December in Grade 3

Greetings all!
With the arrival of December we are getting very excited for next weeks Christmas Concert and the other exciting events that we have going on during the month of December!

Christmas Concert - Thursday, December 11

Afternoon Performance -  2pm 
Doors at 1:45pm

• Parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles & family members are welcome to attend! Tickets are NOT required for this performance! 
• Bring a donation to the Calgary Interfaith Food Bank and have your name entered into a raffle prize draw. (for the afternoon performance only!)

Evening Performance - 6:30pm
Doors open at 6:15pm

• Today we are sending home the tickets for the evening performance of Flakes. Each family will receive two tickets for the evening performance. (Students who are performing do not need a ticket.)
• If you are not going to use your tickets, please return them to the school as soon as possible.
• If you need extra tickets please check with the office. Extra tickets are limited and will be given on a first come, first serve basis.
• Food Bank donations will be welcomed! 

Food Bank

For the month of December we will be collecting food donations for the Calgary Interfaith Food Bank. Our goal as a school is to collect over 370 pounds of food! Some of the foods on the Food Bank Wish List: pasta, rice, tomato sauce, fruit juice, canned fruit & vegetables, peanut butter, baby formula, canned fish & meat, soup, stew.

Thank you in advance from all of us at CN Gunn for your support! 

Home Reading

As our November home reading calendars come in we will total up the number of reading minutes to see if we reached our goal of 12000 minutes! Right now we are at 8, 575 minutes; still some to go to get our prize of an extra gym period. Send those calendars in if you have not already. 

For the month of December we will be aiming for 10,000 minutes. Please try to encourage your child to be reading quietly to themselves or out loud for at least 20 minutes each day! 

Royal Tyrrell Museum

Unfortunately due to the nasty arrival of winter last week we were unable to make the trek to Drumheller for our Royal Tyrrell Museum field trip. Thank you so much to all of the parents who volunteered to come - trips like that would not be possible without the amazing support we have from all of you! 

Report Cards

Student's report cards will be coming home on Friday, December 12th. Just a heads up that we are using a new grading system this year, so marks are on a 1-4 scale (instead of the 1-5 scale of previous years). There will be more information sent home in the report card envelope about this change. 

PD Day - Friday, December 5

There will be no school for students this Friday, as teachers will be engaged in professional development activities. 

This Week in Grade 3

With Remembrance Day coming up next week we have been busy discussing the significance of the poppy and why we take a minute of silence on November 11th. We read a book about how poppies became the symbol for Remembrance Day and then created beautiful thumbprint poppies.

This week was also the Halloween Candy Exchange. Students were asked to bring in a handful (or more, if they wanted) of their halloween treats to donate in exchange for a healthy recess snack. The candy will be donated to The Samaritan's Purse to be used for Operation Christmas Child, a project that sends shoeboxes filled with toys, treats, toiletries and other essentials to children in other countries. This not only encouraged students to make healthy food choices, but also created an opportunity for global citizenship in our school. In Social Studies we have been learning about organizations around the world that help people in need, and we watched a video about where the candy will be going. Our grade 3 friends were very proud of their ability to participate in such a wonderful cause.

This was just some of the candy collected from the whole school!

Our grade 3 friends showing off their apples before recess!

With the ending of October came the end of our October Reading Challenge. The goal for the whole class was to read 7000 minutes during the month. Our grand total was 8785 minutes!

The winner of our book draw was Kappy - Congratulations Kappy! :)

For November we are working on a classroom reward. Our goal is 12000 minutes and if we reach that students who participate will have the opportunity to participate in an extra gym class! Students are encouraged to read 20 minutes every day, and return their reading calendars on Mondays.

Halloween & Student Led Conferences

Today we spent the afternoon in our halloween costumes - check out these pictures of our grade 3 friends all dressed up!

What a fun afternoon!!


If you were able to come in for student led conferences, thank you for joining us to see all of the work we have been doing so far this year. Please remember to enter your email to receive blog updates.

