Things are going very well in room 15! We have our routines down and I feel a lot of learning is going on.

We are working on using reading strategies to build comprehension of the stories we are reading. Two of the strategies we have been working on are Cause and Effect and Predicting and Inferring. As the students read, they can use these strategies to help them understand the story, follow the story line, and learn from the story they are reading.

We have also been working on how to use a dictionary. The students have learned about guide words. Putting words in alphabetical order goes right along with this skill. Also, the different parts of an entry, such as, pronunciation, part of speech, and definitions. We have discovered that many words have more than one meaning. We are learning how to choose which meaning of a word is best by using context clues within the sentence the word is used in. This is a tested third grade skill that we will be revisiting throughout the year.

The students have been doing an awesome job in math. The concepts are sometimes new or forgotten, but the students have been working really hard to learn them. I know some of you may be frustrated with the word problems from the back of the math worksheets. I have told the children to do what they can; try at least the first 2. Don’t get discouraged, they are meant to be challenging. This is a new math program and we are learning as we go. If they are too difficult, don’t spend too much time on them.

Thanks to all who volunteered to help me at the Oak Grove Carnival. The money Oak Grove PTA is donating to our class will be put to good use.

Keep reading and practicing your math facts at home. Both of these incentive programs are moving full steam ahead.

 Great typing website we practice with at school: www.bbc.co/uk/schools/typing/