Hello Parents & Families!

I hope you are enjoying this beautiful weekend. This last week of school before winter break is filled with fun and learning. Monday this week is a full school day. Tuesday through Friday are half-days. Your child does not need to bring a lunch, but should bring a snack.

In History, we will play a review game on Monday in preparation for Tuesday's test on Ancient Rome. A study session for the test will be held in Ms. Headrick's room Tuesday morning at 7:15. All students are welcome to attend. I encourage children to come with questions or ideas that need further clarification. Your student received a study guide last week. We discussed study skills in class and students contributed the following ideas: re-read the textbook, re-write the study guide, quiz yourself with a friend, parent, or sibling, make flash cards, explain important/ concepts to someone who will listen, make a graphic organizer, highlight important information. Later in the week, we will finish watching the film on Ancient Rome that we started on Friday. The short film reviews what students learned throughout the quarter about this influential civilization.

This week is the Alice Celebration! We are looking forward to an excellent party to celebrate reading this classic tale. Please see the link below to donate your time or materials to make this party a success. In Language Arts, we will discuss the idiom "Let bygones be bygones" in a Socratic discussion. We will continue our learning in grammar and writing. There will be no new Riggs words this week. Students will be tested daily on the five words as planned, but there will be no introduction of new words. The list will start fresh after Winter Break.

As we wrap up our study of the nervous system in Science, we will make models of the brain and spinal cord to review the anatomy of the nervous system. We will also review learned facts about each component and write them to accompany the model. We will play a review game on Wednesday. A study session for the Science quiz will be held in Ms. Headrick's room Thursday morning at 7:15. All students are welcome to attend. As stated earlier, students should come prepared with questions.

Winter conferences will begin on January 2, 2013. I look forward to meeting with parents who I did not meet with in Fall as well as parents who have questions about the semester evaluation. A signup will be posted on the Archway website after December 19.

As always, feel free to email me with any questions or concerns.

Yours in Learning,

Ms. Headrick

This Week

Hello, Families!

I hope you are all doing well. We are almost at the end of the semester--the time has really flown by. Here are a few important notes:

• The Alice party is planned as scheduled. Please see last week's blog post to sign up to donate materials or time.
• Because of the shortened schedule next week, the nervous system quiz is moved to next week Thursday (December 13th). 
• There will not be a cumulative human body test because of the shortened week. Instead, we will spend more time delving into the nervous system.
• The unit test on Rome will occur Tuesday, December 11th. Study guides will be sent home tomorrow.
• Project Week (the first week of January) guides will be sent home this week, Thursday or Friday.

This week in History, we will continue to study Ancient Rome as we near the end of the Roman Empire. We will discuss the persecution of Christians, compare the Eastern and Western Empire, and watch a film about the Roman Empire. 

In Science, we are continuing to study the nervous system through learning about both the central and peripheral nervous systems. We will grow to understand how messages are sent from the brain to relatively remote locations of the body. We will study reflexes and how they are related to voluntary and involuntary muscle movement.

In Language Arts, we are finishing the book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Riggs words are available on the school website. We are continuing to revise our writing and learning about the use of transition words.

I hope to see all of you at the concert tomorrow evening! Don't forget that this is a great time to bring items for donation to the Kindergarten class (shoes, sweaters, construction paper). If you have not yet purchased an item and intend to do so, please opt to purchase a sweater to even out the number of donations.

Homework Update

Hello Parents,

Upon reflection, I realize that the amount of homework for tonight is unreasonable. As such, the Colosseum/ Circus Maximus posters will be due Monday. I do not expect any additional research to be completed for this assignment. Students have all the information they need with the reading we completed today in class. If you have any further questions, please email me.

Upcoming Dates & This Week

Hello Families!

I hope you all enjoyed our short break. The next break is just around the corner, and we will soon be at the end of our first semester. Here are some dates to put on your calendar between now and then:

• November 30th: November birthdays bring snack to snack time 
• December 7: Nervous System Quiz 
• December 11th: Test on Rome Unit --study guides will be provided prior to the test
• December 12th: ALICE IN WONDERLAND PARTY! 9-11 A.M. 
• December 11th-14th: Half-days for students
• Week of December 10th-14th: Human Body cumulative assessment (skeletal, muscular, nervous systems)
• December 14th: Last day of First Semester (and Second Quarter)

Thank you to all parents who volunteered at the Fortune-Telling booth. It was truly a fun event and it was only possible because our wonderful volunteers. Thank you. I am already looking forward to next year. 

