In English this week we have published some very impressive instructions on  ‘How to Brush a Sabre-Toothed Tiger’s Teeth’ and moved on to our next text driver, ‘Stone Age Boy’. In one part of the story, the boy and his Stone Age friend, Om, find themselves face-to-face with a furious bear in a dark cave, lit only by a flaming torch. We have begun to explore high-level vocabulary to describe fire and next week will start to use these words and phrases in our own writing.

In Maths, we have been looking at money: converting amounts from pence to pounds and pence and comparing collections of coins to see which is worth more. Some children have been problem-solving, requiring them to add amounts and find change.

This week’s spelling homework focuses on the ‘ai’ family.  Is it ‘ai’ ‘a_e’ ‘eigh’ ‘ay’ or ‘ey’ that you need to correctly spell the word? Don’t forget to consider the homophones! Vocabulary homework, as always, just needs to be a conversation between you and your child – no recording in books is necessary. Thank you for your ongoing support with this.

Well done to Lion class who won the last Year 3, head-to-head competition on SumDog. This week, SumDog focuses on individual achievement. There is a Times Table Focus and an Addition and Subtraction Assessment also, as well as all the fun games of course!  Remember that SumDog can be accessed on any device (even mobiles) via the internet (www.sumdog.com) or the App (available in the AppStore, free).

See you on Monday!

Team 3

In English this week we have been planning to write our own set of instructions on ‘How to Brush a Sabre-Toothed Tiger’s Teeth’. Previously the children had generated an array of wonderfully creative ideas to add into their writing, and matched with their warning phrases, verbs and adverbs, the finished product looks set to be very impressive.

In RE we have been looking at the Baptism of Jesus, why we choose to celebrate baptism and the role of Godparents – if possible, talk to your children about their baptism and why you chose their Godparents.

In Maths, we are wrapping up our consolidation of Number and Place Value. The children have mostly conquered key concepts such as 10 and 100 more or less than a given number and learnt strategies on how to accurately place numbers up to 1000 on a numberline.

In terms of homework, please continue to practice spellings and more importantly….. the rule! Remember that children won’t be tested on just the words they take home, they will be tested on their ability to apply the rule to other words. There will be a suffix and prefix spelling test coming up soon.

Moving forward, our new spelling focus is on the ‘ai’ family – is it ‘ai’ ‘a_e’ ‘eigh’ ‘ay’ or ‘ey’? See how many rhyming words you can find with these sounds and then try and spell them applying the correct phoneme.

Our vocabulary words focus on other ways to say ‘and’ – it’s so important that we continue to expose children to high level vocabulary and different ways  of using language and the different contexts in which in can be used. Thank you for your ongoing support with this.

The weather hasn’t been too great this week but hope you all enjoy your weekend.

Team 3

Still continuing with our Stone Age learning, this week we have been thinking more deeply about the changes that occurred as people began to explore farming. In English, we have been looking closely at what goes into a set of instructions and trying out using our own adverb/verb partnerships, time conjunction and warning phrases.

In RE we have been looking at the Baptism of Jesus, comparing art to the various gospel accounts to try and understand what happened in the River Jordan. From this, we will move on to thinking about our own Baptisms so if you have any personal photos and you’re happy to, please do share!

In Maths, we have been continuing to test our understanding of number and thinking about ‘how many more’ we need to make a given amount. The children have done brilliantly to ‘prove’ their answers with numberlines, bar models, place value grids and counters plus many more creative methods.

To end this week, the school welcomed the NSPCC and the children participated in an invaluable assembly. It focused on children’s worries and which adults are safe to talk these through with.

In terms of homework, a new SumDog challenge is running alongside the Times Tables Challenge for 250 coins! We also hope that you have found the children’s Home Spelling books in their bags and that the instructions are clear. You will find the corresponding strategies that the children need to use to practice their words stapled in the back of the book. This week’s spelling rule-

Adding prefixes.
Adding ‘un’ and ‘dis’ before a word to make an opposite.
Hint: When the word has a short vowel sound at the beginning, we usually use the prefix ‘dis.’
• Discuss what a prefix is with someone at home. Read your spelling words – make sure you know the meaning of the word and record which prefix is it to make the opposite. Record the opposite in the prefix column.
• Practice them using spelling strategies 17, 9 and 22.
• What other words do you know / can find that follow the same rules? Remember you will be tested on your 5 spelling words and 5 other random words that follow the rule so it is important that you understand it.
Spelling word (Verb) Which prefix would you use?
appear
reliable
approve
obey
usual

And our  Vocabulary Home Learning
value      cost       worth       significance       price
During the week, please try and use these words in conversation with each other and identify the different contexts in which they would be used.  Please note there is no need to write these words in Year 3 unless your child wants to!

