Third Grade Happenings

Third Grade Musical

 

Magic School Bus

Kelly Barnes’ class has completed its Magic School Bus Class Book. The idea of our book began with a contest from Scholastic Books for designing a new title and cover for The Magic School Bus series. The winner and his or her class will get to take a field trip anywhere he or she wants! Each child has created his or her own title and then designed a cover to go with it. Each child gets their own personal copy of the book.

Mrs. Barnes Class with Debbie Ford, Beth Hudson, and Stacey Glover at the "Donation Ceremony" of the book to the USJ Lower School Library.

 

An Inventive Way to Learning

From a backpack zip-line that gets you to class on time… to cell phone earrings to keep you in touch and looking stylish… to a pencil that already knows all the answers, students in Kelly Barnes' Third Grade class certainly are imaginative and inventive.

Alaina Holt's "Borrowing Calculator" makes subtraction easier.

Barnes harnessed her students' creativity and imagination by asking them to come up with an invention. The inspiration came from "The Klutz Book of Brilliantly Ridiculous Inventions" that Barnes read to her class over several weeks. "At the end of the book, it asked for students to send in their ideas of 'inventions,' and I thought it was a perfect idea for our class book," said Barnes, who compiled the student submissions and had them bound into a book. "The students thought about their invention for a few days, wrote down their ideas on a page for the book, and illustrated their idea."

Barnes sent the class book to the Klutz publishing company, whose book inspired the project. The company responded with a letter praising the students for their "creative and clever" inventions. All of the inventions in the third grade's class book have the chance to be included in the next edition of the Klutz book.

For the past several years, Barnes's Third Grade class has produced a book on various subjects, ranging from homework excuses to what to know in Third Grade to a dictionary of Third Grade words. Some of the books come from a book the class reads or from a unit of study.

"Each class produces a book each year," said Barnes, who keeps a copy of the books in her classroom and started donating one to the library last year. "At some point in the year, we run along a story or a lesson that just lends itself to this project. Once we have compiled our book, we give it to Debbie Ford, the Lower School Director, to read and give us her feedback."

Producing the book gives the students a true sense of accomplishment, says Barnes. "They love to see their hard work in print, and the whole process gets them excited about writing, thinking, drawing, and learning."

"Santa Goes Green"

View the photo gallery of the 2008-2009 Third Grade's Christmas musical: "Santa Goes Green."

The 3rd Grade's Flat Friends' Annual Adventures

Inspired by the book "Flat Stanley" by Jeff Brown, each third grader designs a Flat Friend that they then send on vacation. Flat Friends travel the United States from coast to coast, with some lucky enough to venture far abroad to the continents of Europe, Asia, and the tropical isles off the coast of South America. The friends return with exciting tales of their adventures.