Welcome to our Class Page
Year 3 Curriculum Overview can be found here: Year 3 Curriculum Overview
To access your child’s home learning via the Class Dojo, please use the following link: https://home.classdojo.com/#/login?redirectTo=%2Fstory
Friday 3rd March
We had the pleasure of a carousel of Art activities at the start of the week. Children made observational sketches of various flowers and developed the technique ‘pointillism’ in different paintings to imitate the work of George Seurat. We also made detailed fact files about Picasso’s life, art and techniques used. Children compared and discussed what they liked and disliked about these works.
In PE, children demonstrated a fantastic range of balances during our gymnastics lesson and balanced using different parts of a body. The children were super at supporting each other.
In Maths, we have been busy rounding numbers to the nearest multiple of ten and exploring different methods to calculate the multiplication of 2-digit numbers by 1-digit numbers.
In Literacy, we have been reading lots of poetry and celebrated World Book Day with a range of reading activities. The children shared stories and were inspired to create new characters following our masterclass by the author Sophie McKenzie. It was a brilliant day of reading – talking about the books and authors that we love. Don’t forget to spend your World Book Day tokens in your local book shop and participating supermarkets!
Have a wonderful weekend.
Mrs Pearson
Friday 10th February
In Science, Year 3 enjoyed investigating magnets, following on from our work about friction. The children worked brilliantly in groups to sort various classroom objects into magnetic and non-magnetic an. The children explored the way magnetic poles attract and repel in an exciting challenge set to see if they can make objects move without touch them. Our scientific enquiry skills will be further developed when we complete our own investigations to test the varying degree of strength that magnets can have
In RE, we made links between People of God and how some Christians choose to live in their whole lives. Children researched how members of the Salvation Army put their faith into action. Children thoughtfully shared some of the things they might like to do in the Salvation Army and the rewards they may experience.
Inspired by Picasso’s rose period, children created hearts and developed the tricky skill of weaving. I was so impressed with the concentration and creativity of the whole class. It was also fun experimenting with a splashing technique using paint!
Enjoy the weekend everyone!
Friday 27th January
We’ve enjoyed so many memorable experiences this week!
Young Voices was incredible! Everyone gave a fantastic performance and thoroughly enjoyed participating in such a large choir at Birmingham arena. All the children singing the same song with only one conductor was such a special event to be part of. The children also had a fabulous time watching an impressive light show and a host of great artists. It was fabulous to see Beatbox Collective, Urban Strides, an impressive violinist – Anna Phoebe and a well-known headliner – Heather Small. Thank you to everyone involved, especially Mrs Pritlove!
The next day, Mrs Hayward arranged a visit from the Bird Man for the whole school. It was fantastic! Our visitor engaged a hall full of children and adults with his talk about his wonderful birds of prey. Eagles and owls flew just above our heads! The children also made excellent links to Science. They learnt about habitats and adaptation to different environments.
We have also been learning about a force called friction in Science. We learned that objects move differently over rough and smooth surfaces because of friction. We carried out an experiment to see which surface would be best for a toy car to move along. We created a ramp and tested out different surfaces- sponge, wood, plastic and cardboard. We discovered that the car moved the fastest over the wood because it was smooth.
I hope everyone has a restful weekend.
Mrs Pearson
Friday 13th January
Happy New Year! I hope everyone had a lovely rest.
What a brilliant week Year 3! There have been so many WOW moments!
We used our new Literacy target: using capital letters, full-stops, question marks and exclamation marks to write character descriptions of Edgar from ‘Edgar the Excitable.’ We finished our assessed ‘Big Write’ where we have written the story of ‘Edgar the Excitable’ – a fire breathing dragon with our own fantastic innovations. Children delighted in reading these aloud! They were all so creative!
We have also been developing our coding and programming skills using Scratch in ICT. Children worked together wonderfully to animate different objects with different backgrounds and interesting sound effects. We have many confident, talented programmers in the making!
