Finally Able to Post

Well, I have finally gotten a chance to sit down and bring you up to date on our third grade class. We are working hard on Multiplication. The final test was this week. If students made an 80% or better they are not required to retake the test daily. We are also working on landforms. We are making a booklet that students will use on their test next week. If they followed direction on the book them the test should be an easy 100. Next week will start our test prep work getting us in the mind set for testing. We will be working on a lot of SAT 10 and ARMT testing materials. So our normal routine will change for the next few weeks. We will be doing Comprehension Toolkit to give students some work on better strategies to help them when reading and answering questions. This should be fun and something different. We will also be using the SAT 10 practice booklets to give students practice on testing skills. The ARMT testing will help students become familiar with how to organize problems and strategies to answer the questions to the fullest.

On a different note remember that Picture Day is tomorrow, and our field trip to the Space and Rocket Center is Friday.

Karate!

I stayed a little late after school yesterday to catch a few pictures of the karate class that three of our classmates take. Here is Kassie getting ready to show off her kicks.
Jake, Kassie, and A'Kyah are practicing their foot positions for the various kicks they will be working on.

They catch me taking their picture and Kassie smiles.

Trick or Treat!

Isabella was a queen for Halloween! She wanted her Aunt to take her trick or treating again this year. So off we went through the neighborhood. Last year we went five miles, we stopped after two or three this year.

She was happy with her loot. I thought she looked so cute. I let her wear some of my make-up. She thought she was so grown-up.

Halloween Party!

Mr. Thomas read two stories to us while one of our Homeroom Mom's set up in the room.

We heard Jerry Seinfeld's Halloween (the class loved this) and Witches Brew.

We then watched as he mixed our very own witch's brew. (lime sherbet and ginger ale)

We went back to the room for some yummy eyeballs.

(doughnut holes with icing and chocolate)

Slime dirt

(Jello and Oreo with gummy worms)

We ended with feeling some guts and skin.

(spaghetti and tortilla)

Then some eyeballs and teeth.

(grapes and corn)

Carving Pumpkins!

Each Table in the room had a chance to help carve a pumpkin. We had a drawing from each table to see who got to take the Jack-o-lanterns home for Halloween.

Cerise won the owl pumpkin
Tony won the jack-o-lantern from his table.

Jayden won the scary jack-o-lantern from his group.

Zach was the winning number from his table.

Austin High School Puppet Show

Austin High School came to school and did a quick puppet show for the third grade.

We had varies characters to help the students learn the problems smoking and drinking can have on a person.

Students learns the negative things smoking and drinking can do to your body.
Here are some of the students that put on the puppet show. Students had a chance to ask them questions after the show.

How Many Pumpkin Seeds!

After dissecting our pumpkins, Mrs. Long took the seeds home and fixed them for us to eat for snack. The students had also read Candy Corn Contest, so we had them try to guess how many seeds were in the jar. Emily was the closest so she received some credits. Emily guess 1,400 seeds. The actual number of seeds in the jar was 1,500. Good job Emily!

Heat Testing

All of the third grade came out into the commons to do the heat testing for our Chemical Testing Unit. The teachers took an unknown and held it over the fire. The classes had a chance to look and smell what was happening.

We took our five unknowns to see what they did when heated. Here is Mrs. Long holding the green unknown over the heat. Cerise and Tony look on to see what is happening.
This is the red unknown. We saw it turn a brown and then black and it smelled like Carmel. Wonder what it could be!

Here the orange unknown is over the fire. It smells bad.

Pumpkin Dissection

Kristi Long is an Athens State students learning to be a teacher. She spent last week with us and she is back again this week. Monday will be her last day with us. She is teaching us about the writing process this week. She read a book to the class about pumpkins and pumpkin seeds.

She then surprised the class with real pumpkins to look at. We got a chance to pull all the seeds out of the pumpkin. Later we will describe what the pumpkin feels like.
Everyone got a chance to pull seeds out of the pumpkin. Some students thought this was gross, but I did not see anyone turn down a chance to put their hand inside the pumpkin.

Here is what we pulled out of the pumpkin. Mrs. Long is going to do something with the seeds tonight, and said she would have a surprise for us tomorrow with them. We can't wait for tomorrow!

Chemical Testing!!!!

Chemical testing is a fun unit for the kids. We have to keep up with all the data we gather through various tests to find out what our unknown chemicals are.

Students have five unknown chemicals. (All household chemical, so we are not going to blow the school up) We will test each unknown with water, water mixture and a filtration test to see if they are solutions or suspensions. We did these tests on Monday.

Today we tested the five unknowns with Iodine, Vinegar, and red cabbage juice. We saw some neat things today.

We saw the orange unknown bubble and fizz when mixed with vinegar.

The orange also turned purple-black when tested with Iodine. The class loved this.
We have a class chart as well as each student collecting data and making their own chart.

Tomorrow will be the heat test and then Thursday students will use their data to find out what our five unknowns are.

Math Fun with Addition

Students used base tens to make addition problems for their partner to figure out.
The class had to figure out the numbers they were adding and then come up with the answer.

Partners would take turns trying to stump their friends.

They really enjoyed the hands on approach we used doing our daily math problems. It was a nice break from paper and pencil work.

Field Trip to Botanical Gardens

We got to the gardens and had a short class on seeds. Everyone had to sit on the seats and watching and listen as our guide explained about what we were looking for on our field trip.


Volunteers were picked to be trees who dropped acorns that became more seeds. The students had fun with this activity. They learned about how seeds move and why seeds move.

Here Alexia is passing the seeds. Students got a chance to see various seeds in different stages.

Alexia held the two seeds for me to show what the class was looking at. We have one seed that is fresh and still living. The other is a dead seed that has already released the seeds in side.

The students are looking at the flowers and looking for seeds.

We had a picture taken of all of those left at the gardens before we got back on the bus. We had a great trip. Everyone was well behaved and learned a lot about seeds.

Fall Break Trip to North Carolina

I visited my sister and her three kids in North Carolina for Fall Break. Coby who started Kindergarten this year is playing Flag Football. Saturday afternoon we went to watch his game. He is the one with the yellow shorts and red shirt in the back.
Corban the baby fell asleep at his big brothers game. He had fun watching for a while, but gave up by the end.

I did get caught sneaking Corban a chocolate chip cookie. My sister didn't get too mad because she had given him bits before. He loved it!
Here the kids are Sunday night before church. I hated thinking that I had to leave on Monday.

I finally got one picture where all three were looking at me. Coby, Sydney, and Corban were waiting for us to leave.