Darwin (Year 3)

Mrs Edwards

Class Teacher

Mrs Barnard

Class Support (Mon-Thurs am)

OUR CURRICULUM FOR THIS TERM:

Welcome to Darwin class! We hope the information about school on our class page will help you support your child at home. We encourage regular practise of reading, spelling and times tables outside school as homework, but also offer an optional ‘Wizard challenge’; a fun activity covering a variety of subjects, which your child can choose to do also. Please see below for the objectives we will be learning in each lesson this term.

English
During this term, Darwin class will learn the following:

  • PERSUASIVE WRITING;  Decide how to present information to persuade a known audience. Use commas and understand clauses. Research a particular area (based on Geography curriculum) using reference materials (books, IT sources).Identify, read and summarise relevant information.
  • SHAPE POETRY;   Read and discuss a variety of shape poems and discuss features of them. Invent calligrams and shape poems.  Choose words carefully and take pride in presentation. Use homophones and similes
  • STORY WRITING; using our work on settings and character to write our own versions  of The Iron Man
  • The children will also apply their English skills during an RE week at the end of term.
The children should try to read a variety of genres, little and often; to keep up their key skills and develop a love of reading. Warminster library will order books for free if your child is a member; a great way to keep up with the latest authors. They could also listen to audio books, read to younger members of the family, or be read to; in order to immerse themselves in literacy as much as possible. They could read to a Teddy or a pet!

Any type of writing they do will be beneficial. Writing their own weekly comments in their link book is a necessary part of their homework. Try to encourage accurate spelling and punctuation whenever they write, especially when writing their own comments in their link book.

Maths

Darwin class will practise their maths skills, by the following units this term:
  • LENGTH AND PERIMETER; measuring accurately and understanding the relationship between centimetres, metres and millimetres, and how to work out the distance all the way round  a shape
  • FRACTIONS Understand denominators in unit fractions and numerators in non unit fractions, start to understand concept of equivalent fractions and order them in size.
  • MASS AND CAPACITY; To measure in grams and kilograms, millilitres and litres using appropriate scales. Convert measures between grams and kilograms and millilitres and litres.
  • 6, 7 and 9  times tables
The children will continue to practise key maths skills through their early morning work- a 10 or 15 minute session each morning to practise speedy recall of number facts and maths skills learnt in previous terms. The children will continue do a weekly times tables test; moving through the times tables at their own individual pace; supported by work in school.

Science

In term  3 and 4  the children will study ‘Animals including Humans’ by:

  • The purpose of skeletons and muscles
  • The different sorts of skeletons
  • Circulation and the heart
  • Look at different types of nutrition and its importance to all living beings
  • Undertaking scientific investigations; practising the skills of predicting, recording and concluding with the use of digital technology.
 
Geography

In terms 3 and 4, the children will explore ‘Food and Farming’ through:
 
  1. looking at maps and identifying different parts of our country and counties.
  2. Looking at how landscapes are used for food production now and in the past
  3. How we trade with other countries
 
History:
In terms 3 and 4 the children will develop their history skills through looking at how the use of our local landscape has changed over time.
PSHE (Personal, Social, and Health Education)

In term 3, Darwin will explore the theme of ‘Living in the Wider World’ by:
 
  • learning why and how rules and laws protect us and others, and how they are made and enforced.
  • working through  and creating our own version of an ‘All about Parliament’ booklet
  • discuss where money comes from and when to spend, save or share it.
Art/Design and Technology

Our focus this term is "Levers and Pulleys"    The children will learn:

  • To look at uses of levers and pulleys in relation to farm machinery
  • Plan and create a small scale machine to solve a problem using levers and pulleys

P.E.(Physical Education)

In term 4 the children will develop their knowledge, skills and understanding by:

  • Developing the skills of swimming and water confidence
  • To build on ball skills learnt in previous terms 
Swimming will take place on a Tuesday afternoon, so please ensure kit is in school on a Tuesday morning.
We will usually go out in all weathers; so please ensure children are suitably dressed for cold and potentially wet conditions.

R.E. (Religious Education)

This term the children will explore their knowledge, skills and understanding of ‘Salvation’ by :

  • Looking at the events of Holy Weeks
  • Finding out what Christians actually celebrating/remembering on Palm Sunday/Good Friday/Easter Sunday
  • Understanding why Christians call the day Jesus died Good Friday
Computing

This term the children will develop their computing skills of ‘representing data’ through computing sessions. We will use this skill to interpret data from our science science and geography work.
We will be creating bar charts and pie charts as well as our results tables.
Computing also appears, and remains a strand that runs through many other subjects such as ; playing an online game in maths, researching using the internet or typing as a way of recording in English or topic lessons.

Music

This term we will be recapping and continuing our learning of the recorder - moving on to playing tunes with four or more notes and reading simple notation.
We had a fantastic morning doing some Stone Age themed activities. We were pretending to be stone age cave painters, trying to recreate some of their art in the newly discovered cave system under the table!
 
We tested out how long it would take to grind pearl barley, corn and pumpkin seeds finely enough to make stone age bread. We tried some, it was definitely an acquired taste!
 
We tried our hand at flint knapping (but used soap instead) and found it is quite an art!
 
Finally, we had a go at making a model village, complete with streams, animal enclosures and thatch roofs. Lots of discussion went on deciding where things should go, as well as the optimum size and shape for the round houses.
 
Everyone was thoroughly involved, we all have lots of respect for our stone age ancestors and how hard they had to work (especially for bread!).
For those that weren't able to make the curriculum night earlier this term, the powerpoint is available below.

Year 3 curriculum night.pptx

Suggestions for helping at home.docx