October 24, 2011 home note

October 24, 2011

Dear Parents,

Thank you for your time on conference day. I appreciate the valuable input and insights that certainly support my role as your child’s third grade teacher. As we look to the second half of this term the children are nearing the final stages of their spider research projects. In the next week their completed posters will begin to appear on the hallway walls outside our classroom.
In math our focus continues on developing the understanding and application of several strategies to solve two- and three-digit subtraction and addition problems. In many cases I see the results of your extra effort to assist your child in mastering the basic facts, particularly those that equal ten and the doubles. It really empowers the children’s facility with calculations and allows them greater ease discerning the relevance of place-value and patterns with computations. All of these skills will carryover to our later work with multiplication, division, and increasingly more complex number stories. Thank you for your support.
We have completed the reading of Charlotte’s Web and will spend some time this week discussing and writing about its basic themes of friendship and life cycles. The barn setting was a key ongoing element in the lives of the characters of Charlotte’s Web. The children will look at barn paintings by local artist, Wolf Kahn, and develop poetry based on their written responses to his pastel landscapes. Also, as a closing project to our first literature unit each child will create a large painting of a farm animal represented by the book’s characters. We will focus on the form and texture of Garth Williams’ illustrations during this art project.
The children will soon begin another creative writing project, a personal narrative. Exercises on verb selection and sentence development will accompany our writing and revising of first drafts.
Before we transition to our next long-term literature unit, we will read a selection from the Great Books series, the Ethiopian folktale, “Fire on the Mountain.” It is a nice connection to our school-wide east African focus. TGS students were able to gain a deeper understanding of the Maasai culture thanks to last Tuesday’s presentation by Paul Weber, Sarah Messenger, and Leyeyo. This Wednesday the students will participate in the first of five weekly activities centered on the Maasai culture.



Looking Ahead:
* Monday, October 31- Given the parties and trick or treating surrounding this school day, we will forego treats as part of our class time celebration, but instead enjoy fun holiday related activities. For example, Emily and I will lead the third and fourth graders in a Halloween themed PSD. If your third grader desires, she/he may bring in part or all of her/his costume to share at LUNCH time.

*Friday, November 4- Our trip to Hooper Institute, Walpole, N.H. We will leave TGS after attendance and return by 12:30. We hope to have a picnic lunch there, weather permitting. This museum offers a hands-on exploration of century or more old gadgets and tools. This trip will serve as an introduction to our unit on 19th century New England farm and family life.

Finally, accompanying your child’s Monday homework will be a list of “core words” (i.e. most commonly misspelled words). It is my hope that this list will support your child’s independence self-checking written parts of homework assignments.
Please feel free to contact me with questions or concerns. Many thanks.

Sincerely,
Linda