January Newsletter

Happy New Year!!!  We hope you had a magical holiday season with family and friends.  We were excited to see your children return to school and are impressed with how eagerly they jumped right into their academics.

In reading, students have been exercising their comparing and contrasting skills, as well as analyzing a text in order to formulate an informed opinion.  As we continue through the month, we will discuss author’s purpose, summarizing, analyzing characters to better understand them, and work on our inferring and predicting skills.  We are also working on homophones and homographs, so when you come across any, have some fun and discuss them with your child. A very exciting third grade reading incentive, called the Newberry Club, begins in February. Students will have the opportunity to read award-winning books to become part of the club. The process involves independent reading of appropriate level books and reaching different goals along the way. Be on the lookout for more information about this project to come home soon.

In writing, we are focusing on growing our independence and ability to self-assess while moving through the writing process.  In addition to practicing this in school, students will take responsibility for completing the entire process once a month for homework. This is the GO Write! homework assignment.  As we write, we continue to work on organization, sentence fluency and using sensory words in our descriptive details. This month we will also focus on making our stories come to life by ‘showing, not telling’, what is happening.  This means instead of telling you “Janet was happy,” we will show you by writing “Janet’s eyes lit up and a huge grin broke out on her face.”

Our exciting journey through Colorado history continues as we take a close look at the Native American tribes of Colorado. We specifically study the Ute Indians and the Plains tribes. Students record their similarities and differences on a Venn diagram as we discuss the cultures and geography of these Native American people. We also investigate the historical conflicts between the government and the native people. Students take part in exercises that require the skill of understanding perspective. Soon, we will learn about the trappers and traders who came to Colorado to hunt for beaver, the Rendezvous where they traded, and Bent’s Fort.

During our Math in Focus work this month, we are moving from bar models into our study of multiplication. Students will review the concept of equal groups and practice multiplication skills by mentally solving problems involving ones, tens and hundreds.  Ask your student how the problems 8 x 1, 8 x 10, and 8 x 100 are all related.  We will also explore multiplication problems involving two and three digit numbers multiplied by a single digit multiplier.  As you can tell by the increased complexity of our work, mastery of our multiplication facts is extremely important.  Please take time to work on these with your student three or four times a week.  Quizzing them on facts while driving, for a few minutes before or after dinner, or before bed is helpful and important. At this time in the year, we expect students to have mastery of addition and subtraction facts and to be working daily on multiplication. 

We continue to feel fortunate to be able to spend our days with your children and thank you for all the support you provide at home. 

Warmly,

The Third Grade Team

Upcoming Events:

January 16 – Martin Luther King, Jr. Day (no school)

January 29 – Spirit Day

February 17 – Field Trip, Naturalization Ceremony