Decimals and Fractions: Really Small Numbers

In Unit 5 of Math we have reviewed place value with very large numbers.  Children should now be able to read, write and compare numbers to the millions.  (Compare, in this context, means to tell which numbers are greater or less than each other, and also order numbers from smallest to largest or largest to smallest.)

Now we have turned our attention to very small numbers.  The question to the class yesterday was:

What is less than one, but larger than zero?

Initially, this question caused some confusion.  Some children thought the question was impossible to answer.  Other children thought the answer was “negative numbers”.  When I phrased the question a different way “What is less than one dollar?  What is less than one meter?”  I had answers such as “10 cents”, “a decimeter” or “a centimeter”. This helped students to realize it is possible to have less than one whole, and still have something.

Although we are just beginning our exploration of decimals and fractions, you can help your child with these more abstract numbers by identifying whole objects around your house and discussing how they can be broken down into smaller equal parts. Decimal numbers represent amounts less than one.  When anything is broken into ten equal parts, it results in tenths (for example: a dollar can be split it into ten dimes. A dime is a tenth of a dollar). When a tenth is broken into ten equal parts, it results in hundredths (a dime can be split into ten pennies. A penny is one hundredth of a dollar).

Examples could include:

– a chocolate bar can be broken down into ten equal pieces

– a piece of paper can be broken down into tenths and hundredths

– a litter of water or milk can be split into tenths or hundredths

– pizza, pie or cake can be split into tenths

Great Readers Wonder!

Today in class, we talked about a new strategy that great readers practise on their own:  asking questions.  That is, wondering.  Sounds simple enough, but it is important that children learn to practise this skill so that it becomes automatic.

Readers should ask thoughtful questions before they read, while they read and after they read.  Questions can start with statements like:

– I wonder….

– Why…

– How…

– Will…

– Does…

– When, where, who, what….

As a class, we discussed why asking questions is important and makes us better readers: Asking questions helps keep our head in the book (engage); it makes us speculate about text yet to be read (predict); it helps us identify when we’re understanding or not understanding (monitor our comprehension); and it helps us focus on specific components or aspects of a text (recall facts and details).  In short, the more you wonder, the more you can learn!

Tonight, children are asked to focus on asking questions while they read. They will bring home a new reading strategies bookmark for their kit. When they practise asking questions, it is useful to use sticky notes to record them.  Later on, they can refer back to them and see if they are able to answer their questions.  Some answers will be found directly in the text, other answers may need to be inferred.

Here is an example of a book we used in class today to practice asking questions.  The book is called “Just a Dream” by Chris van Allsburg.

 

Before we started reading, children asked questions like “How did his bed get into the tree?“; “Is this a sad story?“; “Why is everything in the picture a different shade of green?” and “I wonder if what happens to him is real or a dream.”

While reading, children asked questions like “Why is the future so dirty?” and “Is the tree he landed in Rose’s tree?” and “Is he actually going to the real future or is he dreaming of the future?”

Lastly, when we ended the book, we realized that the story left us with more questions.  Questions that we are wondering, but can’t necessarily find the answer to in the text:

“Is the man mowing the lawn the future ‘Walter?’”  “What will the future be like for us?”  and “What are some things we could do now to protect the future?”

I encourage you to practise this reading strategy when you are sharing a book with your child.  Questions can become excellent talking points.

Happy reading!

Show! (Shhhh…. Don’t Tell)

One of the ways children can practise making inferences when they read is by paying attention to clues that indicate a character’s feelings.  The novels that we are reading in Grade Three frequently use “showing” language, rather than “telling” language for story elements such as character’s feelings or personality traits.  That is, they give hints about a character’s feelings or personality, without coming right out and directly telling the reader. This requires readers to “read between the lines” (or make an inference) using hints about facial expressions, body language, thoughts or dialogue, and situational clues.

For example, instead of an author writing “Susan was upset because she lost her favourite toy“, a great author would show (not tell) the feeling by writing “Susan’s lips trembled and her eyes welled up.  She couldn’t help wipe the tears from her eyes.” A great reader would make an inference that Susan is sad.

In class, we are practising how to identify showing statements when we read and also how to write showing statements in our stories.  We made the following posters in class to help us remember what feelings looks like:

This is also reinforcing what we learned in our previous unit in health on Empathy –  understanding how other people might feel.

