Weekly Update

Dear Families,

Another exciting week is coming to an end in our 3rd and 4th grade classroom. This week, we started many new and interesting projects and we are very eager to share them with you.

To begin with, we had a wonderful Skype session with the author Sheri Amsel on Wednesday morning. The students did a great job taking turns asking questions and I think we had a chance to ask all of them! She generously gave us 40 minutes to chat!! The students created their own questions for her in advance and devised their own system for how to ask them fairly so everybody who wanted to ask a question got an opportunity to. Please ask your child to explain how they solved this as our time with Sheri Amsel was limited. The chat was very inspiring for all of us. The message from Sheri Amsel was clear; if you like something-do it. Just do it. If you like to write…write. If you like to draw…draw. If you like to read….read. She shared the story about how she wrote one of her best-selling books, A Wetland Walk. Many years ago she was attending a graduate seminar when she felt compelled to write this story about a boy who walked around in a wetland area, a story that seamlessly weaves poetry and scientific facts together. She felt inspired, so she wrote this book in only ten (10) minutes!! We had many wonderful discussions about this in class and my advice to the students is; “Be ready to be inspired…anytime.” Are you?

We are started our new unit in literature this week. If you recall from last week, the students will learn to find character traits in fictional stories and find evidence in the texts to support their statements. As a class, we will read the book Frindle by Andrew Clements together and the students will gather character traits as we read along. The students will write their own four paragraph essays on character traits from another book, after we have had the opportunity to explore many others together.

3rd graders are bringing home a math assignment this week. This multiplication array assignment is due next Friday, 2/12/10. Please let me know if you have any questions or need materials to complete it. Thank you.

Our class has the opportunity to participate in a University of Vermont study on peer relationships in the next few weeks. Please see the attached information sheet with permission slips for full details and information. We are very excited to be part of this study. Please let me know if you have any questions or concerns. Thank you.

Lastly, please do not forget to return the emptied Report Card envelopes and permission slips for our trip to the Flynn Theater to see Frindle (March 3rd, 2010).

Thank you.

Have a great weekend!
Regards,
Maria McCormack