December Already?

Well December is officially here... unbelievable! I am excited though for the holiday season. Christmas is my favorite time of year! We have a lot of Christmas music playing throughout the day in my room. Gets us all in the spirit of things!

Today we spent time learning how to summarize books that we are reading. The students had a really hard time getting the understanding of what a main idea or major idea was as opposed to just an extra detail. That is something we will be working more and more on this week to really start processing the idea. We also spent time learning what a "third grade" sentence really looks like. Before this point in the year the students have written a lot of sentences like, "It was fun." or "I liked it." We are well into third grade though and this is not what is expected of them. The students need to remember that they CAN add detail to their sentences and therefore that is expected of them. I shouldn't have to ask a ton of clarifying questions about each sentence to find out the who, what, when, where, or why. Those are things that need to be included in their sentences. That is going to take some adjusting but I told them very clearly today that work not done at a third grade level will be turned back into them and redone. We are third graders after all!

We continued writing our thank-you letters and response letters to pen pals. The students are really doing a great job on these letters! Way to go!

In math we learned about horizontal, vertical, and oblique lines. We used all of the capital letters in the alphabet to find these lines. It is surprising how many have more than one type of line! Oblique also looks like a great bonus spelling word this week... hint, hint third graders! :)

This afternoon we spend another fast afternoon starting getting in the Christmas spirit. We have many art projects planned for this week to make ornaments for our classroom tree as well as ornaments to send to Helena. Each year in front of the capitol building there is one tree for each county in Montana. Last year all of Roosevelt county schools submitted one (yes 1) ornament. Needless to say our tree looked pretty sad compared to the other ones. So this year we are making several ornaments for the students to send off to Helena to proudly represent our county.

We also are making cut out snowflakes to decorate our room with. Today we read Snowflake Bentley about a man who photographed snowflakes in the early 1900s. We learned that no two snowflakes are the same so we each had time to make our own snowflakes. Tomorrow we will add glitter and add some sparkle to those snowflakes to add to the winter feel in our classroom. I am excited! We will get to be toasty warm but enjoy the snow inside! :) Best of both worlds.

Today with your students you should find (in addition to Spelling homework due tomorrow!) a newsletter about a pajama drive we are doing as a class. Every year the Pajama Program (www.pajamaprogram.org) donates pajamas and books to children and adults in needy situations around the holidays. These are mostly children who have been abused and abandoned to add to their holiday spirit for the year. We are asking you to donate NEW pajamas (for any age or size) to this great organization. For every pair of pajamas we donate, Scholastic Book Clubs will donate a book as well to give these young people a Christmas gift. If you (or friends, neighbors or relatives) are interested in donating pajamas to this great cause, please send the pajamas with your student to school and I will take care of the rest. We are sending the box in on December 19th, so the pajamas must be received by December 18th. Thank you so much in advance of your donation!

Tomorrow is PE so remember to get plenty of rest. Bring your backpacks please and enjoy your evening! Peace out little diamonds! :) (Ask your student about the reference there!)