Meet the Year 3 Team! 

Mrs Butcher - Teacher 3BM (3 days - Mon/Tues/Wed)

Mrs Masters - Teacher 3BM (2 days Thurs/Fri)

Mrs Scoles - Teacher 3SJ (3 days - Mon/Tues/Wed)

Mrs Jane - Teacher 3SJ (2 days - Thurs/Friday)

Miss Lewis -   Teacher Assistant 

Mrs Widdicombe - Teacher Assistant

Mrs Davenport - Teacher Assistant

Mrs Mitchell - PPA Teacher (3BM)

Mrs Cowin - PPA Teacher (3SJ)

General Information

Welcome to the Year 3 page. You will find all of the things you should need to know for the year.

Year 3 is a key year and involves the children taking greater responsibility for their own learning. That said, we are very keen to work together as a partnership, with the children, parents, teachers and school,  working together to help us 'to be the best that we can be'.

Please feel free to contact the Year 3 team if you have something you wish to ask or would like to discuss. We have an open door policy and will see you as soon as possible.

Please write a note in your child's Reading record or see us on the playground if you would like to talk to us.

Thank you,

The Year 3 Team

P.E 

• Indoor PE will be on Monday afternoon and outdoor games on Friday mornings. Please can all children arrive wearing their PE kit on these days. Track suit bottoms and jumpers will be needed for the colder months. 

Overview for the Year

Autumn Terms -"Savage Stone Age"

and  “Walk like an Egyptian”

(Stone Age, Ancient Egypt, rocks and volcanoes and earthquakes)

Spring Terms 3 & 4 “Lost at Sea/Survival”

(Animals including Humans, Plants)

Summer Terms 5 & 6 Cities of Gold

(The Mayans, Light)

Our learning this term

Our learning this term will be continuing our topic, ‘Survival!’  

In English, we will focus our writing around an adventure story ‘Oliver and the Seawigs’ by Phillip Reeve. We will use the story to develop our knowledge of characters, dialogue and writing newspaper articles.  

In Maths, we will start the term with length and perimeter, then we will move onto fractions. 

In Science, our topic will be ‘Plants’, we will learn the functions of different parts and requirements for plant life, including plant life cycles.  

In PSHE, our Jigsaw unit is ‘Healthy Me’ which encourages healthy eating, fitness and how to keep safe. Furthermore, this unit explores healthy friendships and how to keep calm in difficult situations.  

In Geography we will be learning all about mountains, volcanoes and earthquakes. 

Computing, Art, PE/Games, (Mondays and Thursdays) French and Music will continue and after half term, it will be 3SJ’s turn to receive weekly violin lessons until the end of the Summer Term.  

Home learning

• Each Friday, children will be given spellings based around the expectations of their year group. They will have a suitable number based upon their ability level. The test will be on the following Friday
• The children are expected to read regularly throughout the week, with parental completion of the reading record on at least three occasions. This should indicate when and how much the children have read. It would also be helpful to include a very brief comment on any problems or successes from the activity. 

English

Reading

Regular reading at home is essential. The children should be heard reading aloud at least 3 times per week, even for those children who are free-readers. Discussions between the child and the adult are key to helping to improve and develop their understanding but also allows the children to work on their expression when reading aloud. 

Free readers may read anything they like but we would like you to always have a challenging fiction book on the go at all times.

Children on the reading scheme must read their scheme books but can also add any additional reading you have done (non-fiction, magazines, other books etc).

Each child has their own reading record and these need to be completed with approximately three adult signed entries per week, indicating when the child read, what they read and anything that arose from the discussion. If the record has been misplaced or left at school, the entries should be completed on a piece of paper, which can be stuck into the book.

Spellings

Spellings will be handed out on a Friday and tested on the following Friday. We will teach the spellings patterns and rules throughout the week. The words given each week are primarily taken from the required National Curriculum spelling list for year3/4 children. Mrs Widdicombe/ Mrs Lewis however, will be working with some children who need greater practice, repetition and  reinforcement of some of the phonics work done in year 2. This has proved extremely beneficial in the past in raising the standard of these children, allowing them to access the year 3 curriculum with more ease and confidence. 

Handwriting

Throughout the week we will ask the children to practise their spellings through handwriting. Part of the curriculum expects all children to be joining their handwriting.

We keep the children's best handwriting on their tables so that they are always trying to improve their work to be the best that it can be.

Maths

Times tables facts

 It would be helpful if children could could practise their times tables at home as well as in school so that class maths challenges that encompass times table facts (fractions, multiplications, problem solving etc) will be much easier and exciting to solve. 

Telling the time is also something that we would appreciate your help with, particularly as we have to ensure by the end of year 3, that children can tell the time in 3 different ways and using 3 different types of clocks- analogue, digital and 24 hour. 

By the end of year 4,  ALL children are expected to know their times tables, up to 12x12, by heart and with instant recall, so we endeavour to make this easier for them by encouraging these recall skills in year 3. The new curriculum focuses heavily on calculation strategies, particularly for multiplication and division, so it is essential that the children work at learning these at home. They are a key skill which they will use throughout their lives.

We are having a huge push on our times tables at the moment as it forms a key part of what we must know to move forwards in our learning. We would really appreciate any help with the learning of this key skill please. 

RE

At Manadon Vale, RE is taught to give every child the opportunity to explore the big questions about life, to find out what people believe and what difference this makes to their lives. Pupils gain the knowledge, understanding and skills needed to handle questions raised by religion and belief and to reflect on their own ideas and ways of living.

In Key Stage 1 and 2, we follow the Plymouth Agreed Syllabus for RE. The principal religions and non-religious worldviews represented in the UK are covered taught through 'Key Questions'. These key questions are explored through the study of sacred texts, through creative arts, with visiting speakers and visits to places of worship and with lively discussion and debate.

In Year 3 the key questions are:

What do Christians learn from the creation story? 

What is it like for someone to follow God? 

How and why do people mark the significant events of life?

How do festivals and family life show what matters to Jewish people? 

Why do Christians call the day Jesus died ‘Good Friday’? (Salvation)

Why is the Torah so important to Jewish people?

Useful websites to support your learning

https://www.topmarks.co.uk/maths-games/hit-the-button 

(To practise those times tables!)

https://www.phonicsplay.co.uk/

http://www.spellingplay.co.uk/

http://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/ks1/literacy/spelling/play/

http://www.ictgames.com/