Recently, third graders have begun an exploration of electricity as one of our science units during Enrichment classes with Mrs. Rankin. "Squishy Circuits" are one activity that Mrs. Rankin hopes to explore with students. In order for this to happen, we need YOUR help to make conductive and insulating dough from an easy-to-follow recipe. If you are willing to help us by making conductive playdoh, either leave us a comment OR email your child's classroom teacher and we'll be sure to get the easy-to-follow recipe to you quickly!
Thanks for your support of our science curriculum AND enrichment!
Over the next week in math students will be learning about how to use the number line to model the distance between two numbers when solving subtraction problems. This video on LearnZillion actually gives you a nice overview, so can learn more about the subtraction strategy your student will be using in math class.
We've been enjoying the makerspace at RES for the first few months of the school year. Just a reminder, we need YOUR help to keep our makerspace filled with materials ready for us to use when we are making!
This week, we worked hard to publish our very first stories as third graders -- small moment stories about one time in our life. Throughout the unit, writers were working to use a storytelling voice instead of a new reporter voice. So, in celebration of all of our hard work throughout this unit, we invited Superintendent Alberghini in to our classrooms to share his own small moment stories!
You see, Mr. Alberghini grew up in Derby Line, Vermont, and he has LOTS of stories to share from his childhood shenanigans with his two older sisters. Today, our writers were honored to hear his retelling of his run-in with an old, forgotten bear trap near a hunting cabin in the woods around Derby.
Here is Mr. Alberghini's impression of a gray squirrel...
And here is the moment Mr. Alberghini accepts his sister Gina's dare to jump over the bear trap...uh oh!
Mr. Alberghini's gift of storytelling certainly had us all hooked from the very beginning...we really felt like we were hiking through the woods with him on an adventure!
And, in case you were thinking that maybe Mr. Alberghini is a big fibber (!), here's the scar to prove it!
What a wonderful way to celebrate our work as storytellers! Thank you, Mr. Alberghini, for inspiring us to continue our work as writers...we look forward to hearing more of your stories in the future!
And, if you're curious, here's the RES Podcast of Mr. Alberghini's Bear Trap story from a previous year!
Or a YouTube video from another year:
As you can tell, this is a favorite story of our RES 3rd Grade authors!
Last week, we had the opportunity to visit Echo Leahy Center for Lake Champlain in order to further our learning about watersheds and the issues that impact them.
First, we listened to a presentation from the Lake Champlain Basin program about invasive species in Lake Champlain, why they are troublesome, and what is being done and how we can help.
Then, we helped to tell the story of Lake Champlain's history with fossils and artifacts. Did you know...that a beluga whale was found in Charlotte? How did it get to Vermont?
We also built our own model of a watershed with a housing development, roads, a farm, and thought about ways we might be able to prevent the farm runoff from getting into our lake. We talked about impervious surfaces and absorbent surfaces, too.
A HUGE thank you to the chaperones who helped us make this trip successful. Thank you, also, to Echo for providing us with this field trip (and the bus!) at no cost! (Third grade teachers took a class at Echo this summer to write the curriculum; Echo gave us a field trip as a thank you for helping to further develop the education program offerings at Echo.)
SAVE THE DATE: Richmond Elementary School Lantern Parade Thursday November 3rd, 2016
at 6pm
(Rain Date: Thursday November 10th)
We are EXCITED to announce that students from Richmond Elementary School will be working with talented visual artist Gowri Savoor, during a six day artist in residence in mid-October. During this residency every K-4 student will create a paper lantern during their weekly art classes. Students will have a chance to create something beautiful, using varied materials and will be supported by Ms. Savoor and art teacher Mrs. Kim Aucter as they create.
The lantern parade will allow us to showcase our work to families and each other and we hope you can support this great artistic opportunity for students by saving the date and attending! The parade will include a lighted walk, music and hot cocoa.
