Passionate People

We wrapped up the reading portion of our nonfiction unit by nominating one of Steve Jenkins books for a fictional award inspired by the Orbis Pictus medal for nonfiction. The readers had to use what they know about text structures (i.e. question/answer, cause/effect, chronological, narrative, etc.) and Jenkins use of text features as criteria for their award. See this week's Let's Recap for some of the books they chose and their reasoning behind it.

Now we have moved into the writing portion of the unit where students will use what they know about text structures and features of nonfiction text to research and write an informational piece about a topic of their choice. The choices they have made range from spicy peppers to snub nosed monkeys and everything in between. We have jumped into notetaking and next week we will use Google Slides to begin to organize our notes with headings. Then students will decide on which structural elements they will include. Maybe they will choose to have a vocabulary section, a question and answer text box, side bars, diagrams, or endnotes. We can't wait to share our Passion Projects with you when we return from the Winter Break. An invite for our Passion Project breakfast will be sent home next week.

We wrapped up our math unit last week and students self-assessed their growth. Many of them were so proud of themselves for how much they grew in developing efficient strategies for multi-digit addition and subtraction and using estimation and rounding to support a reasonable solution. Now we are moving into Unit 4 where students will be learning about measurement of time, mass and volume and beginning to explore fractions. Read here to learn more about the math concepts in this unit.

Also this week we are excited to welcome Vermont author Natalie Kinsey-Warnock. She will be visiting all of the 3/4 teams for an interactive and in-depth look at her writing process. Look forward to some pictures after her visit next week!

Please remember to have your child bring all of their winter gear to school and expect to change into some more comfortable shoes upon arrival. Our rugs are taking a beating from the salty/sandy boots!

Let's Recap

During our most recent literacy unit we are exploring nonfiction texts as readers. Steve Jenkins, creator of books like Actual Size, The Beetle Book, and Never Smile at a Monkey has been our mentor author during this unit of study  and his books have provided us with opportunities to explore access features like headings, contents, index, and glossaries. We have also used his books to explore different structures of informational text. Some are organized by Q&A, Compare/Contrast, Enumerative, and Narrative. Students have learned to use the features and structures to access information efficiently in nonfiction books. Next up, students will share their understanding of informational text access features and structure by nominating one of Steve's books for a fictional award.

During the second part of this unit we will use what we have learned about reading nonfiction to research a topic and write our own informational pieces that will teach others about a topic that students feel passionate about. This will culminate in a Passion Project Breakfast in March where they will share their writing and projects with you. Stay tuned for more information.

This week we also tried out a cool new tool called Let's Recap. Students can respond to a variety of questions using a video commentary. The application then turns their responses into a slideshow to share beyond the walls of the classroom. Here is our first recap video

Just a reminder that students should have all winter gear with them at school as we go outside each day for fresh air and time with friends. We also ask that students have shoes (preferably sneakers) to change into after they arrive at school.

Learning Goals

We hope that everyone had a restful and relaxing holiday and that your new year is off to a wonderful start. We began our new year together welcoming our two new student interns and setting mid year goals for ourselves. We also had the opportunity to share our weather projects that we hadn't gotten a chance to share before the break due to a power outage!

Meet our new interns, Naomi and Katie....


My name is Katie Johnson and I am so thrilled to be student teaching in Mrs.Parker’s 3rd grade class. I am a graduate student at Saint Michael’s College working on an Elementary Education Licensure with a concentration in Literacy. I graduated from Smith College in 2014 with a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology.

When I am not doing homework or wrangling socks from my very cute but very mischievous dog, Dahlia, I like to ski, run, bake, spend time with friends and family, and drink coffee.  I am looking forward to this tremendous opportunity to work with Mrs. Parker’s Class and Mosaic Team.

Greetings! My name is Naomi Risch and I am the new student intern for Mrs. Eaton’s class this Spring! I grew up in the Fryeburg, Maine area which is in Western Maine, right near the border of Conway, NH near Mount Washington. I moved to Vermont 9 years ago and worked in adult mental health for 6 years. I’ve wanted to be a teacher for years but could never make the leap to go back to school and in 2015 decided I couldn’t wait any longer! I started the Graduate Degree and Licensure Program at Saint Michael’s College that Fall, which has lead me here, to Williston Central School for my student teaching internship. In my spare time I am passionate about being outdoors; rock climbing, skiing and hiking. I also really love cooking and trying new recipes. One of my personal goals for 2017 is to learn how to make ravioli from scratch! I am really looking forward to my time at WCS and getting to know all of your children. I’ve only spent a quick four days with them so far, but I can already tell they’re an incredible group of students!

Here are a few photos from our presentations to Kaleidoscope. The Mosaic students were articulate and prepared and the collaboration they showed was commendable. The Kaleidoscope students were attentive, curious, and asked wonderful questions that got everyone thinking. It is so gratifying to see students engaged in project-based learning!

Next week we will continue working on efficient, reasonable ways to solve three digit addition and subtraction problems in math. We will also be launching into a unit on reading informational/nonfiction texts and crafting informative writing pieces. This will lead us to a favorite Mosaic tradition of creating Passion Projects based on a topic of students' choosing. The culminating event will be a showcase breakfast in early March. Stay tuned for more on this! 

Powerful Presenters

We were really looking forward to presenting our slideshows to our Kaleidoscope friends on Friday, but a frozen pipe interrupted our internet connection and we were unable to share all of our hard work with them. Instead we'd like to share our presentations with you. Here is the introduction that Anna and Adam wrote for the audience. Then you can click on the links to take a tour of our amazing weather houses. Enjoy the show! 

