December News 2019

You are invited to our Winter Celebration Christmas Concert! 6:30-7:30 pm College Drive Community church.Hope to see everyone there. ***********************************************************************

Skating Fieldtrip! December 19th 1:00-2:00 Nicholas Sheran Ice Centre All kids need a helmet and skates.  No drivers needed as we have booked busses :) Class party to follow.                   Here is a quick update of what's been going on in our classroom!  Language Arts: Letter writing & continuation of nonfiction reading unit. Identify main idea and summarizing details is our focus. How Can I Help My Child With Spelling? Lists come home every 2 weeks and are made so the kids can cut them apart, sort them by pattern, and play a variety of games with them for practice. We play these at school often, here are a few you can do at home. 1. Blind Sort sit back to back with your child. Have your child divide their paper/board into 3 columns, one for each category of word. Call out words from the list. Your child will record the words on a paper/wipe board by placing them in the correct category. 2. Tic Tac Toe Draw a tic tac toe board on paper. You and your child get different colour pens. Take turns writing words from the list to try to get 3 in a row. Advanced version: when you draw the board, write the spelling pattern in each square. As you take turns, you must find a word with the correct pattern in order to get 3 in a row. ay          ai         a-e ai           ay         ai a-e        ai          ae Math: Numbers to 1000 is zipping along. Kids are loving guided math and we are working on place value, skip counting, and money this month. For some extra math practice click on Place Value on the right hand side or head down to Numeracy for a larger choice of activities.

Social Studies:  Comparing quality of life in Canada with kids in Peru, Tunisia, India & Ukraine.

Science: Testing Materials & Design unit gives us a chance to do hands on experiments and record in our lap books! So fun! ********************************************** https://mmh.lethsd.ab.ca/download/219720 Click the link above to head over to the MMH December Newsletter.

April School Newsletter and Autism Awareness April 2

Don't forget to wear blue on Tuesday April 2 in support of Autism Awareness! 


Click here to access the April School Newsletter

Be sure to check out page 2 to see photos of our Looking at Lethbridge PBL. Thanks to so many who came to support the kids and their amazing projects! 

Also get information about our one district one book project Wishtree on page 4! There  is a wrap up assembly happening on April 8th

Last, the MMH school calendar of events can be found of page 5.

ROCK YOUR SOCKS MARCH 21, 2019

Thanks everyone! You rocked your socks! :) Nice job, Grade 3!!!

February News

Reading: Character Studies

We have started our next Reading Unit called Character Studies and are deep into Because of Winn Dixie.  We’ve been learning that good readers notice how a new character talks and acts and gets to know a character as a friend.  We will learn to follow a character’s journey and eventually be comparing and contrasting characters across books

Writing Strategies: Changing the World/Opinion Writing Unit continues.  We’ve worked on finding and solving problems both large and small and just last week wrote letters to our librarian to persuade her to purchase a favourite book series. I must admit they had some convincing arguments! We will continue with this type of writing for February introducing the OREO format: Opinion, Reasons, Examples, Opinion (restated)/brave bold thesis statements/ consider your audience

Math: We’ve finished skip counting and continue a weekly practise of basic facts and have started multiplication! In Grade 3 kids need to know their times tables facts to 5X5.  We are learning that if we can skip count, we can learn our facts quickly! We know the parts of a multiplication equation including the terms product and factors and talked about the identity property which tells us that any number times 1 is just itself!   

Science: Looking at Lethbridge Project! We are becoming Engineers for our Building With a Variety of Materials unit. We were lucky to have had Abby Slovak, Land Development Manager for the City of Lethbridge come to our school to talk about some of the inspiration, criteria, costs, and constraints of building in Lethbridge followed this week by Jessie Potrie, the architect who helped design Coalbanks Elementary. He will present some inspiring designs and share some 3D models of his work to get the kids excited about their own building projects. The kids are doing their surveys this week to find out what type of building is most needed on the west side. The surveys will help them narrow down their choices and help them come up with their number one building choice.  There will be a letter coming home soon asking for materials to build the final project. We will be drawing up blueprints in the next 2-3 weeks and construction will be underway soon!

Social: Traditions and Celebrations in all 4 countries continues! We have created some Peruvian Llama art pieces and are finishing our Tunisian Doors this week. We learned that Arabic and French are the primary languages in Tunisia and that much of the architecture (arched doorways) comes from Roman influence. We know that Diwali is a popular celebration in India and we created some traditional henna hand art which is often used at weddings and other special days. Ukraine had many traditions similar to Canada including Christmas and Easter. The kids will be having an open book quiz soon to review and solidify all the traditions and celebrations we have learned about.

Word Work Themes: Valentines Day

 7 Sacred Teachings: Peace

Skating Fieldtrip: Thanks to those who have already volunteered to supervise at NCSC arena for skating on Feb. 14^th . We are in need of a few more so please return the bottom of the included form if you are able to help out, or email/Dojo me! Thanks so much!

Important Dates to Remember in February!

Feb 1 – World Read Aloud Day! We chose a Groundhog theme!

Feb 7 – Wear a Sweater Day! / Booster Juice Day!

Feb 8 - No School, Professional Learning Day

Feb 11 - Hot Lunch order Deadline

Feb 14 – Skating to NCSC /Crazy Hair Day/Assembly 12:30/V-day party!