We are so thankful for our community partners who support amazing opportunities for our students! This Artist in Residence was made possible by grants from the Vermont Arts Council and the Huntington Valley Arts.
Are you interested in helping to support the arts and this event at RES?
1. We are looking for a few recyclable items for the lantern making (drop off at school by October 14th):
Large Yogurt Containers (32 Ounces)
Shallow Plastic Containers
Small Bubble Wrap
Yarn Scraps or rolls
Plastic Tablecloths (Perhaps a birthday party leftover?)
2. We need to borrow:
Small Handheld Pruning Shears (label and we will return)
3. We need as many adult helpers as we can get—! If you have some time to come in and create with a class (or two) or could help us to organize materials and the parade. Parade organizers include helping set up materials, serve hot cocoa, and sharing your musical talent! Please sign up here: www.SignUpGenius.com/go/805084FABAD292-lantern
In the month of October, third graders at RES will be participating in the "Reading Without Walls" Challenge by National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature, Gene Luen Yang! During the challenge, third graders are encouraged to expand their reading horizons by reading a book outside of their comfort zones!
Read a book about a character who doesn't look or live like you.
Read a book about a topic you don't know much about. (STEM, history, sports)
Read a book in a format you don't normally read for fun. (picture book, comic book, book in verse)
Throughout the entire month, third graders will get to check out an extra book from the RES Library to help meet the goals of this challenge. We hope you have fun and enjoy finding new books to read with your family! For more information, check out the website here!
Mrs. LeFrancois' 4th graders reminded us this week that RES is a Terracyle'ing school! Here's a quick video reminder of which things can be terracyled instead of trashed or recycled. Feel free to bring in items from home to help our school save the environment!!
Our RES Maskerspace is open and ready for creative business! Students in Miss Darby's 3rd grade class helped Mrs. Rankin develop and share the expectations of the space with other students at RES. Check out all of their hard work!
For a visual tour of the Makerspace, you can check out Mrs. Rankin's Enrichment at RES blog.
Mrs. Rankin will continue accepting donations of consumables for the makerspace, too. Please collect items (egg cartons, toilet paper/paper towel tubes, etc.) and send them in to the Makerspace.
This is a guest post from our library media specialist, Beth Redford.
Third graders are learning skills to help them find books independently in the library. First they learned how to use the library's online catalog, OPALS, to find the call numbers for books.
Great teamwork searching for call numbers!
Then they practiced putting things in alphabetical order, including letters, words, and finally call numbers on students posing as books.
Are these "books" in alphabetical order yet?
After the alphabetical order practice, the scholars were able to find fiction books on the library shelves, because those books are in alphabetical order by the authors' last names. The third graders are so proud of their skills in searching and finding books independently!
Last week, we visited the Huntington River at the Audubon Nature Center as part of our science unit about Interdependence and Organisms. While at the river, groups of students completed three different activities.
At one station, students were working with Mrs. Ankerson to conduct a "BMI" (benthic macroinvertebrate) count of the Huntington River. This required us to use our identification skills to determine which organisms we found in the river. Photos of some of these organisms are in the slideshow.
At another station, students played a game with Mrs. Ayer to learn about the food chain within the Lake Champlain Basin. Students were either algae, macroinvertebrates, or yellow perch. During the game, students also learned about ways that the watershed can get polluted. Some examples of pollution include dog poop, cow manure, road runoff, oil, etc. We'll revisit this topic again later.
Finally, with Miss Darby, students spent time observing the environment in two ways. First, they used their senses (sight, sound, touch, smell) and took notes of their observations. Then, they drew a scientific drawing (accurately detailed with labels) of their surroundings.
A huge thanks to the Audubon for allowing us the opportunity to use their land for our field experience! (Donations to the Audubon would be greatly appreciated!)
Today students come home with our weekly newsletter on yellow paper. Our newsletter lets you know what we will be focusing on this week in school and some highlights from last week's field trip. Check out the back for a few photos from our science trip to Huntington River. More photos coming soon!