Winter Poetry

In Language Arts, we have delved into a unit on winter-themed poetry.  Children are reading and writing various kinds of poems, including acrostic, cinquain, diamonte, shape and rhyming poems.  This is a great opportunity for children to learn how to interpret and use figurative language.

So far, children have learned the following examples of figurative language: similes, metaphors and onomatopoeia. They will also learn to use alliteration. Here is an example of each:

Simile (a comparison between two things using like or as):  The snow is like a white blanket.  The ice was as shiny as a mirror.

Metaphor (a comparison between two things, saying one is the other:  The icy wind bites my cheeks.  The fresh snow is a sea of white.

Alliteration:  The sleigh slid along the slippery snow.

Onomatopoeia (sound effects):  woosh, jingle, shhhh, tweet

Students are now learning how to incorporate figurative language into their poetry, which they can later apply to their story writing.  Figurative language helps children to develop their narrative voice and describe things in a more interesting way (“figuratively” rather than “literally”.  The snow was fluffy versus the snow was as fluffy as the clouds.)

In class today, we started Shape Poetry.  For homework tonight, children will be sharing their idea for a shape poem with you and their initial brainstorming ideas.  This is a chance for your child to bounce their ideas off of you and flesh out their planning.  Their shape poem will be expected to have at least one simile, one metaphor and one example of onomatopoeia.  We will write our Shape poems in class tomorrow.

Vocabulary is Everything

Did you know that vocabulary knowledge is one of the strongest predictors of reading and writing success?

Between Grade 1 and Grade 9, children’s vocabulary’s are expected to grow from 5,000 words to 50, 000 words.  That is a lot!

As Grade Three students, our goal is to expand our vocabulary, when both speaking and writing. We must learn how and when to replace “talk vocabulary” (eg. build, make) with “academic vocabulary” (construct, create). In class today, we discussed some very common verbs that tend to be overly used in narrative writing.  In particular, we focussed on the words “got“, “went“, “saw” and “said“.  This ties in with our previous lessons on using more specific adjectives in place of general ones such as “big“, “small“, “nice” or “pretty“.  Children have been given a thesaurus of alternate words to use in place of these common verbs and adjectives.  They will also be taking home a copy to keep at home. Many of them wanted to know if they could still use the “ordinary” words when they are speaking.  I emphasized that we can choose whichever words we want, based on time and place, but the words we choose definitely impact the effectiveness of our communication.

What can parents do?

You can help enrich your child’s vocabulary through the every-day conversations you have with them, especially during conversations your child has initiated. Adults directly model vocabulary choices when they speak to a child, and a child is more likely to key in on word choices when the subject is something they’re keen to talk about (Lego, sports, Science, one of their friends, etc).  When you listen to your child speak, listen to the words they select to articulate themselves: if you don’t understand what they are describing, ask them questions to help them add more detail (What did it look like?  How did you do that?  How did that make you feel?).  Provide examples of words you think they might be searching for.  Often times, children know there are better word choices to make, but might need some help coming up with it.

Listen carefully to the way your child speaks.  Often the way they speak in daily conversation is a reflection of the way they write. Notice if your child uses repeated phrases (such as “And then…” or “I got..”) and offer them a different expression.

When reading, give your child sticky notes to stick on the pages where they’ve found interesting or unfamiliar words. Ask them to share the words with you and guess at their meaning. Together, you can look the words up in a dictionary or use context clues to figure them out.

Create a Word Wall in your own house and add a new vocabulary word each week to it.

These are just some ideas.  Please feel free to share any others you may have!

Where Does Soil Come From?

In Science class today, we began our investigation into where soil comes from. We are learning about the processes of weathering and erosion and how they create soil particles from rocks. We learned that weathering is the breaking down of rocks into smaller pieces, and that erosion is the movement or carrying away of those pieces.

There are many different causes of weathering and erosion, and children are working in small groups to research the different types:

• physical weathering (caused by water, wind, and plants)
• chemical weathering (caused by climate and oxygen)
• erosion (caused by wind, water and ice)

For homework tonight, children were asked to read up on their topic by using the Learn Alberta, Powerknowledge database:  Earth & Space Science.