We have another amazing event coming up very quickly: the famed 3rd grade celebration of reading Alice's Adventures in Wonderland! You should have received an email about the Alice in Wonderland party, including a link to a signup genius. We will need many volunteers for this event, as the entire third grade participates. If you are unable to donate your time, please donate supplies for the event.

Click for link to Volunteer Sign Up

Click for link to Supplies Sign Up

On Monday and Tuesday this week we worked on getting our list of spelling words back to a full 20 and practice testing on whiteboards. Students will be tested on the list starting with the word "muscle" tomorrow. Friday, they will be tested on the list starting with "relieve." In literature, we are focusing on Point of View. We are working on editing our second drafts of our expository paragraphs in writing. Finally, in grammar, we will review prepositional phrases, discuss subject-verb agreement, and classify nouns with skill building exercises.

Students took a quiz on the muscular system on Tuesday and overall did very well. We will introduce the nervous system this week, which will include discussion of the Central and Peripheral Nervous System (CNS & PNS), spinal cord, neurons, and parts of the brain including: medulla, cerebellum, cerebral cortex, and cerebrum. Next week we will discuss how messages are sent through the body and take a more in depth look at some of the wonders of the nervous system and the senses. We plan to have a quiz by the end of next week, depending on how the week goes. 

In History, we are continuing to study the wonders of Ancient Rome. Students are learning Roman Trivia of the Day in addition to daily lessons. Lessons for the week: Roman Expansion and Two Roman Leaders (Caesar and Augustus), Engineering Feats of the Romans, Famous Buildings I, Famous Buildings II, and Pompeii. 

This Week

Hello, Parents and Guardians!

I hope this blog update finds all of you happy and healthy. We are certainly happy and healthy in the classroom!

This week in Language Arts, we are reading the fifth and sixth chapters of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. The children are really enjoying the story. There is a lot of humor in the classic tale, but the meaning lies within the language. Encourage your child to talk about what we learn about interpretation of words as well as the events in the chapter to help increase their comprehension of the text. We are talking about character traits and learning how to better understand Alice as a main character. In spelling, our rule of focus is dropping the final e when adding a suffix that begins with a vowel. Riggs words are available on the school website. We are continuing to learn cursive--much to the excitement of students. We are working on expository writing in our grammar/writing study and students submitted their rough drafts today. We will have a quiz about classifying sentences this week. Students may study using their Shurley textbook. We will also review in class.

In Science, we are continuing or study of the human body by focusing on the skeletal system. We learned about joints today. Tomorrow, we will learn about x-rays and hips. We will review together on Thursday. On Friday, students will take a quiz over the skeletal system before moving on to the muscular system. Students should study using their Science notebooks. Your children have been doing a great job keeping up their notebooks organized and participating in discussion about the skeletal system.

In History, we are continuing to learn about Ancient Rome. Last week, we talked about religion and social classes in Ancient Rome. This week, we are focusing on the political structure and military of the ancient civilization. We are learning that Ancient Rome was at times a kingdom, republic, and an empire.

Chess pairs are changing this week so that more students have the opportunity to learn with and from one another and also receive appropriate amounts of challenge. The core virtue this week is Wisdom.

Finally, the Medieval Faire will be upon us shortly. Ms. Bruno and myself are getting really excited to tell some fortunes! I am also excited to see this event for the first time. As a first year participant, I can only imagine the fun to be had. Please come out to attend and, if you can, volunteer. I cannot say enough how impressed and thankful I am for all of the parent involvement at Archway.

Here ye here ye~

The Medieval Faire is approaching quickly – Saturday, November 17^th from 1:00-4:00 p.m.! This is THE BIGGEST school event of the year and tons of fun! As you know, each classroom is responsible for running one booth. This year, our class will be running the “Fortune Teller” booth. Apparently this was one of the most popular booths so we need to make it pretty awesome this year.  We need volunteers to help with booth set up, running the booth, and booth clean-up. Running the booth primarily involves having students come in to have the fortune teller give them their fortune. Ms. Headrick and Ms. Bruno have agreed to be the fortune tellers… yahoo! However we do need some help with donations of candy, small toy, fortune cookies, stickers, something that would be fun and creative!  Ms. Headrick could hand it out to the student after they had their fortune told. If anyone has any great decorations left over from Halloween or that would be fun for the booth, please let me know.  Outside of the donations we will need one parent to help manage the lineup of children, fortune telling takes some time and the kids may need some adult supervision while they are waiting.   There are also slots to help at the bounce houses and general Faire set-up and clean-up. The school is asking each Archway family to support the Faire by volunteering for at least one hour (that's just two 30 minute slots). The committee has asked that we make sure that each class has the bounce house time slots filled in as it is absolutely necessary for the safety of our children to have adult supervision at these spots.  Please help us and the school -- it's actually a lot of fun and is a great way to meet other Archway families. We are working hard to get the decorations for the booth accomplished

Please sign up and help us make our booth a success!! Here is the link for the volunteer sign up, however you can find it on the Archway website too: http://www.signupgenius.com/go/20F094CA9AC229-medieval8

Prizes will be awarded for the top three booths and I have a feeling our booth is going to be pretty awesome! Let’s make Ms. Headrick proud with lots a parent involvement and support the school with this amazing event!

