Mrs. T.'s Tip-Top Travel Agency

Hello again!

A huge hug and many thanks to Mr. and Mrs. Friedman for their wonderful presentation yesterday. The students enjoyed learning about another culture;as well as eating the wonderful foods! Yummy! Chelsea did a wonderful job singing to us too!

I have updated the spelling words site and quizlet with this week's words to study. There are links to each on our sightseeing page.
Thought you might want to know. I did catch my typo (Thanks Nolan!) on the definition of machete. "Think" should be "thick"--as in thick, clumsy fingers of mine!

Additionally, the chocolate project has been sent home with each student. There will be additional copies on the document page in case you misplace yours. Enjoy the project! We are learning lots of different skills!

Fondly,
Mrs. T.

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Dear Families.
We are fast approaching the winter holiday break. Each student's excitement will increase each day until the holiday comes! The school is fairly vibrating now!Oh how I remember when I  couldn't wait until Santa arrived too! What a fun time of life! 

Mr. and Mrs. Friedman (Chelsea's grandparents) are coming to school Monday to teach us about Hanukkah. The program will include the history and some special foods. I think it will be great fun to learn about this holiday.

Thank you for working with your child on his/her multiplication/division facts. We have learned about the concept of repeated addition/subtraction, multiplication and division fact families and colored in our charts to the facts we know. Hopefully with your assistance, the automaticity (quick recall) of these facts will come with practice. I have sent home the worksheets for these facts that we will not be using on class. They do not have to be returned to school (stapled worksheets chpt. 9-14). Simply use as you see fit to review, practice or test your child.  After the FCAT we will be digging deeper into this skill, getting ready for fourth grade, but we have many more concepts to teach before the test in March.  

This week's reading is also expostitory nonfiction and we are working on graphing in math. Mean, median and mode are difficult conceopts at this age, but we will forge ahead hopefully finding the way to manuver through these skills! 

Our classroom novel, the original "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory", is a big hit! Currently we are comparing the original edition to the current edition. It is also a reading counts book for eight points! Each student will test on it when we are done. 

Thanks again for all you do to support your child's learning goals.
Mrs. T.  
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Happy Thanksgiving Holiday to all my families,
As a result of the shortened week and classmate absences, we will use this week to review math skills already taught and not begin a new story in our reading books. We will be reading about Thanksgiving and writing along that theme. In Social Studies we will begin our webquest for information about the cacao bean!

I sincerely wish everyone a wonderful time with their families during this holiday. We have much to be thankful for in our lives.

Mrs. T.
 
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Hello,

At the end of today, we were informed that people without tickets to tomorrow's fine feast can still come!
 
So if you were unable to send in your money, don't worry just join us anyway!

To those who did do as the fliers requested, we were given your tickets this morning. I have them, and will pass them to your child as we exit our classroom on the way to the feast! This way, I am sure you will have your tickets with nothing lost!


Additionally, we are almost halfway through our second grading period. Another way of thinking, about where we are in terms of the school year, is that we are almost done with the first half!

Many male students are finding it extremely difficult to behave in a third grade manner lately.

My expectations are:
1) Entering the classroom prepared and ready for the day's lessons.
2) Listening (aka: not talking) while I am teaching, and raising the hand for permission to speak (aka: not interrupting a speaker, be it myself or another student).
3) Arguing with an adult is not an acceptable behavior. 
4) Respect for the learning of other student in the classroom and in the school. Unacceptable behavior adversely affects the learning of students who do desire to learn.

Your child should be very familiar with these expectations. I have had the same ones since school began this year. Additionally, these are the same behaviors expected to be learned in Kindergarten, practiced in First and Second Grades.

We have far too much to learn to waste time playing and taking away from other children's learning.  Each minute I spend in the class redirecting misbehaving children, is one minute less that I have to teach those who truly desire to learn and grow.  

I believe that you, as parents, also have these same expectations for your child's behavior in my classroom.  Please remind your child of the consequences he/she may face from you for behavior that is unacceptable.
 
I thank you for your assistance in this matter. Please check your child's agenda on a daily basis to see what the day's behavior was like for them. 
Mrs. T.