Week of March 4-8

Thursday was our 3P Art Exhibit. The exhibit was the culmination of weeks of preparation in art, music, drama, as well as in our own homeroom classroom. The boys and girls worked extremely hard, especially this week to prepare. What struck me the most, and was observed by other teachers, was the depth of discussions the students were able to have. They spoke very intelligently about the features of art such as line, color, realizm, texture and form, and related their various art media to emotions, as well as to their particular memory that their art was based on. It was great to see them in action. They were very nervous beforehand, but I could see their pride and relief after it was over. Tomorrow we will debrief and they will record their observations in their living journals. How We Express Ourselves has come to an end, but their appreciation for the arts will live on no doubt. While we were busy preparing for the art exhibition, the students continued their work in math on two fronts; a review of "Bedmas" which is the standard rule of order of operations in math. It is knowing that in a mathematical equation, it is knowing that what comes inside brackets is to be done first, followed by exponents, division/multiplication, addition and subtraction, in that order. The second front was our work with decimals. For grade three students, it is imperative that they recognize that .20 is less than one, and that it is congruent to 20%, or 2/10ths. Being able to place decimals in order is also a goal. These skills are practiced in their mental math skills as well as online, in IXL. However, we take advantage of all real life situations where possible. For example this week we made a "thermometer graph" to measure our 3P donations for the Navruz initiative. The elementary school has chosen to donate food to the Mahalla which is closest to the school. We are recording the number of donations using real numbers on one side, and percent on the other. This week in language arts we continued with their work with their historical fiction stories. The students are at different stages in their stories. Some are struggling with writer's block while others are revising for content, or editing for writing conventions. There is a ways to go, but I know they will all be better writers for it. We took a break from our routine spelling this week due to the art exhibit. The students have been putting their final touches on their book of poetry they have been compiling. Some displayed their poetry at the exhibit, but all of them will upload their books to the google folders for parents to see. Be sure to see the pictures from the art exhibit below! Have a wonderful week ahead! Mr. Shawn and Ms. Olga