Term 1

Immanuel and St. Andrew CE Primary School Year 3 Class Bulletin September 2011

Dear Parents / Carers, Welcome to Year 3! I hope you all had a good summer holiday and are looking forward to new school year. I am looking forward to getting to know your children really well over the next few months. This term our theme is Riding the Ocean Waves: The Great Tudor Explorers and their Adventures, with links to many aspects of the curriculum. During our trip to the Golden Hinde we learnt lots about the life of a cabin boy on a Tudor sailing ship! Many thanks to all the parent volunteers who came on the trip with us. I very much appreciated your help! I am hoping to be in the Key Stage 2 playground from 08:45 each morning. Please do come and say hello. Dont hesitate to speak to me (or email) if you have any concerns or questions. Julia Stroud Email: jstroud@immanuelschoollambeth.org.uk Important D airy D ates: Thursday 29th September No Pens Day Tuesday 4th October School Photographs Wednesday 5th October Parents Evening Monday 10th Wednesday 12th October Year 5 School Journey Monday 10th October Friday 14th October Black History Week W ednesday 19 th O ctober Y ear 3 C ollective W orship A ssembly! Thursday 20th October Year 3 Trip to Dulwich Picture Gallery

Curriculum Information Literacy - We have started the term with a focus on recounts, before moving on to narrative texts (story writing). The class will be split for Literacy, between myself and Mrs Hoare, who is a very experienced Key Stage 2 teacher. Both groups will base their work on narrative texts around a graphic novel called The Boy, The Bear, The Baron, The Bard, but each teacher will focus on the literacy learning needs most appropriate to their group. Old and new skills will be recapped and covered will include: securing consistent sentence structure, writing more complex sentences using a range of connectives, using descriptive and interesting vocabulary in writing, using speech punctuation correctly and planning a story in note form before writing it up. Numeracy - The class will also be split for Numeracy, with some children being taught by Miss Harrison. Our initial focus will be on number work, ordering and partitioning numbers, number facts, times tables and addition and subtraction strategies. Later we will move on to patterns and shape. Please note all children should know and use the 2,3,4,5,6 and 10 times table by the end of year 3. Please practise with your child at home. I will send home some resources to help with this.

Important Notes Homework will be given out on a Friday. It is due in the following Wednesday. It will include a maths and/or Literacy task, Times tables and spellings each week. Please support your child with their homework by creating a time and space when they can do it and by discussing it with them. Outdoor PE is on Fridays. We will be doing Invasion Games with a focus on ball skills related to soccer. Indoor PE is on Tuesdays We will start with several multi-skills sessions, before moving onto a unit on dance. PE KIT Light Blue T-Shirt Navy Shorts/Tracksuit bottoms Trainers/plimsolls for outdoor PE.

Science This term we are covering Characteristics of materials. We will be learning about the uses of different types of materials and why materials have different uses. We will learn about the differences in the materials available to us now, as compared to the Tudor Period. RE We will be learning about Jonah, and his Great Big God. Another ocean and boat focus! PHSCE New Beginnings We will be thinking about coping in new situations and how to get along as a class. Creative Curriculum We will be learning about; timelines and placing events in history in time; routes of the Tudor Explorers around the world; continents and countries; discoveries by the Tudor Explorers that affect our lives today; characteristics of materials used by the Tudor Explorers; using non-fiction books and the web to find information about people and events in history. We will also create artwork based around Tudor Seafaring. Our trip to the Dulwich picture gallery will be a focus on portraits.

Times Tables There will be a weekly times tables challenge to help children learn their times table facts. There will rewards at the end of the first long term for those who work hard to make progress in this area. Spellings Spelling tests are on Fridays. Please help your child to practise their weekly spellings each day and try to use them in conversation. The weekly spellings are linked to spelling rules which are discussed in class. It may be helpful for children to write sentences with their spelling words or think of other words that follow the same spelling pattern. Those children who go to phonics do not need to learn the class spellings as they will be given spellings in their phonics class each week. These will also be tested on a Friday. Reading Please continue to bring book bags to school on a daily basis. Books from the school reading scheme will soon be given to your children and changed weekly (date to be confirmed, I will write it on the notice board). Please continue to listen to your child read, question them about the text and sign the reading journal so we know that they have read their current book are and ready for the next book in the series. The children will soon have the opportunity to borrow a book from the school library once a week. Please name every item of clothing your child brings to school is labelled with their name. It is amazing how easily things are lost.

Some photos from our trip to the Golden Hinde!