Third Grade Specials
NFS Curriculum Update :: January, 2014
Art
Third grade artists will continue to explore Medieval and Renaissance art throughout January and gain a deeper understanding of what life in Europe was like during these times. Students were extremely enamored with the armor at the Philadelphia Museum of Art so we will begin the month learning more about it, looking at the beauty of its intricate designs and creating our own using special materials. Students will also learn about important landmarks and locations of the renaissance and as we move into February start learning the life and work of the four masters. Each week students will create unique pieces of artwork that will help them gain a deep understanding of history and technique but allow them to be creative and explore materials.
Library
Music
P.E.
In Lower School PE we will continue to develop our physical fitness and work on our muscular strength with a focus on core. This year we will try for the first time in Lower School a 3 on 3 basketball tournament where students will be placed on a team based on skill level. The teams will compete against the other teams in class in games of half court basketball. The students will be working skill and teamwork, however students will be monitoring fouls and rules, so there is social interaction and problem solving throughout the entire class. The month ends with the introduction of jump rope and various jump rope skills as the class begins to prepare for our 3rd annual Jump Rope for Heart event in February.
Science
Third graders continue our investigations into magnetism by finding out what happens when you put magnets next to each other and apply the new vocabulary words “attract and repel.” We will learn about magnetic force with iron filings and find out opposite poles attract while same poles repel. Finally, we will learn about compasses, the magnetic field of the earth, and make a temporary magnet to create their own compass. We will then start our new unit on ROCKS! We will talk and write about what we already know about rocks. Then we will look at 14 different objects and guessing if it was made out of a rock or not. At the end of our unit we will go back to our guesses and reevaluate our ideas and see if they change. We will also take time to observe our tree. As part of the life cycle unit, we have been observing a tree on the school grounds since the fall. On the next lovely winter day, we will outside and record how our tree has changed using our senses. They will also create an illustration to record what the tree looked like.
Spanish
Happy New Year! Third Graders began learning lots of vocabulary for describing themselves and we have been coalescing this vocabulary into a Wixie project complete with their photo and their own voice recording of them speaking in Spanish that we will share. Next we will work on using this same vocabulary to describe others and emotions/states of being (happy, sad, tired, well, excited, etc.)