Feb 18 - No School Family Day

Feb 19-22 No School- Reading Week & Teacher’s Convention

Feb 26 - Hot Lunch Grades 1, 2, 3

Feb 27 – Pink Shirt Day

Thanks to our volunteers who are sending treats for our Valentines Day Party on the afternoon of Feb. 14^th.  Emma Dieser is sending cheese and crackers and Patrick Bible is sending a fruit tray with dip. Thanks to Jace Mitchell for sending the veggie tray with dip. Please dojo if you are able to help out 😊  Thanks also to Sydney Conrad who is bringing juice boxes and Emmy Brausse Elgie who is bringing paper plates! Thanks so much for helping out!

LOOKING AT LETHBRIDGE BUILDING PROJECT!

Dear Parents: 

The grade three classes have just started working on our large project based learning for science.  Students are becoming architects and engineers.  This is a super exciting time for them. 

This is a large project that is going to take us a long time to complete.  We will be working on it until mid March.  Currently, the students are researching what Lethbridge already has and comparing it to what other cities around the world have.   The goal of this project is for the kids to decide what they think Lethbridge needs to have to improve the quality of life in Lethbridge. The kids have been learning about what quality of life means and how it is different in different countries and cities around the world.   

Project Details

Focusing Question: As an engineer, what structure can you design to improve the quality of life in Lethbridge?

Context: Lethbridge is the 5th fastest growing city in Canada.  As an engineer, how can you improve the quality of life in this growing urban centre? 

 The students will be working with a city land development manager and an architect from Lethbridge to make this a real-life experience for them.  The kids will be planning the structure they are going to build for Lethbridge from start to finish.  They will be drawing blueprints, redrafting blueprints, meeting with architects and constructing a 3D model of their structure with all the building components it will need.  

 At the end of the project there will be a public forum display of all the structures in the gym for parents and important people from Lethbridge to come observe the hard work of the students.   The mayor, city planners/developers, architects, financial planners, school division superintendents, drafting/design/engineering students from the college and university will be invited to attend the final public forum display.

 Please take the time to talk with your child about the project.  A good point for discussion right now is “What do you think Lethbridge needs to improve the quality of life in our city?”  The structure they design and build needs to be realistic for our city location, land space, and population.  

 The grade three teachers are looking forward to watching the students explore their own complex learning and understanding through this amazing project.

FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE HOMEWORK JAN 15

 Hi everyone!
Your child has a small homework assignment tonight! When they are doing their home reading ask them to find and write down ONE example of figurative language. In class the examples we covered were :
1. she was as tall as a giraffe
2. He was as brave as a lion
3. It's raining cats and dogs
4. don't cry over spilt milk
5. laugh like a barrel of monkeys

Your child can write the example they find on a sheet of paper and be ready to share it with the class tomorrow. Happy reading!

Happy New Year 2019!

 Mrs. Payne’s Class Newsletter 2019

Welcome back! Hope everyone had a restful holiday and enjoyed some quality family time!  January is a busy month with lots of new projects and some fun spirit days!  

LA:   Home reading challenge continues!   Please be sure to have agendas turned in everyday so we can include your nightly reading on the bookmark levels. Congratulations to everyone who has “levelled up" 

Reading Strategies: Tackling More Challenging Texts

Finished tackling hard words takes grit/ Readers Climb the Hurdle of hard words by: chunking words/ thinking about the story/using textual clues to figure out the meaning of unfamiliar words: gist, synonyms, antonyms, explanation, prefixes/ Next lessons include making sense of figurative language/ talking back to the text/and considering the author’s purpose 

Writing Strategies: Changing the world/Opinion Writing Unit

 See a problem-imagine a solution/ write about beautiful things/use because to explain why someone noteworthy should be recognized/ OREOs format: Opinion, Reasons, Examples, Opinion (restated)/brave bold thesis statements/ consider your audience/  

Words Their Way: we are continuing with this differentiated spelling program where your child will bring home new lists on Monday that will be worked on for 2 weeks at a time. At the end of the 2 weeks, there will be a spelling test on Friday (or Thursday if there is no school on Friday). Thanks for your support at home working on these sometimes-tricky spelling patterns!  First new lists will be coming home Monday January 14, 2019.  

Math: Completed patterns and numbers to 1000 and will do a quick review of addition and subtraction/skip counting by 2,3,4,5,10, 25 then moving onto Multiplication!  

Science: Completing Testing Materials and Designs and then starting Project Based Learning: Looking at Lethbridge soon. Building with a Variety of Materials 

Social: We have completed Quality of Life in our 4 countries India, Peru, Ukraine, and Tunisia and are continuing traditions and celebrations in relation to Canada.

Word Work Themes: New Years and Winter

7 Sacred Teachings: Wisdom

Important Dates to Remember 

  Jan. 7- Hot Lunch order deadline

  Jan. 8, 15, 22- Free after school skating at ATB centre 

 Jan. 9- School Council meeting 7pm 

 Jan.14 New spelling lists come home  

 Jan. 18 Dress up as your favourite book character

 Jan. 22-Hot lunch day (Pizza) 

Jan. 24- Spirit Assembly 10:20 in the gym

 Jan.  25- spelling test

Upcoming Fieldtrip in February

We will be skating again, at Nicholas Sheran Friday, Feb. 14^th from 10:15-11:15am. If you are able to help supervise please dojo/email. Students will again be bussed so no drivers are needed. Thanks a bunch!