks in it. The bottom layer is the solid rock which is called bedrock. Wind and water make rocks break into smaller pieces and this process is called weathering. Wind throws sand and dirt against the rocks. Water wears them down and ice can split them into pieces. they get smaller and smaller over time. After thousands of years the rocks can become sand and soil. When rain and wind CARRY the pieces away this is called erosion. This is when the pieces move from one place to another.

Is your child worth an investment of your time to improve their skills and success?

If you could give your child a gift, and it would not cost you much at all, but it would help to make their lives better, would you?

I think most parents would answer a quick yes to this question and yet we are still seeing students in third grade who do not know their basic addition or addition facts yet. By the end of third grade they really should know the addition, subtraction, multiplication and division facts by heart, with fluency, and no hesitation.

 Knowing their basic facts is all it would take to increase their math proficiency, their math fluency, to improve upon their math speed and skill and precision in computation, and to help them gain more confidence. This would involve a small investment in flash cards, and an investment of time until the facts are known.

Everyone I know can afford this, and yet most students are struggling just to come up with basic answers to a rather simple problem. It is so easy to master math facts: with just a small investment of time, practice, and with repetition, the fluency will come. It takes a commitment and it takes consistency. This is honestly a priceless gift to give to your child.

Flash cards can be purchased at the dollar store, Target or Walmart, for a very minimal cost, and just a few moments every day or every other day can give your child the gift of knowledge that will help them in all grades of school and will be needed throughout their entire lives.

They will need to be able to balance a checkbook, count money, etc all through life. Math is going to be needed all throughout life, this is a gift worth giving to your precious children. Have you ever been to a store when the computers are down and the person working there is unable to count out the change needed to you without the machine. This is so very sad to me.

My daughter in law who teaches in middle school tells me that the main struggle for the students there in math is that they don't know their basic facts. How sad this is when this can be avoided.

Students are in gymnastics, cheerleading, football, soccer, baseball, and many other after school activities. They watch TV, play electronic games, and have time to do many other things outside of school, but somehow it is just too hard to work in working on basic facts. I honestly find this very sad. It actually breaks my heart for them.

I have nothing against extra activities and think they are important for children. The additional activities enrich their lives and they need the outlet. However, those activities are never more important than a solid education and a solid foundation for life in basic academic skills.

Every parent needs to determine how their child is doing in the area of math fluency. To do this just take a deck of math flashcards: begin with addition: show them the card and if they hesitate at all, or try to count up, or require working it out in their head, then they don't know the fact with fluency and need to practice it until they do.

Put all the facts they know without hesitation in one ziploc and the ones they don't in another. Work on all the facts each day until finally all the cards are moved to the "I know it well" baggy.

Then move on to the subtraction cards and do it the same way. Revisit the addition once every few weeks to keep them current but move on with the next set of facts. Once subtraction has been mastered then move on to multiplication and finally on to division.

This is a priceless gift to give to your child. It is worth the time and investment and it can make a huge difference for them in every grade of school and in life. Next year your child will be doing long and complicated multiplication and division problems

. If they are still trying to put 5 in their heads and count up to 11 to figure out 11 - 5 then they are going to be overwhelmed. Please give this gift of math fluency to your child. They are worth it!

 Some of my students are very proficient already in many of the basic math skills, but most are not. Find out where your child is and take the time to invest yourself in their future mathematical success in school. You can make a huge difference for them for years to come.

I challenge you to get on board and do whatever it takes to make this a reality for your child. Again they are worth it. B Arnold

Field Trip on Monday

Field Trip Monday

Our field trip to Pine Mountain Museum is an outdoor field trip. Please have your child dress for the weather.

Suggestions:

 

• ·         Wear older jeans/pants
• ·         Tennis shoes (older ones… it could be muddy)
• ·         Dress in layers- long sleeve t-shirt with a hoodie

If your child is bringing a lunch with them, all items must be disposable.

In the event that your child forgets his/her lunch or drink, a lunch/drink will be purchased for them from the Frey Cafe (payment taken from their Frey lunch account).

Thanksgiving Feast: Third - Fifth Grades: November 16th

Thanksgiving Feast Forms coming home on orange paper today. If you would like to join your child for Feast Day to eat then please complete the form and send it back in NO LATER THAN November 11th, along with your money to pay for the meal. Your payment will go into your child's lunch account for your child and any and all guests that are signed up to attend. If you are able please come as the students would love to have you join them. Following the lunch Mrs. Arnold would like to invite you all back to our room for just some brief moments of showing what your child is learning. Come for some fun songs and stuff following the lunch! Students will leave to attend specials at 12:00!

 

Arnold 10:30 - 11:00

10:38-11:08 Rountree

Crowder 10:46-11:16

10:54-11:24 Nolen

Musial 11:02 - 11:32

11:10-11:40 Pirro