If you have CPA students in your family, they can earn service hours for volunteering, plus CPA student volunteers get to enjoy the Faire activities without purchasing a wristband ($10 at the gate). Please make sure to indicate they are a CPA volunteer on the sign up. CPA student volunteers will receive a name tag at the volunteer check in.

Also, don't forget to pre-order your Medieval Faire meals, T-Shirts and Wristbands by Thursday, Nov. 8th at 4:00! Wristbands are $7 presale ($3 savings); all meals along with the REALLY COOL Faire T-Shirts MUST be pre-ordered (you cannot buy them at the Faire). Online orders can be placed here: http://www.archwaychandler.org/faire-food there are additional links to printable order forms found under Medieval Faire on the Archway website homepage.

As always, we are so grateful for your support!  Feel free to contact me with any questions, concerns or suggestions. I can be reached by email at khahn16@cox.net or by my cell phone at 602-885-4432.

Sincerely,

Kristy Hahn-McDonald  (Tatum’s  mom J) 

Tutoring Update

There will be no Language Arts tutoring tomorrow morning. Ms. Headrick has a doctor's appointment in the morning.

There will be a Math test on Thursday. Ms. Headrick will host a study session in her classroom Thursday morning. Please come prepared with questions.

Work Coming Home

Dear Parents,

Today, your child's yellow folder will be stuffed with completed work from first quarter. Some is recent and some is rather old. The older things were being kept for the purposes of writing evaluations. You will not see any assessments in the folder--I am keeping those in their permanent file. Additionally, you may see pink "Missing Homework Slips" in your child's things. This is a classroom tool that I use to keep a paper trail of any assignment that is not turned in on time. Your child has completed these assignments, and they are no longer missing. Please email me with questions or concerns. Thank you, and have a great weekend!

Ms. Headrick

Conferences This Week

Please be sure to sign up for a conference slot via the school website. The link is available on this blog to the Archway website. There are still many openings available. I hope to meet with each of you about your children

Tutoring Update

All students are invited to attend tutoring!

Math tutoring will occur Tuesday mornings at 7:15 in the classroom.

Language Arts will occur Wednesday mornings at 7:15. This week's tutoring session is cancelled due to a meeting with a conflicting time.

Finally, I will host a study session prior to our Rivers test. All students interested should come to the classroom at 7:15 on Thursday. Please come prepared with questions.

This Week's News

This week in Language Arts, we will discuss the reading skill of character traits. Using various texts, students will make inferences to think about how to describe characters. As a warm-up to this, students today talked about how to describe their close friends. Students will also be equipped with a character traits word bank. Related to this, our words of the day are character traits. We are working to see how many times we can use these words in a relevant context. Please encourage your child to use these words at home with you.

·         Monday: Arrogant

·         Tuesday: Mischievous

·         Wednesday: Inventive

·         Thursday: Graceful

We are finishing our first book, Shiloh, this week. On Friday, students will complete a graphic organizer in the shape of a beagle to draw together all of our reading skills we have studied while reading Shiloh. These will be on display in the hallway following Fall Break.

We are continuing to go through our grammar textbook. As we continue to work through the second chapter, students are learning more “jingles” and using the information they learn to write increasingly complex practice sentences. Through this, students gain writing practice and learn about the parts of speech and English language in a cohesive manner.

Our spelling words this week are commonly misspelled/ misused words: its & it’s; you’re & your; two, to & too. In this way, we hope to help children understand the proper usage of commonly misunderstood words. Additionally, students will not have an ongoing spelling list to study over Fall Break.

In Science this week, students are continuing the study of ecology—defined as the study of relationships between living things and their environment. We are studying habitats, predator/ prey relationships, and the food chain. This study will continue after fall break. Then, Science study will transition into the study of the human body.

Geography this week focuses on the study of important world rivers. Within this unit, students will learn the vocabulary words rill, canyon, erosion, meander, source, mouth, delta, dam, tributary, drainage basin and reservoir. A study guide will be sent home on Tuesday for the upcoming Geography test on Friday. This test will be the last test of the quarter and focus only on content covered in the Rivers unit.

