Welcome to Room 212 - Mr. Stafford's Third Grade Class

This is our classroom webpage! We hope it is informative and keeps you updated on what's happening at school. If you have any questions or suggestions, please let us know.

You can email me at: staffordd@royaloakschools.com

Click Here to view the Curriculum Guide I passed out during Curriculum Night. It lists classroom Policies and Procedures including the Redo Policy.

Beetlemania!

The Fab Four were nowhere to be seen but students still had a fabulous time learning all about the Bess Beetle. They made observations, labeled body parts, and compared them to the crayfish that we have already been studying. Students also worked on a very fascinating expermiment with crayfish habitats. They used four "houses" coded with shapes to see how crayfish react when they are put together in one habitat. Students from four groups worked together to add crayfish to the habitat and then observed behaviors like entering and protecting one of the houses, defending territories, and even "battling" over space! The students were busy observing and recording data as fast as it happened!

Students carefully and bravely picked up the Bess Beetles.

"Nister Tashord! Take the ticture! Take the ticture!" Abraham says through clenched teeth!

Students add crayfish and make observations.

Students track the movements of the crayfish to the "houses".

Paleo Joe Visits Oak Ridge

Thanks to the PTA and all the families who support our fundraisers, we're able to have cool authors like paleontologist Joseph J. Kchodl, a.k.a Paleo Joe come and teach our students about reading and dinosaurs! The students were very excited to share what they already knew about dinosaurs as well as learn new things about our favorite "terrible lizards"! Did you know that the infamous velociraptor was about as big as a small dog? Doesn't seem so tough now, does he? During our library time, the five Paleo Joe books we have here at Oak Ridge were quickly checked out! March IS Reading Month!

Paleo Joe holds a VERY large dinosaur tooth! Imagine how big the toothbrush must have been!

The "T-Rex" was a lot more interesting than the character that appeared in that movie!

Why I Love the Great Lakes...

The timing couldn't have been better! Just as we finished our unit on learning how to write essays, several MSU students from Royal Oak invited us to participate in a state-wide essay contest. The contest also ties in beautifully with our recent field trip to the Dossin Great Lakes Museum. While we were there, we learned about invasive species to the Great Lakes like the Zebra Mussel and the Asian Carp. The contest asks students to write about what they love about the Great Lakes and why it's so important to protect our state's most precious natural resource from fish that could potentially change everything in our waterways! We're not only learning about Michigan's ecosystems but we're also learning about being citizens who participate in the political process of notifying politicians and other Michiganders. Students again practiced our conferencing skills to revise and edit our essays. We'll submit our essays and hope we win!

Alex and Cassidy work on paragraphs.

Being comfortable while working helps Kyle and Chase think better!

Maverick reads his essay while Payton listens and gives feedback.

These two are expert conferencers by now!

Elementary e-Folder

Make sure you check out the efolder for important March is Reading dates! Lots going on this month! If you'd like a copy of the fliers and notes that go home each week, check out Oak Ridge's e-folder. There you'll find lots of communication that you can read or print out if you'd like a hard copy. Just click on the link below. Bookmark the page so you can get back to it easily.

Oak Ridge e-folder

Study Island Anyone?

With just a click, your child can get some extra practice at home on Michigan Curriculum! If you click on the Study Island link that's on the left of this page, it will take you right to the website where we work on Reading and Math skills.

The log in is:

firstname.lastname@oakridge

password is:

firstname

It's a great way to reinforce what we're doing in the computer lab and it's fun!

Archived Webpages

If there was something you missed on a previous week, I am making links to the webpages that we've already had up. Click on one of the weeks below to find what you need.