Welcome to Third Grade

Can you believe we are nearing the end of August? You know what that means.

School!!

Ty started 3rd grade here at Arrow Academy last week.  Wow!  Third grade!  That’s hard for me to believe.  So far it’s been smooth sailing.  Both teacher and student have had positive attitudes, and we have enjoyed getting back into the swing of things.

Once again, I am using the A Beka curriculum with Ty.  (More on why I chose this here)

For the most party, Ty’s lessons have been review of previously covered material:

In Arithmetic:
He’s working on addition and subtraction to the 1,000’s place with carrying and borrowing; Multiplication – the 0’s, 1’s, & 2’s tables; Labeling the parts of arithmetic problems (addends, sums, minuends, products, etc.); telling time to the nearest 5 minutes; linear measurements; and story problems.

In Language:
Definition of a sentence; Types of sentences – declarative, interrogative, exclamatory; Capitalization and Punctuation.

In Science:
The nervous system and the Senses – he’s learning the parts of the eyes and ears this week.

Penmanship:
Review of all cursive letters – capital and lower case.  This year he’s learning to write 3/4 space.  I wondered how he was going to do with having to write so small, but I think it’s actually a bit easier for him.

One new thing we are doing this year is a calendar notebook containing materials that I downloaded from one of my favorite homeschooling websites.  Each morning Ty takes his notebook and completes calendar-related worksheets that reinforce the days of the week, months of the year, math facts, place value, color and shape words, sight words, and the fifty states – map, abbreviations, and capitals.  The last activity in his notebook is a daily doodle – it’s just a fun, random, step-by-step drawing for him to do.  Last week he drew Dr. Seuss characters.

I also ordered a supplemental art book along with his regular curriculum this year.  The book includes about 5 simple art projects to complete each month.  Today, Ty did his first art project – Pinprick Art.  Lucy joined in the fun too.  She couldn’t wait to do the “part roject,” as she called it.

First Ty had to draw a simple picture on colored paper.  He chose Angry Birds as his subject matter of course.

Next, he had to use a push pin to poke holes all along his line drawing.

Lucy watched big brother do it, then she gave it a try.

She drew a “fish” and went to work poking holes.  Lucy was quite adroit at using the push pins.

These two monkeys had a blast with this simple little project.  Ty even confessed that art was his favorite subject in school… aside from recess, of course.  They were so proud of the finished products.  They could hardly wait for Daddy to get home so they could show off their work.

Here’s the final result…

Pretty neat! Ty squealed with delight when he saw the light shining through.  He’s easily amused.

You may have noticed the star in the center of Ty’s forehead.  He got that for making a 100 on his first trial spelling test.  All eighteen words correct.  Way to go, Ty!  Who knew that a sticker on the forehead would be such an incentive for him.  It’s amazing the work I can get outta that boy if there’s a possibility of getting a sticker on his head!  Ha ha.  Wished I had thought of this a couple of years ago.

Lindsey