Animal Classification Study Guide

Many parents were concerned about the Science study guide. We will complete this as a class tomorrow so that your students have a certain, corrected version of the study guide to use tomorrow night. We will also use tomorrow for a review day.

Classroom Liason Needed

We are in need of a second classroom liason. If you are interested, please contact Melanie Hunter via her contact information available on this blog. We appreciate any and all help that comes into the classroom. The donation of your time has a direct effect on the environment of our classroom and as such, student achievement. Thank you.

Picture day is this week! Our class is signed up for the slot just after lunch (12:30) on Friday, September 21^st. Please send your child with a tidy lunch that day so that no students are photographed wearing stained clothing!

Students are working together well in Chess. I love to see students teaching and learning with each other. We will play chess every Wednesday.

Study groups will begin next week. I will host a Language Arts tutoring/study group Tuesday mornings and a math tutoring/study group Wednesday mornings. They will be hosted in my classroom from 7:15 to 7:45. The topic will vary according to student need.

Starting this week, I will host a weekly lunch with the teacher. Working in alphabetical order, I will have lunch with one group of three boys or girls every Tuesday. Students do not need to bring anything special to this lunch. I am setting aside this time in hopes to develop stronger relationships with students. I am also hoping new friendships among students will stem from these lunches throughout the school year.

Science: This week, we are continuing our study of taxonomy and classification with the study of our final warm-blooded vertebrate, the mighty Order Mammalia! Today in class we discussed how vertebrates make up only 3% of the entire Animalia kingdom. We will discuss the overarching properties of the mammal as well as compare and contrast three seemingly different mammal species: the human, the dolphin, and the bear.

Language Arts: Riggs words can be found through a link on this blog or directly through the school website. We are finally getting into our Shurley textbooks. Today, we practiced our first jingles about nouns and verbs. By the end of the week, we will be classifying sentences with subject nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs. In literature, we will read Shiloh chapters 9 and 10. We will finish the book by the end of the quarter. Students are really getting interested in the plot. We are making predictions and learning about cause and effect and making connections with the text as we read.

History/Geography: Students will take the Canada test tomorrow. The short unit about our neighbors up north comes to a close as we start to discuss rivers starting Wednesday. In the Rivers unit, we will learn about rivers around the world, touching on topics such as how rivers bring life to farms and cities and learning about historical and geographical significance of major world rivers, including the Yellow, Nile, Yangtze, Mississippi, Indus, Amazon, and Ganges Rivers.

Finally, please give your student an extra hug this week! Your children are working so hard and I am proud of them as their teacher. I hope you are also proud of the work of your children.

Amendment to Yesterday’s Update

I apologize for the misinformation. We will not have a Canada test on Friday. That test will not be until next Tuesday.

This Week in 3B

Language Arts: We are continuing to delve into the Shiloh text. Students are enjoying comparing their own lives to that of Marty, the young protagonist. Thank you to all parents who come in to help with our literature circles! Our vocabulary words for Shiloh this week are Monday’s Riggs words. These words are: nudge, meadow, creation, manage, and relative. Related to Riggs, please note that the markings in your child’s Riggs notebook will not necessarily match up with the markings on the “official” version that is posted. This is due to differences in the pronunciations. Rather than demanding that all students use the same markings, the third grade teachers and I ask that the markings the students use are reasonable. We believe that this helps students feel ownership and feel motivated to consider the unique qualities of the English language. In grammar, we will investigate subject nouns and the five parts of a complete sentence. Your child will come home on Monday with their copy of Shurley English. I am asking that you help your child cover the book with any sort of protective material. We are going to have a review for homework and an in-class study session prior to our grammar test on Friday. Students will come home with review homework on Wednesday. Finally, our Socratic discussion this week is “A Case Study in Medical Ethics” from our Touchpebbles text. We will uncover and discuss the question of whether it is ever appropriate to lie.

Geography: This week, we are continuing to study our neighbors up north in Canada. We will discuss Canadian history, geography, and culture. We will compare and contrast Canada and the United states as a whole group using graphic organizers. Friday, we will have an in-class review and a short test over the material learned in the Canada unit.

Science: We are moving onto the warm blooded class of vertebrates this week. Particularly, we are studying the birds order. To aid in our understanding, we will create a lap book that focuses specifically on ostriches.  

