Year 3

Welcome to Year 3!

Mrs Haines, Mrs Wilkin & Miss Slater

Summer is here!  We are really looking forward to continuing our learning this term, building on what we already know and seeing just how much we can achieve.  

Summer Term Curriculum:

RE  RE units for the Summer term will include Easter, The Eucharist, Pentecost and Prayer.  We be continuing our ‘Life to the Full’ relationships and health education, focusing on how we are created and loved by God as well as how we relate to others and to our community.

We are very much looking forward to celebrating with the children who will be receiving the sacrament of First Holy Communion this term. 

MATHS  The spring term we will be focusing on measurement, looking at mass, capacity, money  and time. We live in an increasingly cashless society  and it would be very helpful if you could give your child opportunites to handle real coins and begin to understand their values.  Another opportunity to support your child is with learning to tell the time confidently from a traditional analogue clock. 

We will also continue our work on fractions as well as looking at angles and properties of shapes in addition to different ways of representing data in statistics.

We will continue to make our maths as hands on as possible, using different equipment and different representations to strengthen and deepen our understanding. 

We will also continue to focus on fluency and instant recall of our times tables and number bonds.  Throughout all of this we will be doing lots of talking about maths, learning and using mathematical vocabulary.

Please keep encouraging your child to practise times tables and number bonds at home – if the children know these securely it helps them with their wider maths learning.  Year 3 revises and secures the 2x, 10 and 5x tables and then moves onto 3x, 4x and 8x tables.  The aim is for instant recall.  (Realistically, ‘instant’ means 3 seconds or less!!!)

Your child’s Times Table Rockstar login details have not changed.  The same login details can be used with the NumBots app too.  

Mini Maths homework is set each night, generally consisting of 5 questions designed to practise fluency as well as embed what we are learning in class.  This daily homework should only take around 5 minutes to complete.

ENGLISH will be taught by Mrs Wilkin. This term we will be learning about how to write the following text types: Narrative, Discussion and Newspapers.

Every child should have 2 books from school: a banded reading book and a library book for reading for pleasure.  Pupils should read for 25 minutes a day and this should be recorded in their diary.  Reading really does enrich the mind and has proved to have a great impact on progress.  There is also the school library which pupils can use. Thank you for your continued support in this area. 

In addition to daily reading, there is other English homework:

Daily:

RWI Spelling Words to Log and Learn (5 mins x 5 days) and Spelling Frame

Weekly:

Grammar focused or comprehension focused (30 minutes) on Century Tech.

 SCIENCE will be all about plants this term!  We have already planted some potatoes and we will be watching and observing these and other plants grow.  Science will be taught by both the specialist science teacher, Miss Swinson, and by Mrs Haines.

COMPUTING will cover a range of subjects including, branching databases (much more fun than they sound!), simulations and graphing.

In FRENCH we will be on building on the language we already know as well as moving on to talking about our families and describing people (and maybe the odd monster!) using colours and body parts.  We will start to think about French grammar and how adjectives change in agreement with masculine or feminine nouns.

Our HISTORY will be all about the Romans.  Why on earth did they invade cold and wet Britain?  Why were the Romans so successful?  Why did their empire come to an end?  How is our life today influenced by the Romans?  We will be trying to answer these questions and practising drawing conclusions from historical evidence.

In GEOGRAPHY we will be finding out more about Europe, learning about the different physical and human features of our continent and then zooming in on certain countries.

ARTwill be very exciting as we explore the world of Picasso and cubism.

DT will link closely with Science this term as we start with a unit of work on food.  We will be investigating seasonal fruit and vegetables and finding out where our food comes from.  We will also be learning how to prepare food safely and hygienically and look forward to tasting our own home-grown potatoes later in the summer.

In MUSIC we are going to be continuing to learn to play the recorder.  We are making progress playing different notes and learning to read musical notation.  We are even learning some Italian words in the process! Did you know that the word ‘piano’ is the Italian word for ‘quiet’?!

PE will be taught on Mondays and Thursdays.  Mondays will be taught by an ASM PE specialist.  Over the course of the Summer Term we will be practising our athletics skills, swimming and rounders. 

As this is the first time the children will have been swimming with school, more information will be shared separately about swimming which will take place over a period of 4 weeks.  The swimming is taught by the experienced and qualified leisure centre staff and each child’s swimming ability level will be assessed by them during the first session to make sure they are taught in the most appropriate group.

We will be making the most of the summer term weather and having our PE lessons outdoors whenever possible and appropriate.  PE kits must stay in school during term time, but will be sent home at half term to be washed.   Please ensure girls have a pair of socks in their PE bags as they will not be allowed to wear tights during a PE lesson.

Reminders:

• The school day starts at 8:40 a.m. and finishes at 3:30p.m.
• Reading should be logged in diaries each day when your child reads (30 minutes).  If it is a new book, please include the title of the book.  On each occasion, the pages read should be noted and signed by an adult.
• PE Kit

Indoor PE uniform: burgundy t-shirt with school badge, black shorts, white socks and black pumps.  Children must have black pumps for indoor PE as trainers may only be worn for outdoor PE.  If your child is wearing tights to school, please make sure they have socks to change into for PE.

Outdoor PE uniform: burgundy t-shirt with school badge, black shorts, white socks and trainers.  The burgundy hoodie and jogging bottoms are optional.

• Please ensure your child has the full, correct PE kit in school, even on days when we would not usually do PE, as occasionally timetables change.
• PE kits will stay in school during term time and will be sent home for washing at half term.
• ALL CLOTHING SHOULD BE CLEARLY LABELLED WITH YOUR CHILD’S NAME.
• Children should bring water bottles each day; these should also be clearly labelled with your child’s name.  They will be sent home regularly to allow them to be washed.
• Please do not bring large school bags in to school unless absolutely necessary. We strongly advise children not to bring toys from home into school as there is always a risk that they could be lost or damaged and they are not allowed to have them in the classroom.  Plenty of equipment and toys are provided in school for the children to play with.

Please do let us know if there is anything going on at home that will affect your child’s learning, or if you have any questions.  If you have any messages to pass on either Mrs Haines, Mrs Wilkin or Miss Slater will be available on the yard at the beginning and end of the day.  Alternatively, you can telephone the school office who will pass a message on to us for you. 

Thank you for your continuing support.  We are excited to see what this term brings, and we look forward to seeing the children grow and learn together.