Enjoy a lovely, sunny weekend.

Team 3

This week in Year 3 we have been continuing with our Stone Age learning, finding out interesting facts about their homes, diets, tools, farming and clothes. In English, we worked in groups to present our knowledge as a rap which we then put together with others to create a class performance. On Friday both classes battled it out on the playground with Mr Cunningham as our judge. Hippos were declared the winners! Congratulations Hippos!

In RE we have been looking at our new school Mission Statement, thinking deeply about what it means and how it affects our lives and conduct in our school and wider community.

In Maths, we have been continuing to test our understanding of number and how great or small they are in relation to each other. We’ve been working on the tricky concept of numbers lines and placing the numbers in an accurate position. This is so difficult and requires lots of resilience but we will get there!

Also this week, some children have nominated themselves and campaigned to become their class School Councillor. After giving their very impressive speeches about what they think makes a good representative and what they would bring to the role, the class voted. We’re pleased to announce that Lola M and Daniel D will be our Year 3 representatives! Well done to you both and commiserations to those who weren’t selected this time – you all did a great job of presenting to the class.

In term of homework, a new SumDog challenge is running alongside the Times Tables Challenge for 250 coins! We also hope that you have found the children’s Home Spelling books in their bags and that the instructions are clear. You will find the corresponding strategies that the children need to use to practice their words stapled in the back of the book. This week’s spelling rule is adding suffixes and knowing when to double the root word’s consonant and when to remove -e, for example. Thank you for your support to reinforce these school-taught spelling rules which support the learning of the government’s Year 3/4 Spellings.

If you have any questions regarding this or anything else, we look forward to seeing you at Monday’s Parents’ Welcome Meeting from 3:15pm.

In the meantime, enjoy the weekend!

Team 3

What a great couple of days!

Welcome back to all our children and parents, and welcome to our new pupils and families also. The children all seem to be settling in well and have risen to the challenge of Year 3, becoming deeply invested in our topic, “Stone Age to Iron Age.”

We have already learnt so much…

In English and Guided Reading we have begun looking at snippets of a new book, in which our character wakes up in a dark, damp cave in the Stone Age! We’ve been unpicking the vocabulary and starting to think about the character’s emotions as well as generating our own questions.

In Maths we’ve been using our really solid knowledge of two-digit numbers to help us to understand three-digit numbers and represent them in lots of different ways.

We hope that you have found your child’s diary in their book bag, along with their SumDog login. There are currently two ‘challenges’ live on SumDog, one for times tables and one general challenge based on achieving a target number of correct answers. We can’t stress enough how useful SumDog is, it is truly good screen time! The more it is used, the more accurate assessment of your child’s ability it gains, meaning that the questions on offer will be unique to them. In book bags today there was also the first of many pages of Year 3/4 Spelling Words for them to learn. These will be tested every other Friday.

Next week, look out for the Autumn Term Reading Passport and don’t forget our Parents’ Welcome Meeting on Monday 16th September at 3:15pm!

Have a wonderful weekend,

Team 3 – Mrs Atkins, Mrs Pike, Miss Shaw, Mrs Chapman and Mrs Gissing.

Hello,

We hope that you have all had a good weekend and that you have enjoyed this week so far.

In English, the children have enjoyed evaluating their explanation texts about the machines they had invented. We were delighted by the children’s use of conjunctions, imperative verbs and technical vocabulary when explaining how each part of their machine worked. Well done, Year Three! We have also started our new unit of learning on a poem called The Sound Collector. Each class was given a ‘mystery bag of words’ from the poem and were given the task of matching the correct sounds to the correct item. Afterwards, Year Three enjoyed going on a ‘sound walk’ around the school, listening to and collecting sounds they could hear which shall then be used in their own onomatopoeic poem about sounds around school.

In Maths, we have been revisiting our learning on fractions. In particular, we have studied fractions of amounts using bar models. We then moved on to solving ‘missing box’ fraction problems by using the inverse, drawings and number lines to help us solve each question. As the week progressed, the children worked in groups on sugar paper to interpret and draw how they would solve a multi-step problem they had been given, using different fractions. We were very impressed by the children’s use of multiple representations when analysing and presenting the problem – each group had used drawings, diagrams, numicon, multi-link and bar models as part of their strategies to begin understanding the challenge task. Great commitment, everyone!

Please see below for a selection of photos from our Fishbourne Roman Palace trip:

On Friday 12th July 2019, we look forward to Transition day whereby the children shall be spending time with their new classes and teachers in Year 4.

With best wishes,

Miss Honeywell, Mrs Stewart and Mrs Sumba.

