Technology is helping us learn from and with people outside the four walls of our classroom. A few weeks ago we had the opportunity to be a part of a live video conference with Kate DiCamillo, author of The Tale of Despereaux, the first read aloud we completed this year. Kate is lovely and inspirational, and has a wonderful way of connecting with children. She currently serves as the National Ambassador for Young People's Literature. Pittsburgh Arts and Lectures hosted the video conference and schools all across America tuned in. Our class submitted a list of questions with the hopes that one of ours would be chosen. It was! The students were delighted when the interviewer announced that the third graders from Westchester Elementary in Decatur, GA had a question for Kate. We learned a lot about where she got her ideas for her books and she also gave our writers great advice about the writing process. Last week we participated in our second Mystery Skype with a fourth grade class in Charlottesville, Virginia. Mystery Skype is a great way to learn geography and map skills. We make a connection via Skype with a class in a mystery location. Each class takes turns asking yes or no questions until both classes figure out where the other class is located. Students partner up and use a dry erase map of the United States and eliminate states as they hear the answers to the questions. This particular Mystery Skype session was extra special because we Skyped with Luke's cousin's class! We have another one scheduled for tomorrow afternoon. Be sure to ask your child where our Mystery Skype class was located.
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In social studies we have been studying the life of Paul Revere. The students have many questions about life in colonial America. Our anchor text for this unit was Who Was Paul Revere? by Roberta Edwards, which is a part of a great series of biographies. They were most appalled to learn that children growing up during Paul Revere's time were bopped on the head by their teachers if they did not follow directions. They enjoyed reading about the Boston Massacre and the Boston Tea Party and then watching a cartoon version of the events on Liberty Kids, which I've linked on the social studies section under the "For Students" tab on this website. The students also put themselves into Paul Revere's shoes and wrote diary entries from his perspective. A few finished examples are below. We will go on to study eight other historical figures this year--Frederick Douglass, Susan B. Anthony, Mary McLeod Bethune, Thurgood Marshall, Lyndon B. Johnson, Eleanor Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt, and Cesar Chavez. Below are some pictures of some other things we've been doing this month. This week in Writing Workshop the students began working on making revisions to their personal narratives. This is no easy task! Our first focus of the revision process was using a strategy called "Explode a Moment." Students used their knowledge of the narrative story arc to find the climax of their piece and stretch out that moment in a way that helps the reader create a better mental movie in their minds. We watched a clip from writing expert, Barry Lane, to help us with this process. Students will continue to work on applying different revision strategies throughout next week. They will also meet in peer writing groups to provide feedback on each other's work. We are looking forward to sharing our pieces with you at our Writing Celebration at the end of the month.
Research shows that students learn math concepts best using a 3-step framework called the concrete-representational-abstract (CRA) approach. During the initial stage of introducing a new skill, students use concrete objects to physically model the concept. Once there is a solid understanding of why and how the concept works, students move into the representational stage where they turn the concrete models into pictures. Finally, in the abstract stage, students learn the algorithm that symbolizes the concept using numbers and mathematical symbols. Entering the abstract stage too soon prevents students from developing a deep understanding of the mathematical process. As we begin our multiplication unit, we are moving slowly using the CRA approach so that students' brains can make connections between what they already know about numbers (skip counting, making equal groups, doubles) and the new concepts they're learning. There's more to multiplication than just memorizing the facts!
Day 1: Last week we began to think about how arrays represent multiplication. We started off by solving the "Arranging Chairs" problem. The students worked with a partner to put chairs into equal rows and columns. Every partnership had a different number of chairs. They used colored tiles to build a model of all the different ways they came up with. Then they used graph paper to make a pictorial representation of all of their arrangements.
Day 2: Students worked in groups and used the arrays they created from the Arranging Chairs problem to show the total number of chairs in each arrangement. Most groups used skip counting strategies or repeated addition. Some connected the repeated addition to multiplication as they remembered a strategy used when playing Circles and Stars.
Day 3: We went on an array hunt around Westchester to look for every day arrays in the real world. The students discovered arrays in many different places and in many different forms. Students used iPads to take pictures of the arrays they found, cropped and edited the photos, and uploaded them into a Google Slides presentation. All 23 students shared one Google Slides document, so using collaboration skills to build our presentation was a must. Enjoy our final product! And stay tuned as we dive deeper into multiplication this week.
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AuthorMrs. Yoo teaches 3rd grade at Westchester Elementary School, home of the Wolves. Archives
February 2017
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