Third Grade News
Barksdale Elementary School
Upcoming Dates
January 31st - Poetry Assessment
February 7th - Author Polly Holyoke Visits
February 14th - Breakfast with a Buddy & Valentine's Day
Information from Nurse Ericka
Dear Barksdale Parents:
We are in the season of colds, flu, stomach bugs, and strep throat. We want to minimize the chance our students will get ill in the first place, and also avoid the risk of spreading illness if students do become sick. Your children are our highest priority. Their health, safety and welfare are our top concern. We need your help to keep everyone healthy!
Please take a moment to review the attached PISD Exclusion for Health Reasons. It’s a great guide to keep handy when you’re trying to decide if your child is well enough to come to school.
If your child is ill, please contact our Office Secretary, Poornima Poondi at 469-752-0102. Please be specific about your child’s symptoms and any diagnosis you have received from your child’s doctor. This helps us to track clusters of illness so we can have extra deep-cleanings done in classrooms if needed.
Plano ISD very strictly enforces guidelines on when to stay home from school, and it takes parents and staff members working together to be successful. If a child becomes ill while at school, we will contact parents promptly to pick up their student.
Plano ISD schools routinely teach and reinforce the following:
· Proper hand washing (soap and water for 20 seconds and hand sanitizer in between)
· Washing hands after certain activities, including bathroom breaks, after recess and before lunch.
· Cough and sneeze etiquette (cough into the upper sleeve or use tissue and dispose of it properly).
· Keeping hands away from eyes, nose and mouth
· Staying home if sick (please refer to the attached guidelines)
· And other healthy habits…
Please do not hesitate to contact me if you have any questions. I’m always happy to help!
Ericka Freeman, RN
School Nurse
(469) 752-0109
Communicable Diseases
Exclusion from School for Health Reasons
To protect all children from communicable illnesses, students infected with certain diseases are not allowed to come to school while they are contagious. Students should be symptom-free for 24 hours before returning to school. Contact your campus nurse if you are unsure whether or not your child should return to school.
The guidelines below have been developed for the exclusion of students who have communicable or contagious diseases. These regulations are in compliance with the requirements of the local health authority, Plano ISD Administrative Guidelines and the Board of Trustees’ appointed medical officer.
1. A student with any of the following symptoms will be excluded from school until such time as the student is free of symptoms, has been satisfactorily treated or submits a signed physician’s statement that he/she is not contagious.
- Temperature of 100 degrees or more. Student must be fever free for 24 hours, without medication, before re-entry.
- Pain and/or swelling at angle of jaw.
- Undetermined rash over any part of the body.
- Undiagnosed scaly patches on the body or scalp.
- Nausea, vomiting or diarrhea. Student must be symptom free for 24 hours without medication before re-entry.
- Red, draining eyes.
- Intense itching with signs and symptoms of secondary infection.
- Open, draining lesions.
- Jaundice
2. The Principal or his/her designee, in collaboration with the school nurse, will notify parents that the student must be excluded for medical reasons.
3. It is the responsibility of the parent or guardian to transport the student from school to his/her home.
4. For readmission, some diseases may require a statement from the student’s physician affirming that the student is not contagious.
Friendship Party/ Valentine's Day Cards
Dear Third Grade Parents,
The “Friendship Party” is still a couple of weeks away, but we wanted to give you plenty of time to be prepared.
Please work with your child to decorate a shoebox or large tissue box. It can be decorated with just about anything. Ideas include construction paper, wrapping paper, grocery sacks, or even foil. Then, your child can decorate the box with markers, photographs, stickers, magazine pictures, etc. Please leave the box open or cut a large opening on the top. The children will use the boxes as a mailbox for the cards.
Please send these decorated boxes to school with your child on Wednesday, February 14th. (Please don’t send the box in early because we don’t have a lot of space to store the boxes.) The boxes will be used to collect the Valentine’s Day cards. Your child will bring the boxes along with their cards home that afternoon.
If your child is interested in exchanging cards, please send in enough cards for every student in your child’s homeroom class. In third grade we ask your child to sign his/her name to each card, but we would prefer that you leave the “To” part blank. We find it much easier and faster to pass out the cards that way. Please also send the cards to school on Wednesday, February 14th.
Student count per teacher:
Ledsome – 20
Hoffmann – 19
Rosen – 19
Hansen – 20
Kemendo - 19
Russell - 19
Additionally, the third grade teachers will host a Friendship Party during school on the same day. During the party, the kids will open Valentine’s cards and play a few games.
Thanks for all of your help with making this a special holiday celebration for the boys and girls.
Sincerely,
The Third Grade Team
Have you heard? Our Chromebooks just arrived!
As part of a district initiative to increase student access to district technology, Plano ISD has purchased Chromebooks for all elementary students. The Chromebooks are currently being rolled out to to each elementary campus, and ours just arrived.
In addition to increasing access to technology, the policy is intended to provide a more personalized learning experience for students.
Please send earbuds or small headphones for your child!
Poetry Unit
The boys and girls are continuing to study the structure and elements of poetry. Our end of unit poetry assessment is Wednesday, January 31st.
During the unit the students have been learning:
- Poetry is a form of writing that uses compact language, pattern, and rhythm to express feelings and ideas.
- Sensory language is used by poets to evoke a sense of sight, sound, touch, smell, taste, or movement in the reader.
- Similes and metaphors are types of figurative language that compare unlike things to create an element of surprise or help the reader see something familiar in a new way. We will also explore additional types of figurative language during the unit.
Types of poetry students will continue to explore and discuss:
- Narrative poetry tells a story.
- Humorous poetry is a surprising and funny form of rhyming poetry.
- Lyrical poetry has a songlike quality to it.
- Free verse poetry can have rhyme and rhythm but is not consistent and tends to break the rules.
The students will also apply their understanding of the structure and elements of poetry to writing their own personal poetry.