Persuasive Writing Digital Stories

Check out our digital stories below! These digital stories are the final, published piece of our Persuasive Writing Unit. Students came up with a thesis statement they felt strongly about and supported it with reasons and examples. Students also had the chance to learn some video editing skills as they created their persuasive speeches! Enjoy!

Justin's Video

Garrett's Video

Jax's Video

Danny's Video

Karla's Video

Jefferson's Video

Jillian's Video

Faithe's Video 

Joanna's Video

Roksolana's Video

Tatiana's Video

Niki's Video

Ashton's Video

Bryan's Video

Colton's Video

Julia's Video

Jackson's Video

Gabby's Video

Colby's Video

Matthew's Video

Anthony's Video

Zoey's Video

Kiara's Video

Ellington Public Schools is pleased to offer a variety of programs for our students this summer designed to provide enrichment experiences and academic support. Our fun-filled line up of programs include reading and math camps, Summer Science, LEGOs, theater, music, Robotics, and many more opportunities for students entering grades 1-12. Registration for all programs will begin on April 18^th and will be available through the Ellington Public Schools website under the Parents tab.

We have just started Unit 4 Measurement & Fractions for math. Please be sure to read the unit overview to understand the skills and objectives being taught this unit. Fractions are an important part of 3rd grade and will show up quite a bit on the SBAC. I look forward to using manipulatives and hands-on learning to teach the concept! 

Unit 4 Overview

Good Afternoon!

It is just about that time, CONFERENCE TIME! Conferences will be held Wednesday, March 22-Friday, March 24. The students will be dismissed at 12:00 on those days. I am doing conference sign-ups the same way as the fall. The link to the form can be found below. Please complete the form and then "X" out of it immediately. It can get glitchy and there can be overlap times if people stay in the document after finishing. Also, please don't open the document and then walk away with it open in your browser. I appreciate you taking the time to make sure the conference sign-up runs smoothly! Please email me with any questions/problems. See you soon! 

https://goo.gl/forms/E0RG3gvUNHM7ZeU63  

Good Afternoon Families!

Some of your children may already have come home and told you some exciting news! I did share some happy news with students today. My husband and I are expecting our first baby in August! We are so excited! I look forward to finishing the school year with such a wonderful group of children! Please contact me if you have any questions or concerns! 

Students are coming home with a permission slip for the movie, Because of Winn-Dixie. Please read it over and return by Wednesday, February 8.  It can also be found below.

Because of Winn-Dixie Permission Slip

We will be celebrating Valentine's Day in our classroom on Tuesday, February 14. Students can pass out valentines to classmates during this time. I have attached a list of student names. Please make sure each student in the classroom receives a valentine. Please note that this is completely optional. 

I am also asking that students bring in a brown paper bag to decorate. Lunch bags need to be brought in by February 10. We will use the decorated bags to drop our valentines! 

Valentine Names List

Another spirit day to celebrate! Crystal Lake School will have a Sports Spirit Day on Friday, February 3 to celebrate the Super Bowl! Students are encouraged to wear any sports attire and/or colors. This can be a professional sports team or a sports team that they participate on! Can't wait to see the school spirit!

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The third graders have been working toward a goal of collecting tickets for positive behavior. Their goal was 75 tickets and they earned 87! Congratulations, third graders! Students came up with ideas and suggestions and then we voted! We will be celebrating this positive behavior with a PAJAMA DAY in our classroom on Thursday, February 2. Students can come to school in their pajamas (if they wish) and be cozy all day! Please make sure students have a sole on their feet! :) This is just in our classroom only. Can't wait to see some cozy students on Thursday! Our next goal is 100 TICKETS! 

I can't believe that it is almost February. Time is flying here in our classroom. The third graders are absolutely loving Because of Winn-Dixie, a story that brings so many emotions to our hearts. We have been doing a lot of character work this unit. Students have made new friends right in their books! We have spent a lot of time getting to know our characters and noticing patterns of behavior. We have also been following characters up and down story mountains and noticing how they react to problems. We have done this work with Peter's Chair and Because of Winn-Dixie! As we have gotten to know our characters we have begun to grow theories about them. We use what we've noticed and learned about characters to develop theories and make predictions. We are coming to the end of Because of Winn-Dixie, and have noticed we are at the climax of our story! Can things get any worse for poor Opal? Ask your child to take you up and down the story mountain of their books when reading at home! 

We have been learning and sharing a lot of different strategies for addition and subtraction. Students have also been practicing rounding and estimating to the nearest ten and hundred. Students love to share their different strategies for solving different word problems. 

In the coming weeks, we will learn the standard algorithm for addition and subtraction. We will learn to use the algorithm with and without regrouping. This strategy will be the encouraged strategy to use as an efficient mathematician! 

Writers have just begun brainstorming and flash drafting persuasive writing ideas. Who knew they were so good at persuading?! :) There have been so many different ideas brainstormed and they are so exciting to read. Writers have learned that we state an opinion, support with strong reasons and then show examples/give detail to support each reason. The final product of this writing process will be a bit different than others. Students will be publishing a Digital Story for their persuasive writing. Students will create a storyboard (an outline) and then use WeVideo to create and publish a Digital Story. Students will be learning writing skills as well as video editing skills. It really is an exciting task and students in the past have loved it! Their stories really come to life when they are voiced using a video! Stay tuned as we begin to work on those. 

We also have been spending a lot of time on grammar and spelling practice. Students have been working on paying CLOSE ATTENTION to their writing, whether it is during writer's workshop or not. Capital letters and punctuation seemed to disappear so we have been working on bringing them back! If a student is not using capital letters or punctuation, they are doing the work over! We also have been learning about contractions and homophones like there, their, and they're, to, too and two, and your and you're. Students are expected to have these words spelled and used correctly in their writing! Please work with your child at home to help master this understanding.