 If you ever have any questions or concerns, please feel free to contact us via email:

Mrs. Harper - ejharper@cbe.ab.ca

Mrs. McIntyre - kamcintyre@cbe.ab.ca

October reading calendars are due in on Monday. Our class goal was to read 7000 minutes and so far we are at 4945! Students who have brought in reading calendars received a ballot for every 50 minutes that they read, and on Tuesday next week a name will be drawn for our October winner. The winning student will be able to choose a book from the Scholastic catalogue to take home and keep. November reading calendars went home today - don't forget that every student should be reading at least 20 minutes every day! :)

On Tuesday next week we are having a candy exchange. Students can bring in Halloween candy to trade in for a healthy recess snack. The candy will be donated to Operation Christmas Child through the Samaritan's Purse. What a great way to be global citizens!

A Beautiful Day for a Walk to the Library

As a part of our "It's a Crime Not to Read" program we are invited to take a tour of the Thornhill Branch of the Calgary Public Library. This is a great way for us to all feel comfortable in the library, to know where to find the books we like, and to encourage us to come outside of school time.

Yesterday we walked to the library with Constable McCartney, a member of the Calgary Police Service, who will be visiting our classroom every month to read stories and answer questions. It was fun to have a police officer stop traffic for us as we crossed Centre Street!

At the library we were able to choose two books from the kids section, and we got our own purple cloth bag to carry them in! Constable McCartney read us some really funny stories and we had a great time checking out everything that is available at the library!

Check out these pictures from our adventure...

Our grade three friends are all encouraged to visit the library with their families! We were only allowed to check out books, but there are so many other cool things to borrow - magazines, movies, CDs, and more!

Thank you to the parents who came with us on the walk, we appreciate your ongoing support. Without parent volunteers these trips would not be possible!

Just a reminder that next week is Fall Break and the school will be closed until Monday, October 20th!

A Day at the Zoo

Last Friday we were so lucky to spend the day at the Calgary Zoo! For some of us it was our first time visiting the zoo, and we all learned so much about animal habitats, behaviours and life cycles! 

We went on an African EcoTrek, which is really just a fancy way of saying that we had our own personal tour guides through the African Savannah and the Rainforest areas of the zoo! Sarah and Brandee did an awesome job of telling us all about the different animals and helping us to understand why they behave the way they do. 

Here are some of our favourite memories...

We saw the tigers walking around and we went to the very end of the zoo. ~Cheyenne

We got to see the butterfly part of the zoo and it was so pretty. It was also very hot in there! ~Noor

I liked when the bat girl came out. She knew a lot about bats and she told us lots about bats. Fruit bats don’t have to be fast or good flyers because it’s not like prey. ~Aidan

When we were walking on the sidewalk the peacock was there and he was really close to my legs and then his touched my hand. ~Bailey

When I was at the butterfly and plant area, I showed Cheyenne where the chocolate tree and the coffee tree was. ~Kairei

I learned that camels bumps are made out of food and water. ~Emily G.

I learned about how the hippos have big teeth. ~Kendra

The fruit bats, whenever they eat their fruit, they poop out the seeds and that helps make new plants. ~Arsalan

The hippos, they hold their breath in the water six minutes and sometimes you see half of the head and they breathe or they sleep.~Heala

A butterfly, in the butterfly place, landed on my finger. ~Asher

We went to the owl enclosure and we saw a bunch of owls and when we turned the corner there was an owl sleeping on the branch right in front of us. ~Brooke

When me and Amelia and our group, we went with the other class to see the lions, there was two girl lions and two boy lions and the girls were turning 20. They had babies when they were 4 and then now they are done having babies. ~Christina

We saw a penguin make a loud noise. ~Lily F.

I found out that the gorillas eat their own poop. ~Amelia

I got to see a tortoise. ~Billy

Janet and I were sitting in on a fake rhino! ~Marie

The meerkat on the top of the castle thing, he watches for predators and he makes a funny noise. ~Jordyn

I saw a butterfly hatching from its chrysalis.~Jarrick

I learned that komodo dragons are almost the size of a real dragon. ~Tristan M. 

We got to see the zoo keeper feed the grizzly bear. ~Chase

We got to see the hippo eat an apple as a special treat.~Beth

We got to see the snow leopard. They were sleeping. And the next time they were walking around. ~Hailey

I saw the whooping crane.~Sarah Y

I enjoyed when we went to go see the mountain goats there was a whole bunch of plants in the water. ~Charissa

I liked when the sun bear was walking back and forth. ~Emily Rose

A huge thank you to all of the parents who were able to join us.
We had a WONDERFUL day and are so excited for our next adventure! :)