Under Rocks and Minerals there is a section on Weathering and Erosion (the last link).   Here is an example of some of the information the children can read.  It is also useful for children to practise reading information from a graphic organizer:

Volcanic Eruption in Hawaii in the News

One of the youngest volcanoes in Hawaii has been in the news for its recent activity.  There are some interesting live videos and photos of the lava as it encroaches on a nearby community and it shows very clearly how the lava moves.  Much of the lava has already cooled and hardened.  Although the destruction is overwhelming, the volcanic eruption does provide some benefits to the environment:  fallen ash and soot will fertilize the soil nearby, new igneous rock will be created, and the ashes will (over a long time) become sedimentary rock called volcanic tuft.  The steam from the volcanic eruption also releases water into the atmosphere (the water that at one point filled our oceans).  Here is a link to one video here:

CBC News Video

People and the Environment

Today in class we began our new unit in Community Studies on People and the Environment.  We began by reading a poem that essentially sums up what this unit is all about:  how people are dependent on the environment, and how the environment is dependent on us.  Here is the poem:

Desert, mountain, valley, plain,
Ocean shore and river’s flow,
Forests, prairies, fields of grain –
The land creates the world we know.

But people move and cities grow,
Shaking old ways and making new,
And wherever people go
They change the world around them, too

Factories, homes, the work we do,
Affect the earth in ways not planned.
For people everywhere it’s true:
The land shapes us, and we shape the land.

Although students heard the poem already today, they really enjoyed discussing it and would probably enjoy discussing it with their family.  Many had ideas about what the different phrases mean, and it is a great conversation to encourage with your child (what do you think it means by “wherever people go they change the world around them” or “factories, homes, the work we do affect the earth in ways not planned“).

In this unit, we will be looking at how the environments of other countries are similar and different to Alberta’s.  We will look at landscape features, bodies of water, climate, how the land and water gets used, and how people care for or take advantage of the environment.

Great Readers Recall Facts and Details from a Text

In class today, we added a new reading skill to our repertoire:  recalling facts and details.  Recently, we have been practising finding the main idea of a book or passage (by asking what is it mostly about).  Today, we expanded on that skill by talking about the facts and details that support the main idea.

In general, children should be able to recount facts and details from the stories and information texts they are reading.  If they cannot, then they may not have understood the passage or else they may not have been reading for meaning.  To help them monitor their comprehension of a text, they have been sent home with a bookmark with questions they can ask themselves at the end of a reading such as:  who was the story about and where did the story take place?  They should be able to answer the questions on their bookmark when they have finished a reading.

If your child has trouble recalling facts and details, it can help if they think about the main idea (what was it mostly about?).  If they can answer that, they should also be able to answer the question “how do you know what it was mostly about?” (these are the facts and details).

Tonight for homework, children are asked to practise recalling facts and details while they are reading by answering the questions on their reading strategies bookmark.

Reading Strategies Kits (for home)

Today your child is taking home a Reading Strategies kit that he/she made in class today. This Reading Strategies kit is for your child to use at home when they are reading and is intended to support their reading comprehension. Throughout the year, we will be learning strategies and skills to become deeper, more engaged readers in all subjects. Those skills will progress from basic skills and strategies (eg. finding the main idea, recalling facts and details, understanding sequence) to more advanced (eg. making inferences, interpreting figurative language and finding word meanings in context). We practise these skills in class every day. In September, we practised the following skills:

• decoding unfamiliar words
• activating background knowledge
• visualizing (making a movie in your head)
• finding the main idea (what the text is mostly about)

Today we learned that great readers make connections to real life and other texts while they are reading.

Inside your child’s Reading Strategies kit is a card to match each strategy we cover (more cards will be sent home as new skills are covered in class). They are encouraged to choose a different strategy every day while reading for at least 20 minutes. This can be independent reading or shared reading. You can directly support your child’s use of these strategies by reading with them (listening to them read or reading to them) and asking them questions that relate to the strategy, for example: What do you already know about this topic? What are you picturing? Does this remind you of anything? What was that passage mostly about?

At the end of each reading session, your child is encouraged to record the reading strategy they used on their monthly Reading Log. Practising reading strategies at school and at home will assist in these skills becoming more automatic. Children can also use them to check their comprehension (“if I can’t visualize, then I’m probably not understanding”).

In order for children to make sure your child is selecting a “Just Right” book at home for their reading level, there is a chart on the back of their reading kit to remind them (also on the reverse of this page). Children should be reading “Just Right” books independently. More difficult books can be shared or modeled aloud by an adult.

If you have any questions at any time, please let me know.

Miss Fear