Campfire Stories

Thank you for visiting today, Mrs. Byrd. Everyone enjoyed your campfire stories...

Tent City

Our first few days in Tent City have been busy... as you can see we have a campfire! We meet every morning around the campfire to greet each other and find out the news of the day. In our tents we have continued to research a specific ecosystem to find out how people (not animals) live, work and play in the environment. Sophie came prepare to teach us how to make coins using poster board and tinfoil. She did a great job teaching Camp Pack how to do this.
p.s. We throughly enjoyed the letters that you wrote!

Adwards Day!

I cannot believe this year as flown by so quickly! Today signals that the end of year is coming very soon. I have enjoyed my first year at Mark Twain very much. The Super Stars have made my job easier and more delightful! I have learned so much from your wonderful children. Thanks for a great year and a big THANKS for all your help in the classroom.

TENTS!!!!!!!

Everyone was excited and thrilled to come to school today and find tents. The students got right to work creating their new school habitat.

Camping has begun!!

You won't recognize our classroom! It has been transformed into a campground. Thanks to our amazing parents. The Super Stars have been looking forward to having tents in their classroom all week. What a great way to end our planner on habitats.

Elementary School Reading at Rice University, May 15th.

Click on the following to see a slideshow of pictures from the event.

Friday afternoon at 4:30, Rice University was swarming with its newest members, Elementary students from around Houston. The students' teachers are participants in the School Writing Project which is a collaborative workshop for teachers. The result is that the students in these classrooms also benefit when the teachers bring the lessons back to the classroom. Our goal is to help students find their voice. This was evident today as the audience listened to them read their poetry and stories. We laughed, we cried and we continued to be amazed at the writing produced by these young authors. The students were recognized with a certificate of appreciation from Rice University. The poems and stories read to day will also be published in the magazine, Impressions. Congratulations to all the participants! Everyone did an amazing job. The faces of the students said it all. After reading, one student commented to another,
"you are right it feels really good after you read!"

Field Day!!!

Field Day was AMAZING! I don't know where to start.... Parents - Thank you Thank you Thank you we could not have done it without your help... from the t-shirts (how cool were they?) to snacks, water, popsicles, watermelon, and the list goes on. I think the Musters' Meteorites did a great job working together and cheering each other to do their best. The spoon relay was very exciting and how about that 50 yard dash! A great time was had by all.

Rice University Winners

The following students had their writing chosen to be read at the annual Spring Reading at Rice University. This is a great honor. The students will be reading their poetry, Friday the 15th. The poems will also be published in Impressions, a Rice University magazine. Remember everyone is invited to come and listen to the students read. Congratulations to Sebastian, Chris, Sophie, Kendall, Caleb, Caroline, Connor, Sarah, Cameron, and Gabrielle! Everyone did an amazing job and I am looking forward to hearing you read on Friday.

Habitats

We have begun our final planner, Habitats around the world. We will be focusing on how people live in different areas and how we affect the environment around us. Of course, we will also be looking at different ecosystems and how they work. The students are enjoying learning about new and interesting places. Last week we were in the desert and this week we are in the mountains.

Multiplication

The Super Stars continue to explore multiplication in different ways. Today we used place value blocks to create arrays. The arrays were a visual representation of a multiplication problem. We are practicing mental math and partial products algorithm to help us become experts at multiplication.

Mother's Day

I hope everyone had a lovely Mother's Day and you enjoyed your special surprise - a one of a kind mother and child portrait!

Have A Voice, Make A Difference

We ended our planner with a cooperative group activity. Each group was assigned a period in time and a topic to research. Together they compiled the most important information and created a piece in the grade level time line. Please take a moment to walk through time and learn about the events and people who helped to shape our country. The time line is posted next to the third grade hallway.

Teacher Appreciated!!!

This is just one of the many flower displays I received this past week. In addition, I got lots of notes of appreciation. I enjoyed reading all of them and I definitely felt appreciated! Thank you to everyone for your thoughtfulness and special gifts. You are certainly making my first year at Mark Twain a fabulous one!