We have begun our new history unit, The Shang Dynasty, where we have examined historical artefacts to support our understanding of this period.
For RE, we have discussed the Christian story of Noah and the Ark. We thought carefully about the qualities Noah had for God to choose him for this important job. Children also considered the promise in the story, God’s covenant. We discovered that Christians believe God sent a rainbow to remind Noah of his promise never to flood earth again. Everyone had lots of reflective questions.
Best wishes for the weekend.
Mrs Pearson
Friday 9th December
We have achieved so much this week but by far the highlight was our incredible KS2 Carol Concert. It was a wonderful performance – we are so proud of everyone! The magic of Christmas, joy and laughter has continued to fill our classroom with Christmas themed books and craft.
Thank you for providing lots of different types of packaging to support our new DT unit on ‘Shell Structures.’ To develop our understanding on different structures, we explored food packages and opened up several boxes to discover the construction and material of various nets.
In ICT we have used an app called ‘iMotion’ to make our own animations. Children worked with their partners to take a series of photos of their sketches. Thank you to everyone for sharing examples of flip books to support this new topic.
In Maths, we have been securing our understanding of different calculation methods to solve addition and subtraction problems, including partitioning and rounding. We’ve also been counting in 3s, 4s and 8s this week, ready to apply this knowledge in different problems.
We are looking forward to our Christmas party next week and lots more. The details will be sent out shortly.
Mrs Pearson
Friday 25th November
The past few weeks have been jam-packed with lots of exciting learning!
The children loved meeting Andy Seed during the Really Wild Reading Festival. We discovered that he is a Blue Peter award winning author, has a passion for bringing history alive and has impressive knowledge about animals. Andy inspired everyone to read and write to become authors themselves! Indeed, the children created a descriptive recount following the event.
We have continued further writing this week using a very moving book – The Mousehole Cat – to write character descriptions. It is a Cornish tale of a cat and a fisherman who brave the stormy seas to save their village. Everyone used their creativity to apply possessive apostrophes in their writing e.g. Tom’s beloved cat.
In Science, we have carried out lots of experiments. We observed the colour changes in celery sticks to support our understanding of water transportation in a plant. We found that the stem acts like a straw and the thickness of the celery stalk impacted the results. We are also investigating whether a plant needs soil to grow. We have been surprised to find that a plant can grow in sand.
In Geography, we are learning about our local area and the county of Gloucestershire. We enjoyed looking at Google Earth to find various villages, towns and cities.
In Maths, we have been busy learning how to add two 3-digit numbers using various mental methods and we’re now able recall 2, 5, 10, 3, 4 and 8 times tables.
I hope everyone has a relaxing weekend.
Mrs Pearson
Friday 4th November
In Literacy, we have been working very creatively to produce our ‘Big Write.’ We are writing clear instructions on how to wash a woolly mammoth. Everyone is trying to apply all of our targets and make their instructions interesting to read.
In Maths, we have started to build and recall the 3 times tables. Children have loved learning the multiplication and related division facts (e.g. 3 x 10 = 30 and 30 ÷ 3 = 10, 3 x 9 = 27 and 27 ÷ 3 = 9). We are looking forward to the 4 times table challenge next week!
We enjoyed a fun outdoor session in Forest School. Children noticed lots of changes Autumnal changes during our walk. The children worked together to construct a shelter which involved a lot of problem-solving. We also toasted marshmallows, created mud creatures and discovered lots of interesting animals, including a frog!
Mrs Pearson
Thursday 20th October
This week we have been refining our writing target: using commas in a list. We successfully applied this target when writing a letter from a character from our class text, ‘The Stone Age Boy.’
In Science, we have set up our new experiment on Plants and will carefully monitor the results next term. The children have made some interesting predictions and made sure it will be a fair test to explore whether all plants need soil.
In RE, we have finished exploring the story of Adam and Eve called, ‘The Fall.’ Children have thought carefully about retelling the story in thoughtful descriptive sentences and pictures. We’ve also started to make sense of our main RE question this term: What do Christians learn from the Creation story?
