Author Visit

Learning all about the writing process and how to become a published author from Katie Zaho, author of The Dragon Warrior. She took us through the story mountain and explained how she got the inspiration for her novel.  

Campfire Stories- Unit 1 Writing Celebration

Yesterday, our 3rd graders got to tell their stories by the "campfire." We are so proud of these narrative writers and the hard work they have put into developing their story teller's voice. Make sure you check Seesaw to see your child's final draft.

Reading Celebration

This week was the end of our first reading unit: Building a Reading Life. Students worked on finding the gold in their reading lives throughout this unit. They learned ways to build their reading stamina, check in on their comprehension of a text, and dig deeper into the author's choices in a story. To celebrate, students participated in a scavenger hunt around Kipling to find a Box of Gold! They read clues together which led to their box, filled with their reading notebooks. Students then created covers for their notebooks of gold - the place where they will gather all the gold they will be getting from their texts this year. They also reflected on the unit and the gold they have found so far! Ask your child about their notebooks of gold and how they have found gold in their reading so far this year!

Writing Celebration

Hello 3rd grade families,

Next week we are finishing our first writing unit. To celebrate this accomplishment, we will be creating a classroom "campfire" where students will be sharing their stories with each other. To make this extra special, we are asking students to wear pajamas and bring in a flashlight to read with on Wednesday, October 16th. 

If you don't have a flashlight, you don't need to go out and buy one. We should have enough for students to share. 

We are so excited to "read around the campfire" and share the stories from our lives!

Disability Awareness with Beth Finke and Whitney

Special guest speaker Beth Finke and her service dog Whitney came to 3rd grade to teach us about the challenges of being blind and how she is able to accomplish many things despite her blindness. She also taught us about what a service dog is and how she uses Whitney to live more independently.

Choose Love - Courage Unit

Kipling has adopted the school theme "Color Your World With Kindness" this year. In the spirit of helping students understand what kindness means and how to show kindness to others, the 3rd grade is using the Choose Love Enrichment Program to directly teach lessons on social emotional learning.

The Choose Love Formula is: Courage + Gratitude + Forgiveness + Compassion.

We are finishing up our first unit on Courage. It takes courage to be grateful, especially when things aren't going your way. It takes courage to forgive, especially when the person who hurt you isn't sorry and it takes courage to step outside your own busy life to help others.

The students have learned a few different strategies to help them be courageous:

• Brave Breaths
• Brave Pose
• Hug the Human
• CALM

Ask your child to show you their Brave Pose and how to take a Brave Breath when they are feeling anxious or worried.

If you'd like to learn more about the Choose Love Enrichment Program, click this link.

Reading Update

Unit 1: Building a Reading Life
In the first reading unit of the year, students have learned about themselves as readers. We started the year learning about how to set ourselves up for success as readers and how to track our reading to learn more about our habits. Then students learned ways to deepen our understanding of a story, such as:

• Giving ourselves a comprehension check as we read
• Predicting using what has happened so far, what we know about how stories go, and what we know about the characters
• Looking for clues that an author is asking us to envision or collect information
• Retelling the big parts of the story, skipping over the smaller parts

As we finish the unit, students are working on strategies to build our reading grit, particularly when they come to harder words in the text. Using context clues and knowledge of figurative language are two big tools we have begun practicing. 

Ask your student about his or her reading goals. How are they working to grow their grit as a reader? What will help them to build their reading lives?