Year 3

Welcome to Year 3

Goldfinches & Puffins

2024-25

The Year Three Team

Goldfinches

Teachers: Mrs Luckhurst (Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday)

Mrs Element (Wednesday, Thursday, Friday)

Teaching Assistant: Mrs Elsworth

SEN Teaching Assistants: Mrs Wight, Ms Dillon & Mrs Hayton

Puffins

Teacher: Miss Hassell

Teaching Assistant: Miss Cooper

SEN Teaching Assistants: Miss Muirhead & Miss Jakonkaari

PE 

Puffins - Monday

Goldfinches - Thursday

Please ensure your child comes to school dressed in their PE kit on the above days every week. Thank you.

Reading Books

Books are changed once a week, with each child allocated a set day. Please see your child's reading diary for their book changing day. 

Biscuit Sale

Year 3 are raising money for the WWF to adopt an endangered animal. To raise the money for this, we will be holding a biscuit sale on Tuesday 17th December straight after school on the KS2 playground. 

The biscuits will be 50p each.

We can't wait to raise money for such an amazing cause!

WB 25.11.25

In English, we started our new unit of work based around the The Tunnel by Anthony Browne. In our lessons we will be looking at how to build suspense and writing our own portal stories. Should you wish to discuss the story with your child, there is a link below.

There was team work, perseverance and creativity in abundance in Year 3 during our Design and Technology Day. We planned our 3D rainforest animals in groups then we carefully selected the  materials needed and worked as a team to construct our amazing creations. Our models each had a part which moved thanks to a pneumatic system; this made  mouths open, wings flap and tongues stick out.  We are very proud of  our models.

WB 18.11.24

Assessment Fortnight

This week sees the start of the Key Stage 1 & 2 assessment fortnight. Next week in Year 3, pupils will complete 2 maths papers, 1 focussing on fluency and 1 on problem solving and reasoning. In English, pupils will complete 1 reading paper, which will be spread across 2 lessons. We try and keep the assessments very low key in order that pupils do not become anxious. Once assessments have been completed, we will put a copy of the maths paper on our class page. Unfortunately for copyright reasons we are not able to do this for the reading paper.

In maths this week we have continued to develop our understanding of written methods of addition and subtraction. This is a key skill and we are pleased with how secure many of year 3 now are exchanging hundreds, tens and ones. This can be practised further at home, roll a dice 6  times to create 2  3 digit numbers e.g 452, 339, ask you child to add the 2 numbers using a written method. Does it matter which number goes first? Then ask pupils to subtract, why is it important that 452 goes first? Can your child exchange 1 ten for ten ones? ​​​​​​

This week is the final week of our English topic – persuasive letter writing. We wrote to the woodcutter to try and persuade him not to chop down the kapok tree. We have been really pleased by many of the persuasive techniques pupils included in their writing; rhetorical questions, emotive adjectives and verbs , persuasive language. Ask your child to tell you more about the letter they wrote.

We began our D&T topic – pneumatic animals by investigating a range of objects to try and find out what they had in common. We discovered that they used air to make them work. We investigated simple pneumatic systems by trying to make an egg box open using a balloon, and using a larger syringe to push open a small syringe. We compressed air through a tube which made a balloon inflate and deflate. We investigated how pumps can be used to inflate objects; it is very important to have the right sized pump for the job.

WB 5.11.24

In Maths this week we are continued to practise a standard written method for addition and began to introduce a written method for subtraction. Please see the information below, form our school calculation policy.

In English, we started our new unit of work based around the The Great Kapok Tree by Lynne Cherry. Here is a link below, should you wish to discuss the story with your child.

As part of our work on The Great Kapok Tree,  we focussed on the reasons why the creatures of the rainforest did not want the woodcutter to cut down the Kapok tree. We thought about the language we would use to persuade him not to cut the tree down and wrote this on leaves. Then, disguised as rainforest creatures, we made an alley towards the tree. As the woodcutter walked through we whispered our reasons to him. At first, he didn’t seem to care—he even said the animals could just find another tree to live in! However, we explained that the animals could become endangered, or even extinct, there be no oxygen for him to breathe, his children would suffer as they would never see the beautiful nature and how all nature is linked together. Finally, all our persuasive ideas worked—he put his axe down. We saved the Kapok Tree!

Harvest Festival Contributions

A huge thank you to everyone who supported the foodbank by bringing in donations. We received this message and certificate in appreciation of everyone's efforts.

To all the Children and Staff at Bridgetown Primary school,

We would like to thank you so much for hosting and donating your Harvest Festival collection to Stratford upon Avon Foodbank. 

We are incredibly grateful for your support and donations this Harvest. Your donation weighed in at 108kg which equates to £299.16 in monetary value to us.

WB 14.10.24

This week, we have been busy practising our harvest assembly and are impressed by how many children have learnt their words. All pupils, except narrators, need to know their lines off by heart by Monday 21st October. Thank you for your support with this.

