New school year, new class! At the beginning of the year we are still learning everything we can about each other and learning the rhythm of our classroom. In Grade 3, we have been sharing about ourselves through our art.
Please enjoy 3RB’s creative writing self portraits!
We are learning about fractions! We have been learning how to share an divide delicious treats such as brownies into equal portions. We have also been studying equivalent fractions. One rainy day we kicked off our wet shoes and spent time playing with our fraction pieces, experimenting with equivalent fractions:
During a maths lesson one of the Grade 3 students developed a question: “We know that <-ion> is a suffix, so does that make <fract> the base word?” The students discussed this question for a few moments, unsure if <fract> could be a word by itself. We wrote down the question and delved deeper at our next SWI session.
The students began their investigation by observing the word <fractions> and going through the four investigation questions to help guide their study.
After we spend some time looking at our word and going through the questions, we recorded the hypotheses and data that we had collected. Here are some answers that the students provided:
The investigation is still taking place and the students have developed a further question: “Does a base word need to mean something when it is by itself, or can the meaning come when affixes are added?”
3B students have been crafting and writing fairytale adaptations! As they develop their story telling voices, the students have been asked to work together in groups to create and act out their own dramatic retelling of fairytales.
The students are enjoying the process of developing scripts and practicing their lines so that their voices and actions help to tell the story.
The students have formed research groups to study their animal topics of choice. They must work together to study a range of subtopics, sort through a variety of resources, and use technology to create a presentation to share with their classmates.
Each group is working on communicating so that they can collaborate on their shared presentation. In their own groups they have decided which task each member will handle so that they are making good use of their time. Their presentations are going to be awesome!
During Sakura Medal season, the ES students have the amazing opportunity to read an interesting selection of books and vote for their favourite in the collection. When students start Grade 3 they move from the picture books category into the Grade 3-5 chapter book category.
In 3B some of the students set a challenge for themselves to read as many of the Sakura Medal books as possible. They worked hard to select books that were a good fit, and then read their books carefully to make sure they understood everything.
Three students focused on the challenge and made a plan so that they could reach their reading targets. As a result, they received a special invitation to the Sakura Medal voting party in the library. Woo hoo!!!
For further information about the event, please check out the Saint Maur library blog: http://blogs.stmaur.ac.jp/library/
This month the Elementary students have been celebrating their love for reading. All April the students have been submitting their individual and class photos for the Extreme Reading Challenge!
Check out our awesome submissions!
At the end of the Extreme Reading Challenge on April 23rd, we celebrated World Book Day by coming to school dressed as book characters. In 3B we had a wide variety of characters including characters from the Amulet series, the Cookie Monster, Harry Potter, The Big Bad Wolf, Mal from Descendants, and many more.
Grade 3 have done it again! Our amazing Word Detectives took a word inquiry case, sniffed out the clues, developed hypotheses and drew conclusions.
As we were reading from a class book some of the students noticed something interested about words that had the <-ed> suffix. They were not always pronounced the same way! This discovery led the students to create their investigation question:
When asked how they would begin their investigation, the students discussed their options and decided that the first step should be data collection. They determined the best way to study the <-ed> suffix would be to collect as many words as they knew with <-ed>.
They pooled their knowledge to create an extensive vocabulary list. Afterwards, they shared their words with their partners while paying close attentions to the phonemes (sounds) connected to each of their <-ed> words.
After writing and saying all of their words, the the Grade 3 Investigators created a hypothesis and presented many examples to back up their claim.
The students in 3B have become gardeners…of poetry!
First, they planted their seed ideas and made planners to help them organise their ideas and to develop powerful words to put into their poems.
Next, they used the writing process to draft their poems. As Wonderful Word Wizards, they added alliteration, rhyme, and strong adjectives to their writing. They considered whether their written words would take a shape, or be given a supporting illustration.
What started as seed ideas bloomed into a beautiful poem! Well done, 3B!
March 23rd was Japanese Culture Day. The students arrived dressed in clothing with a Japanese connection.
They started the morning with a special assembly where they sang “Ponyo” for the Elementary School and family members.
The students had the exciting opportunity to watch and participate in a traditional Japanese Kyogen.
Lunch time was an abundant feast! During the potluck some of the Grade 3 family members volunteered to teach the students how to make delicious onigirazu and sakura mochi. Yummy!
After lunch some Grade 3 mothers taught the students how to create beautiful origami balloon garlands.
Thank you to all the parents who provided food and volunteered to help out during this fantastic day. Many thanks to the Japanese department for organising Japanese Culture Day!
Have a wonderful spring break!
In the week leading up to Christmas break the ES students celebrated Spirit Week. They enjoyed dressing up for a different theme every day. Please enjoy these group photos that were taken each day of Spirit Week!
Hero vs. Villain
Class vs. Class: 3B Ninjas
Day vs. Night (Featuring a tinseled ES principal)
Christmas Cheer
Whenever a student has a pressing question about words, the question is placed on our Wonder Wall so that we can revisit and investigate it later. During a recent Structured Word Inquiry (SWI) session, a few grade 3 students added a question for us to investigate.
They had noticed that the letter C made different sounds depending on the word it was in. They asked:
The students began their investigation by brainstorming as many words as they knew that contained the <c> grapheme. The <c> could be at the beginning, end, or middle of the word. Some of these words included: celebration, character, face, and communicate.
The student shared some of these words to be written on the white board and suggested categories for these words. We found so many words that we almost ran out of space!
After studying the categories they created, the students developed a hypothesis about the letter C and made plans to further investigate which letters (graphemes) changed the spelling of the letter C.
In the following session, the students studied their whiteboard data and discussed the location of specific graphemes and how this informed their pronunciation of the <c> in each word. The two groups are pictured below:
2. <C> graphemes that create /k/ phonemes…
The next day, the class took charge and presented what they had learned about the letter C and the jobs it can have inside individual words. They created lists of words they knew and organised them into categories.
Each student group reviewed their list of words and created labels for each category based on the function of the letter C within that word.
During this investigation the students became interested in the <ch> digraph and have started noting the different sounds it can make depending on the word. We have a new investigation waiting for us on our Wonder Wall!
On November 3rd the ES students gathered for our annual Sports Day! We started the day off indoors, rotating through a variety of athletic activities. It was wonderful to watch the blue, green, red and yellow teams work together and cheer each other on.
Enjoy a few pictures that were taken during the day!
Basket Shoot
Tug-Of-War
Sprints
Thank you to everyone for your hard work and good sportsmanship during the games! Congratulations to the red team for their win this year!
