The 3rd and 4th graders have been busy this month! In Science, we finished our paper slide videos (which will be available to watch on Facebook soon) on life cycles, and have started to learn about space. The reason for this jump is because the Boone Public Library does star parties, where you can go out and look at the stars and planets through a telescope and we are very much looking forward to that. Space is one of Mrs. Yox's
favorite things to teach and learn about because it really shows the majesty of God and
his creation. It also shows us just how much he loves us because in the scheme of things, we really are tiny and seemingly insignificant. The students are also finding space really exciting and we will be having an upcoming project on planets, which Mrs. Yox is super excited about and when it is finished, will also be available to watch on Facebook.
In Math, we are currently learning how to add in columns, and have just started to review
counting money. With credit cards being such a huge part of our lives, it is hard for the students to understand the value of money and even harder for them to recognize the different kinds of coins, so this has proven to be a lot more difficult for them than Mrs. Yox suspected. But, she believes that it is good for them to know how to count money and later this week we will learn how to count back change. It is also good for them because they have to count out bigger numbers and remember how to count by 10's, 5's, etc.
In Social Studies, we have started learning about the branches of government and the constitution, which will bring about some fun projects for the third and fourth graders, including escape rooms, debates, and drafting a bill to change one of the classroom rules.
Mrs Yox also bringing out the classic schoolhouse rock videos to help the students
retain this information.
We have been doing lots of fun things in Language Arts lately. The third graders are on
their third theme in their textbook and are learning lots of new vocabulary through the use
of Kahoot! and reading. They are also moving up in spelling, with harder words every week.
We have also started some creative writing projects. There are two especially Mrs. Yox would like to highlight: first, with a partner, the students had to rewrite the lyrics of the first verse and refrain to the song "Allstar" by Smashmouth. This came about at lunch one day when the students were telling Mrs. Yox parodies of the song lyrics and then we started making up our own at lunch, and she decided to turn it into a project. This project was good because they had to come up with something completely original, but it also had to fit within the rhythm of the song. So they had to match up the syllables of their words with the ones already in the song, without completely copying it. It also helped them understand song writing a little bit more, even though we didn't explicitly go over that. The second project is one where I had them write a persuasive letter to Mrs. Yox's husband asking him to get the class Disney+ so that we can use it in the classroom. The students had a lot of fun with this one and also learned how to start and end a letter, and why the components of a persuasive letter are important. We will be doing more on this in our Social Studies class later in the year.
We have started to do a growth mindset class once a week with a person from Heartland. She comes and teaches the students about emotional wellbeing and helps them figure out what their feelings mean and how to cope with them in an appropriate and healthy way. She comes in every Thursday to help the students learn about different kinds of emotions and help them work out their feelings. It is nice to have this time where they can just focus on how they are feeling and how to express their feelings to others.
We are so excited for Thanksgiving coming up and the opportunity to spend time with family and to get a break from our hard work in the classroom!
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