Year 3

Staff

  • Alex Vaughan acting Assistant Head Years 1, 2 and 3
  • Asha Matthews – Class Teacher
  • Higher Level Teaching Assistant (TA) – Joanne Leah
  • SEN TA – Sumaira Rafqat

Curriculum overview – Spring 1


Topic

Our whole school topic this half term is, ‘Britain Through the Ages’. We will go way back to
prehistoric times and travel through the Stone Age, Iron Age and Bronze Age. We will be analysing
sources and artefacts to understand the advances in civilisation and technology that were made
during these times. We will compare life in the Stone Age to our own lives and we will explore the
ways that historians actually know about these significant events.


English

Our text for this half term is, Varjak Paw, by S.F Said. It is a more advanced novel than we have previously done and so there is a lot more to it but the children have risen to the challenge and are absolutely loving hearing about Varjak and his adventures so far. We will be basing writing, reading and grammar learning on this book as well as enjoying daily guided reading, handwriting and spelling sessions.
Spelling tests will be on a Monday to give the weekend as additional time to practice.  


Maths

We will start the new year by developing our column methods for addition and subtraction, perfecting exchange in the tens and hundreds columns now. We will be covering more of a range of reasoning skills to apply our number work to promote problem solving and real life application of maths. We will continue to practise our times tables rapid recall and formal methods as well as linking them to division facts. We will continue with our work on fractions of numbers as well as basic addition and subtraction within fractions. We will explore money and solve lots of problems.

Science

Year 3 will be starting the Science unit, Forces.
Your child will explore magnets and talk about the ‘pull’ and ‘push’ of a range of forces.
Your child will test if some magnets are more magnetic through a range of practical investigations.
Your child will investigate friction and make simple comments about the patterns they notice when using a car and ramp on different surfaces or heights.

Other Curriculum Areas

RE – How do family life and festivals show what matters to Jewish people?
Art – Working with shape and colour
Music – Charanga unit: Three Little Birds
PE – Yoga (Wednesday) Games (Friday)
PSHCE –  See School Website for More Information
Computing – Stop Frame Animation
*Handwriting lessons and spellings lessons will continue throughout.


Important Dates

Wk beg 9th January : Children’s Mental Health Week
Tuesday 10th Feb: Safer Internet Day
Friday 13th February: Break Up for half term holidays

Empowering learning skills

Self manager

  • Organise themselves and work out goals and priorities
  • Show personal responsibility, initiative, creativity and enterprise
  • Anticipate, take and manage risks
  • Commit themselves to learning and self-improvement
  • Respond positively to change 

Effective participator

  • Engage actively with issues that affect them and those around them.
  • Play a full part in the life of the school
  • Take responsible action to bring improvement for others as well as themselves
  • Discuss issues of concern, seeking resolution
  • Present a persuasive case for action
  • Propose practical ways forward
  • Try to influence others, negotiating and balancing diverse views

Resourceful thinker

  • Think creatively by generating and exploring relevant ideas, and making original connections
  • Find links and see relationships
  • Explore & experiment with resources and materials
  • Ask ‘why’, ‘how’ and ‘what if’ questions
  • Apply imaginative thinking to solve a problem
  • Try different ways to tackle a problem
  • Work with others to find imaginative solutions and outcomes that are of value

Reflective learner

  • Evaluate their strengths and limitations as learners
  • Review their work and act on outcomes
  • Set themselves realistic goals and criteria for success
  • Monitor their own performance and progress
  • Invite feedback and deal positively with praise, setbacks & criticism.
  • Make changes to improve their learning
  • Communicate their learning in relevant ways to different audiences

Independent enquirer

  • Gather, process and evaluate information in their investigations
  • Plan what to do and how to go about it
  • Draw conclusions and evaluate outcomes
  • Take informed and well-reasoned decisions, recognising that other have different beliefs and attitudes
  • Use range of techniques to collect and organise information

Team worker

  • Work confidently with others, adapting to different contexts and taking responsibility for their own role
  • Listen and take account of others’ views
  • Form collaborative relationships, resolving issues and reaching agreed outcomes
  • Adapt behaviours to suit different roles and situations
  • Show fairness and consideration towards others
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