Also, we look forward to meeting you all this Wednesday from 6:00-7:00pm for our Open House! Your children are so excited to show you their classroom and what they are learning!
Students are working hard at RES to follow expectations! They are doing such a great job that we anticipate they will light the second set of lights soon! This time our celebration is giving scholars a chance to tie dye their white shirts they brought in at the start of the year in RES colors!
Kim Aucter has graciously agreed to lead this activity during our art classes, but she still needs help. We need extra hands to help with the tie dying of the shirts with students, rinsing out shirts, and also laundering all the new shirts. Please look through this Sign-Up Geniusand sign up for as many slots as you think you can help with.
Thanks for all you do to help support your children and us!
This fall, third graders at RES have a very important responsibility. We are helping six Elementary Education undergraduate students from the University of Vermont learn all about teaching and learning in our classrooms. We have opened our classrooms for their "Lab Experience in Inquiry" class this fall. The focus of their lab experience will be mathematics and social studies, but they'll experience all the great learning that happens throughout our days!
We're happy to welcome these future educators to RES Third Grade on Tuesday mornings and all day Thursday!
In Mrs. Ankerson's Class: Sarah Long and Caroline Gribble
In Mrs. Ayer's Class: Hannah Tobey and Caroline Connolly
Miss Darby's Class: Brenna Nolan and Kate Ahearn
If you happen to come by and see them, please help them to feel welcome!
As we start our year, we are establishing routines and building our classroom communities. In just a few short weeks, however, we'll be digging into our studies for the year and it will be important for students to be present during each of those academic blocks as much as possible! Please refer to this schedule to help in planning for appointments, etc. Thank you! 3rd Grade Team Schedule 2016-2017
On move-up day, our incoming 3rd graders shared everything they are looking forward to this year. It's going to be a fantastic year...we can't wait to get started!
We had an eventful last few days of third grade this year!!
On Monday afternoon, we celebrated one another with "Paper Bag Awards"...honoring the positive qualities in our classmates that we discovered over the course of the year! On Monday evening, families celebrated our year of learning as we shared our portfolios and final projects...
On Tuesday, we celebrated our final PBIS celebration for being Resctful of Ourselves, Others, and our Environment with Water Recess! (We were very happy that the warm weather returned in time, too!)
And, finally, we shared a special video we made for Mr. Berry as he prepares to leave RES for a new position at the MMMUSD-CESU Offices.
Throughout the year, we collaborate with Mrs. Rankin and Enrichment class to enhance the learning in our classrooms. Students spent three enrichment classes creating and making something that would share their learning about the Westward Expansion topic of their choice.
We had students cooking, creating green screen videos, making 3D projects from wagons to models of gold rush panning and the Alamo. I love giving the students freedom to create anything that showcases their learning and to see what they produce. I also really valued that students wanted to include reports and information that they had collected in their classrooms during their research. I think that creating a project at the end of a learning process can be a great way to give students creative freedom and to help them synthesize the knowledge they have acquired.
Sharing their learning in a project was great, but what gave it additional meaning was the knowledge that they would also share their projects with second graders and in the display case at the front of RES....as well as online in this blog post. As second graders prepare for grade 3....this connection at the end of the year is meaningful for all!
Here is a glimpse into the share with Grade 2:
This post originally appeared on Mrs. Rankin's Enrichment at RES blog.
In third grade students had an opportunity in enrichment to design and build some invention prototypes.Their creativity and inventiveness was inspiring!
Here are some examples of the excellent inventions made by third graders during enrichment:
Our third graders are so excited for next week. The actual hatching day is Tuesday, May 24th. As we all know, sometimes things arrive a little early. Sunday night into Monday morning would be the earliest hatching. Please keep checking the live stream to see if there is any movement. Once all of our chickens have hatched we will move the camera into the brooder. Spring is an exciting time in our classroom!