Introduction
By: Anna and Adam 

Welcome!

We have been working on these weather houses. We starting off by finding a location and studying precipitation and wind speed and temperature. Then we started  to make slides and we had to  answer four questions- They were where it happens, when it happens, how it impacts people and animals and what causes this weather to happen. Then we had to use the steps of the EDP (That’s the engineer design process) to build a house that can stand up to  our weather and then we had to make these slides. I hope enjoy the slides.

Link to Parker Weather Houses
Link to Eaton Weather Houses

Also, please help your student to be sure they have all of the appropriate winter gear they need to head outside and get fresh air at recess. You can feel free to keep any extra sets of snowpants, boots, etc. at school for easy access.

Weather Watchers

We all returned from the Thanksgiving break rested and ready to work hard. This week the students used the notes  they took before the break to create strong, informational writing pieces. These mini weather reports will serve as the first piece of information in the Google Slideshows they are creating. After writing they used their engineering plan and Google Drawing tools to create blueprints of what their "dream home" would look like. The home has to contain features that would help it withstand their type of extreme weather. We had features like heated roofs and driveways, emergency bunkers, and water collection tanks to name just a few. For students who wanted to take on the extra challenge they were encouraged to add a glossary and import photos of their weather to make their presentation even more educational and entertaining. We will practice our presentations and share with our Kaleidoscope friends on Thursday. Stay tuned for pics!

This week in math we participated in two different surveys. Then we analyzed the data and create picture and bar graphs to represent our data. The students had to practice using a scaled graph, labeling axes, and giving their graphs a clear and meaningful title.

We ended the week getting dirty in Four Winds. The students learned all about the decomposition process of trees. We were amazed at how long it takes for one tree to break down...over ten years! We enjoyed pulling apart logs from the DeSantos' yard and we found LOTS of critters who were making their home inside these snags.

There are many events this month including a two Mosaic Traditions. The first is our R.A.D. (Reading All Day) event which will be held on Wednesday, December 21st. Students are allowed to come to school in their PJs with a small lovely and a blanket if they'd like. We have guest readers, buddy reads, digital reading, and much more. We are encouraging our students to bring in gently used books (appropriate for 3rd and 4th graders) that they would like to contribute to a class book swap. It doesn't matter how many they donate. All of the books are compiled and we turn the class into a "book store" to shop for books to take home.

On Thursday, December 22nd we will have another Mosaic Craft Morning. We are looking for parent volunteers to come in and run a festive, winter craft. A sign up sheet will come home soon. We hope to see you there.

Ask About:
What type of extreme weather did you study? What did you learn about it?
How did you design your house? What features did you think it should have?

Rocking The Vote

This past week in math we have been investigating efficient strategies for solving multiplication problems. The goal is to move students beyond the use of repeated addition to use known facts and structure to make sense of more complex equations. We did this by using cubes to build "multiple trains." Then we made observations about what these different trains had in common and thought about ideas such as, "How can knowing 10x6 help you to solve 5x6?" Being able to develop efficient strategies and think flexibly about multiplication helps students to develop a conceptual understanding that will help them as we build fact fluency and explore factors, arrays, and multi-digit problems in the future.

After working hard to prepare and deliver our campaign speeches, the students used Google Forms to vote for the fictional character whom they thought would make the best president and vice president. J.K. Rowling would be proud that both of her characters were winners. Harry Potter was the clear victor for President and his friend Hermione Granger was elected V.P. The students also got to take a tour of the real polling station and ask questions of the volunteers who were dedicating their time on Tuesday.

We have now moved in to our next integrated unit of study where students will be studying weather. The focus will be on the causes and effects of extreme weather phenomenon like hurricanes, tornadoes, and blizzards. Students will be learning about cause and effect relationships and how to use text and digital tools to research. They will also be tracking and graphing weather data on a location where their type of extreme weather occurs to observe and record patterns. The engineering challenge will combine this new knowledge and their design skills as they work in groups to design a virtual blueprint of a home that could withstand the effects of the extreme weather. Stay tuned for more exciting learning ahead!

The weather has been mild, but as we head into the winter season please be sure that your child has the necessary winter gear for heading outdoors for recess. We go out everyday unless it is below zero.

Please remember that we do not have school next week. We hope that you have a restful Thanksgiving holiday with family and friends.

Fondly,
Jess and Liz 

Celebrating the Season

We started the week out sweetly with our Harvest Crafternoon (or Crafter-morning) as the schedule would have it. Thank you to all who volunteered their time and contributed snacks and beverages. The students loved it! We then headed outside with all of the 3/4 teams to put the school garden down to rest with songs and cider.

This week the students continued to work on their persuasive speeches. The students thought about how to add strong words to their pieces that would convince the "voters" to elect their nominee. Then we learned how to add an image to the speech making sure to be good digital citizens and give credit to where the photo came from.

As the week came to a close the speeches were being edited and students began to think about how to read and present their speeches with fluency and confidence. We watched one of our favorite public speakers, Kid President and created a list of things to remember when public speaking. Here's a few things that they came up with:

• Speak with enthusiasm
• Use body language
• Look at your audience
• Use a loud crowd voice
• When you're nervous...just fake it! 

Students practiced with partners and used a checklist to score each other and give feedback. Next week they will present to other voters in small groups and then rock their own fictional vote on Tuesday.

Ask about....

• Who did you nominate for a fictional president? 
• What character traits does that character have that makes you think they'd be a good president? 
• Talk to your children about how you get informed as a voter and what traits you look for in a leader.