Week of Sept 4

What’s New in 3B

General Announcements: In response to some questions raised during curriculum night, here are some answers to parent questions. First, we will celebrate student birthdays on the last Friday of every month. Please email me to let me know if your child will be bringing in a snack and I will keep track of your responses. Please note that the number of snacks your child will bring in will be determined by how many children wish to participate. This is in an effort to cut down on the loss of instructional time and cut down on the amount of food consumed by children in class. Additionally, please see the new birthday snack policy which was in the folder from Curriculum Night. Secondly, Riggs Spelling Lists are now available on the website through a link on the top left side of the blog page. Follow this like to the spelling lists. All third grade students use the same list which contains words pulled from curriculum. On a separate note, students will receive direct writing instruction through our grammar program, Shurley. Finally, look out for a detailed curriculum map posting later this week. If you sign up to follow by email, you will receive an email once this is posted.

Science: This week we are studying amphibians. Amphibians are the third class of cold-blooded (or ecothermic) vertebrates we have studied so far. By Friday, students will have a deepened understanding of the similarities and differences between frogs and toads. Next week, we will move onto warm-blooded classes of vertebrates. We will specifically study birds and mammals.

Language Arts: Students completed their first graded spelling test today. Students will take a spelling test each day and be graded on the top five words (the words that they have had the longest). Then, students write the other fifteen. These are checked for accuracy—but not corrected—and students will bring home their quizzes to complete the corrections on the opposite page. In literature, we had our first literature circles of the week. Thank you parent volunteers! If you would like to join us, please sign up through Sign Up Genius. On Thursday, we will read Chapter 6 of Shiloh. We have been discussing as a group the choices that the main character makes and the effects that his choices have in his life. This week in grammar, we are reviewing synonyms, antonyms, and analogies. Finally, the Touchpebbles story on Friday will focus on judgment and the role of a mediator.

History/ Geography: Our studies of map skills are continuing this week by studying landforms. Students will learn new material including how to identify the following landforms: bay, channel, desert, island, isthmus, peninsula, valley, plateau, prairie, and strait. By the end of the week, we will begin our study of Canada.

Other: Chess officially begins this week! Students are paired up based on ability and whether they volunteered as a teacher or opted to be taught. Students will play chess for 15 minutes between recess and lunch.

8/13 Newsletter

Dear Parents and/or Guardians,

Welcome back to another school year! It was so nice to meet all of you at Meet the Teacher. It is hard to believe that night was only two weeks ago! I appreciate all of your warm welcomes to the Archway community. We are going to have a great year together.  

Thank you for your time in continuing to sign your student’s agenda and reading log. Please also look out for any tests coming home. I am asking that students bring home the test for you to sign. I feel that this is an efficient way to increase communication about grades between the school and home. Below you will find information about the news in our classroom. Thank you for your time and interest in your child’s academic life. Our weekly schedule is on the reverse side.

Please email me at bheadrick@archwaychandler.org  to confirm that you received this newsletter. I would like to get an email list of all the parents of students in the class. Also, look out for an updated blog coming soon! Finally, I would like to invite you to join Melanie Hunter as co-classroom liaison. Please email me if you are interested in this greatly appreciated classroom role.

This Week In…

Science: Our third-grade scientists are coming to learn the classification system. Last week we grouped animals by vertebrates and invertebrates, then according to whether they are warm- or cold-blooded. This week we are starting to learn the classification system. Students now know the order is: Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus, Species. One way to remember this is: Kings Play Chess on Fine Grain Sand. Today we had an exciting science presentation with a live snake in the Chandler Prep auditorium as an example of a cold-blooded invertebrate. Friday, Ms. Bettis will bring her bearded dragon to each third-grade class. This is to introduce students to a cold-blooded vertebrate. Next week we will be looking further into cold-blooded vertebrates.

Language Arts: Last week, we read a short story called Gone is Gone. This week, we will read Amelia Bedelia to introduce students to literal vs. implied meaning of words and phrases. Next week, we will begin reading our first novel, Shiloh. Please make sure that your child has this book with him/her at school. We are reviewing in Riggs phonics before beginning our new spelling words. Archway Chandler has started using a new grammar program—Shurley grammar, which we will delve into next week. We are currently reviewing capitalization rules and nouns before commencing our work in the more rigorous grammar curriculum.

History/Geography: Last week, students took a test on the seven continents and four oceans. We did a great job! This week, we are coming into a more narrow geographic focus by using our map skills to study North America, the United States, Arizona, Phoenix, and our school. We are discussing the difference between state and national borders. Additionally, we are learning about the land forms in the United States.

General Classroom Procedures: As a group, we are establishing appropriate behavior in the classroom. Please discuss the meaning of appropriate school and classroom behavior with your child. We are working on following directions the first time they are given and, in doing so, cutting down transition time. Students are working toward having a full five minute activity at the end of the school day. We were able to play yesterday for three minutes; every day has improved since Friday. We are trying to keep that momentum going. I am confident that we can do it!  

Hello, Students, Families, and Guardians!