Reading:

This week, readers will develop their understanding of text structures. So far, they have learned about ‘boxes and bullets’ and ‘comparing and contrasting’. They will now learn about the ’cause and effect’ and ‘problem and solution’ text structures. The attached PDF gives an overview of these different text structures. If you wish to support with this work at home, you could ask your child what structures their home reading books use. 

G3B4_AnchorChart-2-2ad2f9u

Math:

Science:

This week, students will study how to make a disaster plan that would be enacted due to a natural disaster. After learning the key elements of a disaster plan (meeting locations both inside and outside the community, lists of necessary resources, etc.), students will make their own disaster plan. They will get to choose whether the plan will be for use at school or at home and they will also choose the type of disaster that it should be used for (perhaps one plan could be used for different types of disasters?) If you wish to support this work at home, the following video will give you more information about what should be included on the disaster plan: Prepare a Family Emergency Plan | Disasters 

Writing:

Students are now choosing their last natural disaster to research. This will be done independently. Once they have created a non-fiction writing piece, they will turn these into podcasts.

These are the headings we agreed would fit with their research…

And these are the standards…

Science:

This week, students will be following ‘Line of Inquiry 2’, which is ‘How do (natural events, earthquake, volcanic eruption) affect the environment?’ Students will study different types of natural disasters, why they occur and the affects that they have. After this, they will compare and contrast different natural disasters. On Friday, students will visit Sihai Park for a field trip, in preparation for studying ‘Line of Enquiry 3’, which is related to communities. In Sihai Park, they will observe their local community, how people interact with each other and how their community functions. 

Math:

Reading:

This week, readers will develop their fluency and the use of their “teacher’s voice”, which is what they will use when reading to each other. If you wish to support with this at home, please ask your child about the attached PDF, which shows how they can use their voice for different effects. 

Writing:

Writers will choose a new topic from their science learning to research. They will learn more about adding facts and details to teach their readers. Please check SeeSaw to view their writing from before break.

Science:

We have started our new unity of inquiry with the central idea being: COMMUNITIES support each other in TIMES of NEED. The question we will grapple with is: how are things connected? There are patterns in nature that are predictable and we will explore these. Students will be collecting daily data in their notebooks (weather) and noticing the patterns. This week will also entail more hands on activities as students are asked to plan their own experiment. Thank you for your support at home. Some questions you can ask to generate conversation: what is a community? What are patterns in nature? What city did you choose to collect weather data on? What natural disaster are you researching? What have you learned? 

Math:

This week we will conclude our unit on fractions.  Students will review how to compare fractions and place them on a number line while labeling equivalent fractions. On Thursday and Friday, students will take two different types of assessment to demonstrate their understanding; a traditional test and an authentic task.  The authentic task will require students to piece together all the strategies and math content they learned this unit together to solve a problem they could face in their lives.

Reading:

Readers this week are learning to ask “Why?” and “Why not?” when researching. This will enable them to find more information and to research deeper into a topic. For example, if a text states, “By May, chicks that are well nourished by their parents weigh about 26 pounds. But by September, those chicks that have survived weigh only around 13 pounds.” then students should be asking “Why? Why are their weights so different?” Etc.

Writing:

Students meet with their research groups and they decided on how to publish their learning. The choices were book creator, flap book, and handwritten nonfiction book. They will share out their learned information. To end the week, we will write a script to perform in front of the green screen. Should be fun and they are learning a lot! Focus is to write information in their own words after learning/reading.

Math:

This week we will continue understanding distance and position on the number line as strategies for comparing fractions. Students will begin to recognize and show that equivalent fractions have the same size, though not necessarily the same shape. We will also strengthen our number talk using images and generated discussions through word problems for each image. 

Science:

Students will use their scientist skills to collect data and infer which traits are inherited or acquired, create a new species of “monsters” from traits passed down, and learn more about heredity. They will rank the most important traits for survival and will justify their reasoning. In the later part of the week we will inquire about how adaptations help organisms survive. Students will learn first hand how species’ populations rise and fall. 

Reading:

As we continue reading fairy tales, we will also be blending science into reading time. Students will have an opportunity to read more about traits and heredity during the reading block.

Writing:

Generating their own fairy tales. Students will create their own stories with a focus on problems and solutions. We’ve written fractured fairy tales, so now they get to be creative and write their own! They’re excited!

Click HERE to view the plant life cycle padlet.

Reading:

This week, readers will be continuing with reading fairy tales, focusing on the  traits of characters. They will learn that characters have internal traits and external features/characteristics. Readers will learn to use these traits by applying them to the heroes and villains in their own fairy tales. If you are supporting your child with this work at home, then this anchor chart contains the type of vocabulary that we will be using:  

Writing:

This week, writers will plan and draft their own fractured fairy tales. Students will revise as they draft. We will focus on the usage of dialogue, descriptive language (verbs and adjectives), and language structures in compound and complex sentences. 

Math:

In this next topic with fractions, students practice comparing unit fractions with fraction strips, specifying the whole and labeling fractions in relation to the number of equal parts in that whole. 

Science:

This week, scientists will transition from thinking about how life cycles are diverse to learning that living things share traits with their parents.  We will launch a mini inquiry into traits shared with our parents as we continue to learn about how organisms adopt to their environment.