3.10.11

What a thrilling Thursday all...(can you detect my sarcasm?!?  I'm so over this rain!)  Rain, rain gooooo away...come again...NEVER!  tee-hee :)

READING:

making an Author's Purpose "P.I.E."!

Today, we continued practicing our skill of the week which is identifying the Author's Purpose for writing a text and justifying how we know which purpose they have for writing. I am a firm believer in always getting hands-on practice with any concept, (as much as possible), so today, we can our hands-on some practice with the Author's Purposes for writing!  We remember Author's Purpose by the acronym: P.I.E. (to Persuade, to Inform, or to Entertain).  We have learned that there are ways for identifying an author's purpose by looking for clues in how the text is written.  If we notice strong words and language and it seems as if there is an argumentative tone that is trying to convince us to do or believe something, then the author's purpose for writing is PERSUASIVE.  If we notice a "teaching tone" and are given facts and information, then we know that the author's purpose is to INFORM.  Finally, if we notice that the author is using fun/ colorful language that could seem friendly to kids and a somewhat "talking tone", then we know that he/she is writing to ENTERTAIN.  Obviously, many texts may be just one, but many can be more than one or even all three. The emphasis of this concept is being able to identify which one is apparent through our reading.

justifying WHY!

To get hands-on with this concept, we created our very own A.P. "pie" and found examples of text of each purpose from our classroom library.  Next, we were able to go through our reading group rotations and groups FINALLY got to do their roles for their chapter books in their literature circles for this week.  I will note that students had time in the "Word Work" rotation to work on their spelling packets which are due tomorrow.

HOMEWORK: complete spelling packets (due tomorrow) and study to prepare for our spelling test, which is tomorrow as well. 

**ALSO, BY NEXT TUESDAY, YOU MUST HAVE THE NEXT THREE (AT LEAST) CHAPTERS READ IN YOUR GROUP'S CHAPTER BOOK...and...complete your coinciding role sheet!** 

cutting a PIEce of the A.P.- P.I.E.!

MATH:
We began our new skill of focus which is data analysis and graphing (bar graphs, line plots, circle graphs, stem and leaf plots, etc.). 
We got a new packet that we will use for Independent Practice in class and for homework as well.  We will be conducting a survey and learning how to represent our findings (the data!) on a meaningful, insightful, and easy-to-read representation (a graph!).
HOMEWORK: complete any of pages 61 - 68 from your NEW WORKBOOK (3B) that you did not get completed in class
**AND: visit the websites below to get TONS and TONS of practice with graphing!!!  (Trust me, it's well worth your time!) HAVE FUN!**
http://classroom.jc-schools.net/basic/math-graph.html

http://www.gamequarium.com/data.html

PM activities:
Again, we worked on completing our ON-DEMANDS for March because we started to watch a special video about communities and then we were very disrespectful to Mrs. Ingold.  On that note, our "Silly String" party scheduled for tomorrow is cancelled. I will have a reward in "Lunch Bunch" for those students who were on task and have maintained respectful expectations throughout this week. 

I hope you have a wonderful evening and guess what?!?  Tomorrow is FRIDAY!!!
xoxo,
Mrs. Thomas