In Maths, we have been working hard to identify horizontal, vertical, parallel and perpendicular lines. It was great to hear that children have been spotting lots of different types of lines at home. The children have also used place value counters in lessons to help their understanding of addition and subtraction. We will continue to use these resources as we move on to learning about tenths.
Finally, some children took part in a Ten Pin Bowling competition working in partnership with the Gloucester School Sports Network. This was a fantastic event and incredibly we won Gold plus the best shot of three strikes in a row! The children were delighted to receive their medals, trophy and certificate.
I hope everyone has a restful half term. It has been lovely speaking to you all for our Parents/Carers meetings.
Mrs Pearson
Friday 7th October
I hope you enjoyed our singing and the prayer we created at our Church Harvest Service. Well done to all children for remembering the song lyrics and their prayer lines.
Year 3 put our value Community into action further as we all worked together successfully during a coding masterclass hosted by Microsoft. I was impressed by their game design choices and compromises made during partner discussion. Everyone managed to code their own video game called Chase the Pizza via this platform: https://arcade.makecode.com/
A wow moment for many of the children was our PE session. The control of our passing has improved and the Tag Rugby game was so much fun! Please ask the children so they can share this with you.
In English this week, we are practising our punctuation and our new target is to use commas in a list. We have been writing a character description about Abdul Kazam, the incredible magician from ‘Leon and the Place Between’.
Enjoy the weekend.
Mrs Pearson
Friday 23rd September
What another brilliant week!
Everyone worked super hard to finish off our descriptive diary entries from the perspective of one of the characters in, ‘Leon and the Place Between.’
In Maths, we have improved our understanding of Place Value. We placed 3-digit numbers on number lines and discussed how 0 can be used as a place holder. We also counted forwards and backwards in steps of 10 from any 3-digit number. I was delighted with all of the completed Maths homework . What a terrific effort for our first week!
In History, we created a timeline, sorting events into chronological order and learning about what BC (oldest) and AD meant. We are all looking forward to discovering more facts about the Stone Age.
During RE, we have deepened our understanding of the Creation story. We’ve had lots of discussion about why we should look after the world and each other. Everyone made a thoughtful set of instructions to make the world very good.
Finally, we’ve enjoyed great sessions in PE this week. I was impressed with the skill during our basketball as well as our stamina during our outdoor session. Please remember PE kits every Wednesday and Thursday.
Have a wonderful weekend.
Mrs Pearson
Friday 16th September
The children have settled into their new classroom and adapted brilliantly to our new Key Stage 2 routines. We’ve had lots of reflective discussions around developing a ‘Growth Mindset’ and how to follow our classroom rules.
In class, we’ve also spent time talking about Queen Elizabeth II’s reign and why she was so important to the UK and beyond.
In English, our target has been to use ‘a’ and ‘an’ correctly before a noun, e.g. ‘an elegant ballerina,’ ‘an enormous ocean.’ We have linked this target into our writing to complete descriptive paragraphs based on the wondrous carousel in the story, ‘Leon and the Place Between.’ The children are already so engaged in this story! I can’t wait to read more in our Literacy lessons over the coming weeks as we explore the themes of wonder and magic to fuel their creative writing. The classroom reading area has also been a great success. Please continue to read at home as regularly as possible and update your child’s reading record.
In Maths, we have deepened our understanding of place value for 3-digit numbers. We have focused on partitioning numbers in different ways. For example:
236 = 200 + 30 + 6
236 = 100 + 130 + 6
236 = 220 + 13 + 3
We have used base 10 equipment to represent Hundreds, Tens and Ones to support our understanding. We have also practised our reasoning skills and practised writing 3 -digit numbers in words (e.g. two hundred and thirty-six).
Our Stone Age History topic and Plants Science topics have started. We have many questions that we have already started to research! In RE, we are exploring the question: ‘What do Christians learn from the Creation story.’
Well done Year 3 – you have all worked so hard!
Mrs Pearson