We have had a very busy week again in Year 3.  The weather was perfect for our trip to Fishbourne Roman Palace. Thank you for sending in your children with full water bottles and sunscreen to keep them safe in the Sun.  We had a workshop where the children were able to build bridges, use ancient (replica) artefacts and dress up as Romans for the session.  They thoroughly enjoyed it! We then had chance to explore the museum and the surrounding gardens which are stunning especially on a beautiful day.

Friday the fun continued with our STEM day.  Today we became employees for the research department at LEGO.  The children had various challenges to work on throughout the day such as building a tower out of Lego 1 metre tall; creating a marble maze; building a pyramid at least 15cm tall; and building a bridge to cross a 30cm gap and hold a 1kg weight. The children rose to the challenges and were very successful.  We were particularly impressed with their resilience especially when a challenge seemed quite difficult.

Home learning has been sent home today.  Don’t forget we check and stick in new home learning on a Friday.

Have a lovely time at the St Peter’s Fest and enjoy the sun over the weekend – at last!

Team Three

Pictures:

Hello,

We hope that you have all had a good week so far. This afternoon, the children had a fantastic time at the school carnival! As part of our continental study for our Geography topic, we studied the human and physical Geography of China before making our own set of props for the Olympic-style carnival and showcasing our work to parents:

• Dragon Head
• Chinese Lanterns and fans
• Origami animals
• Chinese Dance
• Pastel Art (Chinese Fruits)

It was wonderful to also see the children , as part of today’s non-school uniform day, wear traditional Chinese clothing including hats and kimonos. They also enjoyed a choice of Chinese Noodles and Vegetable Curry, for lunch! Please see the photos of our day, below:

In English, we have been learning about causal conjunctions and how these can be used to explain how a machine works. Year Three have particularly enjoyed designing and inventing their own machines, which shall perform specific jobs in and around their homes. Next week, we look forward to drafting, editing, publishing and evaluating our work. Well done for all of your creative ideas, everyone!

In Maths, we have been learning about multiplication and division. In particular, we have been learning how to use related number facts and mental strategies such as halving, doubling and ’10 times bigger or smaller’. As the week progressed, the children explored different methods for solving division problems (part-whole and repeated subtraction of groups on a number line) and compared which they felt were more efficient to use. Great use of ‘critical thinking’ skills when discussing your ideas, Year Three!

Next week, we look forward to our school trip to Fishbourne Roman Palace where we shall explore and look at a variety of Roman artefacts. The trip shall take place on Thursday 27th June 2019, please ensure that all permission slips are returned to the office as soon as possible. We also look forward to our STEM day, Reading Passport Awards assembly, as well as our St. Peter’s Summer Festival – these events shall all take place on Friday 28th June 2019.

We hope that you all have a brilliant weekend,

Miss Honeywell, Mrs Stewart and Mrs Sumba.

Hello,

We hope that you are well and that you have all had a good week so far.

In English, the children have been working very hard on their newspaper reports about the dragon invasion at St. Peters. At the start of the week, the Year Three showed great commitment and critical thinking skills when drafting, editing and publishing their final pieces of work. On Wednesday, the children walked to Waterlooville library in order to show their work to the library staff and have their news articles put on display for members of the public to see. Both classes also had the opportunity to take part in a series of activities including a library research task, making dragon masks and listening to Dragon stories. We would like to thank all of the parents and staff who helped on the walk to and from the library. Please see photos of our visit below…

In Maths, the children have been learning about statistics. In particular, we have been studying how to interpret and present data through the use of Pictograms. Year Three were able to understand the keys and produce versions of their own that were more efficient. Well done to both classes! We also looked at Pictograms that illustrated ‘half an image’ from the key, then discussed what this meant too. By the end of the week, we successfully created bar graphs using the information provided by tables and Pictograms. Please make sure to check Sumdog for your next piece of Maths home learning.

Just as a reminder, please could reply slips for our Fishbourne Roman palace trip be returned to the school office as soon as possible. If you would like to assist on the day, please contact reception.

We hope you all have a great weekend,

Miss Honeywell, Mrs Stewart and Mrs Sumba

Although it was only a short half of the term, we have certainly packed in lots of learning!

We had a very successful (and hot) walk to the church on Tuesday to celebrate Mass at Sacred Heart Church.  Thank you to all the helpers who were able to walk with the children to the church and those who were able to attend and celebrate Mass with us.

We have enjoyed learning about Boudicca in our history lessons. We learnt who she was, why she was represented in different ways, and had a go at addressing the Celts as Boudicca to give an inspirational speech. We have also looked at the Roman army that she faced and some of the tactics that the Roman Army used when fighting.

SUMDOG challenge: There is a challenge on Sumdog which runs until Monday 3rd June. Can you collect the most coins?  There is a leader board for the top 15 children in the year group.  Can you break into the top 10??

Have a brilliant and restful half term break.  Let’s hope the sun shines for some of it.

Team Three