Tag Archives: flashcards

Third Grade Update

Hi Parents,
We’ve had another great week in third grade! We continue to practice procedures in the classroom, cafeteria, recess, hallways, etc. Tomorrow  we will practice our SOAR procedures on the bus.
Here is an update on a few things to know for third grade:

Math:
We have started learning some strategies and patterns for multiplication. We start with the 5s facts. Throughout the year, it will be very important that students be practicing their multiplication facts at home. We work on multiplication at school, but students need continuous practice with the basic facts so they can complete the math work at school.
There are a few ways students should be practicing at home:

 

FLASHCARDS: We cut out the 5s flashcards today and your child has a yellow math fact folder. This folder should be kept in your child’s daily folder and should be coming home each night. This folder will be filled up with flashcards over the next few months. It is not so helpful to try and practice the whole pile of flashcards in one sitting. Instead, choose one color count-bys that your child is struggling with and just practice those for that night. Then choose a different color on a different night. This will help mastery. A recommended order of practice is: 5s, 2s, 10s, 9s, 3s,. As the flashcard folder gets full, we will start to take some out and keep them at school.

MOBYMAX: students have been working on MobyMax math fact practice at school. They are reviewing addition and subtraction facts and when they have mastered those, they will move on to multiplication and then division. Students can access Mobymax at home for practice. Let me know if your child does not remember their password.

Please take a look at the math parent letter:

REMINDER:
Puzzle Piece Homework due tomorrow:
 Each student in our class is special and unique and together we make a great team! Each student is part of the puzzle that is our class. On Tuesday, we read a book called The Crayon Box That Talked. This reminded us that each one of us is a special part of our classroom community. Students were sent home with a puzzle piece homework assignment today. Please read this over with your third grader. This should be brought back to school by next Friday, September 6.

Thank you!

Multiplication and Division

We have been working on learning strategies for multiplication and division facts. Today we used counters to help us solve word problems.

Example: I have 12 books that I will place on 2 bookshelves. How many books will be on each shelf?

Joe has 27 baseball cards. He arranges them in 3 rows. How many baseball cards will be in each row?

***Please help your child practice their math flashcards for at least 5 minutes each night. Building fluency with multiplication facts will be crucial to learning division and future math concepts.

img_7196 fullsizerender img_7194

 

Spelling, Flashcards, Homework, and Library!

SPELLING:
Today we started a new spelling unit. Each Monday, we take a spelling pre-test and this determines if the regular list or the challenge list will go home. We have discussed that we each have different lists because we are different learners and that’s ok! You should see a spelling list come home tonight. This can stay at home and should be practiced throughout the week. We will have our spelling test on Friday.

FLASHCARD FOLDER:
Please practice the math facts at home with your third grader and then make sure the green folder goes back in the blue daily folder to come back to school.
During math today, students practiced the 5s facts with a partner. They quizzed their friend and placed the flashcards in two piles: if they didn’t know the product ‘in a snap’ then it went in the NOT YET pile. If they said the answer right away it went in the GOT IT pile. Then, just to be sure, they quizzed the GOT IT pile again.
Try this strategy at home when practicing with your third grader.  

HOMEWORK:
Today we talked about our own personal reading life and what makes reading work for us. We talked about needing a quiet, comfortable space without distractions as well as making sure we choose a good-fit book that we are interested in. To prepare for our lesson tomorrow, each student should bring in a favorite book. 

LIBRARY:
We went to the library today. Your child should come home with a few books. We will talk about reading counts in class. When a student is done reading their book, they sign up to take a test and then during reading time, we do our best to make our way through the list of students who signed up. Please check in with your third grader about what books they have chosen. 

We are off to another great week in 3rd grade!!  🙂

For your information-

Multiplication flashcards:
Today we started our math unit on multiplication. We have started with the 5s facts. In your child’s daily folder will be a parent letter and an envelope with flashcards. We will be filling this envelope with flashcards. It should go home for nightly practice and be sent back to school each day as we will use the flashcards in class.
***It is very important to make fact practice part of your nightly routine. We will be learning a lot of multiplication facts and they will be crucial to know as we move on in math concepts this year.

Spelling Words:
We started our spelling work today. Each Monday, we will take a pre-test that will determine the word list for each student. During the week we will use activities to practice the words and the spelling concept. On Fridays, we will have a spelling test. It will be important to practice these words at home during the week. One of the best ways to do this is to write them out in sentences. I also have spelling activities linked to the right side of the blog. Spelling City is a great one!

Math Flashcards

Parents,
Yesterday we began our multiplication unit for math. We started with the 5s multiplication facts. Your child should have come home with an envelope with flashcards in it. This envelope will go home each night and should be returned to school each day. As we learn the multiplication facts, we will be adding more flashcards. Please help your third grader to keep these in their folder.

A special reading and math fact log will be going home next week. More information to come.

Thank you! It’s been a great week! Enjoy the weekend!

3rd Grade Update!

Here is an update of what’s happening in third grade:

Writing: We are finishing up our personal narrative writing. Our third graders have done a great job of using some new strategies to make their writing interesting. We will be moving on to informational writing next week. 

Reading: We have been learning about what it means to have a discussion about our reading. We have learned about how to be respectful when we talk as a group and how to listen to others. We will be working on responding to our reading through discussion and writing. We started discussing the reading strategy of visualization. We have been practicing making mental images as we read or listen to a story. 

Math: We are finishing up unit 3 on word problems. We will review on Monday and have our Test on Tuesday. We will be moving on to multiplication next. Over the next few weeks, we will also be focusing on fact fluency. Your third grader has a collection of addition flashcards at school for practice. As we practice at school and your child masters the facts, they will be sent home. If you see flashcards come home, please do not lose them or throw them away. They still need to be practiced often. Keep them in a safe place where you and your child can access them. Thanks for your help in this. As we work on more facts, I will be sending home a weekly practice log. 

Social Studies: We continue our study of Michigan geography and have recently been learning how people, goods, and information move. We have also been talking about why they move. It was also interesting to learn about zebra mussels as something we don’t want moving into our Great Lakes. We will have a quiz on movement on Monday. A review went home on Thursday. Next week, we will review for our Geography unit test. As of right now, the test is planned for Friday. 

Spelling: We continue practicing our short a and short e words. We have learned a few word work activities this week. We will do a sentence dictation test on Thursday.