We cannot believe we are already more than half way through this half term and only have three weeks until the Christmas holidays! We have had a great week, which has been packed full of learning and excitement.
On Thursday, we had our STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths) day, where we made string telephones and learnt about how sound can travel down a string to another person. We learnt that sound travels in sound waves and is caused by vibrations, so we tested how this works on our string telephones. We had great fun making hypotheses and investigating how we could improve the sound clarity of our string telephones.
In English, we have been writing speeches about why we should help refugees. We have been thinking about how to structure paragraphs in our speeches, with a different topic for each paragraph. We have also been focusing on self and peer marking, as well as making sure we use our writing targets from our bookmarks. During playtime, some children have been litter picking, and they have become really inspired by speech writing, so they ended up writing speeches about climate change and how we should help the environment. It’s wonderful to see how the curriculum is inspiring children to make a change to the world out of the classroom!
In maths, we have continued looking at mental methods for addition and subtraction. We compared two different strategies of subtraction – partitioning and finding the difference. We then examined which method we think is the most efficient for different subtraction questions. On Wednesday, we continued looking at choosing the most efficient method through multi-step problems with addition and subtraction. This involved examining the digits and seeing if we could swap the equation around to make it easier for ourselves. If you would like to consolidate any learning with your children, the worksheets that we have been working on can be found here: Maths Aut 2 W4 sheets. Next week, we are starting looking at arrays and linking this to multiplication, which we are very excited about.
In Topic, we looked at what we can do to help refugees. We looked at the websites of some charities, such as Refugee Action and Choose Love, and we brainstormed what we could do, including fundraising, campaigning and raising awareness. We each planned out a card to send to children in a refugee camp for New Year, which included pictures to give messages of hope, love and kindness.
We hope you have a wonderful weekend.
Your Year 3 team
Reminders
A reminder that children should bring in their reading records on Tuesday (Maple) and Friday (Oak and Redwood) for their teacher to check and see what they have been reading. Please write which pages have been read and a comment every time you read with your child at home.
The school has found that many children still don’t have the correct PE kit. A reminder that children should wear a plain white t-shirt, black/navy shorts and tracksuit bottoms and trainers. Anything else is not considered school uniform. Furthermore, as Winter has now arrived, please send your child to school with a coat.
If you would like to go over spellings with your children at home, the common exception words can be found here: https://universityprimaryschool.org.uk/learning-and-curriculum/learning-strategy/writing/