In our English work we started a new unit on poetry, using 'The Lost Words' by Robert McFarlane and Jackie Morris as our starting point. Some extracts from the book can be found on the link below. As part of our spelling work we have been looking at how to use apostrophes correctly to show possession e.g Sarah's book.

In maths we continue to focus on addition and subtraction specifically mentally adding and subtracting across 10 / 100  e.g 147+8,  284 +50. This is quite a challenging concept for the start of Year 3 and one we will continue to practise throughout the year. 

In our topic lessons we have been learning about the layers of the rainforest: the emergent layer, canopy layer, understory and forest floor. Ask your child if they can tell you about the animals which live in each layer.

We have been having lots of fun with magnets in our science lessons, learning about magnetic and non-magnetic materials.

Year 3 Assembly

Everyone is welcome to the Year 3 Harvest Assembly on Friday 25th October at 9:15. We would be very grateful if you could bring in contribution for our foodbank collection. The current most needed items are: 

• Tinned tomatoes
• Instant soup
• Tinned chicken meals
• Instant mash
• UHT fruit juice
• Squash
• Large nappies
• Tinned veg meals
• Bleach

Please encourage your child to practise the words to our songs. They can be found on the links below.

Art

This half term we are developing our drawing skills. In our art lessons we have: experimented with different types of mark making, observed shapes we can see within objects, worked on our shading and learned how to add texture, using a technique called frottage. In our future art lessons we will combine these skills to create observational botanical drawings.

Street Dance Workshop - 25.9.24

Goldfinches and Puffins had a wonderful time 'busting some moves' in their street dance workshops. During their workshops they: learned the origins of street dance, worked on 'finding the beat', developed a sequence of moves and put them together to perform a wonderful routine to 'I Like to Move it.' There were sweaty faces and smiles all round as pupils threw themselves into the routine. Ask them to show you some of their moves...

TT Rock Stars Launch Day - 16.9.24

What a busy and fun packed day we had to launch this year’s Times Table Rock Stars.  We dressed the part and looked very cool in our fabulous outfits. Instead of our usual maths lesson  we played times table games and used the ipads to earn coins in our rock battle. An extra special well done to Tom B who was inducted into the TTRS Hall of Fame in a special assembly - earning the 3rd highest total of coins out of the whole of Key Stage 2!

Rainforest Hunt - 9.9.24

Today we used the Forest School as a starting point for our rainforest topic. We searched high and low, for pictures of animals and fact cards. When we found them all, we decided if the animals were rainforest animals or creatures which would be found in woodland. We discussed the fact cards and asked some excellent, thoughtful questions of our own. Rainforests are amazing places and we can’t wait to find out more about them!
 

Topic

We have a wonderful topic to start the year - rainforests. Here is an overview of the key things we will be learning.

KIRFs

Our KIRFs (Key Instant Recall Facts)  this half term is to recall number bonds within 20. We practise our KIRFs every week in school and we will set homework based on it each Friday. Please support your child to learn and rapidly recall these key facts. There are lots of activities on the KIRFs sheet below (a copy can also be found in your child's homework book) to try at home.

Helpful websites to practise our KIRF:

Welcome to Year 3

Goldfinches & Puffins

2023-24

60th Birthday Celebrations

What a 'groovy' day we have had celebrating Bridgetown's 60th birthday. We enjoyed a whole school assembly attended by four previous head teachers, learnt all about toys from different decades, enjoyed a lovely picnic and created art work for a whole school birthday project.

Egyptian Assembly

We are looking forward to welcoming families to our Egyptian sharing assembly at 9:15 on Wednesday 24th April.

Please use the links below to practise songs we will be performing.

A Visit from Professor McGinty

10.4.24

Today, Professor McGinty visited our class and took us on an exciting adventure back to the Ancient Egyptian times. We had lots of fun there, hearing stories and looking at lots of artefacts. Some of the artefacts we could touch were papyrus, scarab beetles, baskets for collecting grain and Egyptian bread. We even got to look at a mummified child and cat! During the day, we also made our own papyrus and artefacts made out of clay.

We are looking forward to starting our exciting topic this term - The Ancient Egyptians. Here is an overview of the key things we will be learning. 

Rainforest Animals

As part of our Design and Technology work, we planned and made 3D rainforest animals with a pneumatic mechanism. Working as part of a team, we carefully selected the materials needed, then made our animals, including a part which moved via a pneumatic system. Finally we carefully painted our models—we are very proud of them.

Year 3 Assembly

Everyone is welcome to the Year 3 Harvest Assembly on Friday 27th October at 9:15.

Please encourage your child to practise the words to our songs. They can be found on the links below.

The Year 3 team are:

Mrs Pinner,     Mrs Luckhurst    &  Mrs Elwell  - Goldfinches Class

Teacher            Teacher                     TA

Monday &        Wednesday -

Tuesday            Friday

Mr Lether,  Mrs Cooper   &   Ms Acutt - Puffins Class

Teacher         TA                       SEN TA

We have had a very busy two weeks getting to know the Year 3 routines, developing our maths skills, creating some beautiful art work and hunting for dragons!