Year 3

Year Group News 2023 - 2024

Today, Green class used water colours to paint fruit and they worked on creating different depths to the colours by varying the amount of water used. They also thought carefully about the patterns within the fruit and the graduations in their colours. As part of this term's topic, the children have created their own fruit for Willy Wonka's factory and they painted these too. 

This afternoon, Green Class made a pasta salad as their healthy snack for healthy bodies week. The children practised their chopping and slicing skills and were brave enough to try things that they might not normally eat, such as olives! Well done Green Class - your bowls of food look delicious.

This morning, Year 3 had a Yoga session led by the wonderful Mrs Hussey. The children worked on their breathing techniques as well as certain Yoga poses, including the downward dog and the warrior. It was a lot of fun and the children did really well with all of their poses.

Today, Green Class began work on their next Gold Book write, which will be a narrative poem based on the story of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. The children discussed the meaning of the word narrative and analysed the features of a narrative poem. In groups, they then re-structured an example poem by looking at the chronological order of the story.

Today, Green Class went our into the Forest School area to create quadrilateral shapes out of materials in the area. The children made various types of quadrilaterals and even marked where the right angles would be on their giant square. It was a great start to the new Maths topic.

Green Class have begun term 6 in a flurry of chocolate! They began their new topic "Scrumdiddlyumptious" with a Science investigation, where they were measuring the temperature that chocolate would melt. The children loved using the thermometers, timers and of course the chocolate in this experiment - they became Willy Wonka himself.

Today, Green Class brought into school their all-time favourite book. We started this week's mini project by thinking about whether the book was fiction or non-fiction, how they would describe it in three words and what the book is about. The children were able to walk around the classroom to see their classmate's choices and some are already inspired to read something else so it was a very good start to the project!

Year 3 displayed their art today in the hall for the whole school to see. The art had a Science theme. In Scarlet class the art was based around the characteristics of animals and in Green Class it was biology, specifically identity with hand prints and finger prints.

The children produced some gorgeous art, using different mediums such as chalk and paint. Please don't forget to look out for some of this art  at the Rotary Art competition.

During Art this term, Green Class have been designing Greek paper pots and today, began sculpting one out of clay. The children made pinch pots and then created patterns in them by using tools and scoring traditional Greek patterns. We will be leaving them to dry and next week, the children will paint them.

Today, Green Class began working on their next Gold Book by investigating the story structure of Jason and The Golden Fleece. The children worked in pairs to identify the beginning, dilemma, resolution and ending. Over the next few lessons, they will build their narrative skills so that they can write their own version of this infamous Greek myth!

Green Class have been learning about the Ancient Greek Olympics and as we decided that we are all winners, we made the head wreaths, which were awarded for the Gold, Silver and Bronze positions. The children had lots of fun making them but even more fun wearing them!

Today, Green class had their first ever Ukulele lesson with Mr File. It was absolutely brilliant and already some of them want to save their pocket money to buy their own ukulele. The children learnt the names for the different parts of a ukulele, including the body, bridge, sound hole and neck. They also learnt how to hold the instrument correctly and how to vary the volume and depth of sound that they can make. Mr File was very impressed with their engagement and enthusiasm and is looking forward to teaching them weekly for the rest of the school year.

Year 3 have been using charcoal to create Cave art. The children used the tip of the charcoal to create the outline and then smudged and blended the line. They also experimented with different colours and overlapping of hand prints to create a sense of chaos, which was the theme that we were working on. We got a little messy but it was very fun!

Today, Year 3  went into the Forest School area to build their own Sone Age settlements and homes. Many of the settlements that the children built had different areas for cooking, making weapons and more. The children imagined that they were Stone Age people and some ground grain, while others whittled wood to make their weapons. It is safe to say that everyone had a great time but unfortunately we couldn't stay and so we are now back in the year 2024!

Today, Year 3 visited Kent Life to experience a Stone Age Day. Throughout the day, the children learnt about different aspects of the Stone Age, including Beliefs and Burials, Cave Painting, Trading, Weapons, Hunters to Farmers, Grinding Grain and at the very end of the day, they got to meet a real Cave Man! He wasn't very keen on our modern names and so re-named all of the children with different names like Nut and Wildebeest. It was a jam packed day but the children were brilliant and had a thoroughly great time. A particular shout out goes to all of the parent helpers, who gave up their time to make this day possible. Thank you!

Today, Green Class were being computer networks. One of the children was the server, who had all the information. They then passed this information to the switch, who then passed it to the correct device. We wrote positive messages about each other and passed them through the computer network. Green Class enjoyed being computers for some of the afternoon.

Today, year 3 had a visit from Courtney Orange, a gymnast and dancer. As part of this athlete visit, they took part in a series of circuits and as you can see from some of the blurry photos - the children were very active!

Green Class have begun the New Year and their new topic, Flow, by learning about magnets and investigating which objects in the classroom are magnetic and which are not. The children learnt that magnets can attract and repel items, dependant on their materials. We have concluded that it is helpful that humans are not magnetic.

Green Class celebrated Christmas Dinner day today by wearing their Christmas jumpers and attending the staff pantomime. We even had our own visit from a mini Santa!

Green Class completed the end of their Spanish animals unit by taking part in a very fun and competitive Kahoot quiz. Team Adeson took Gold, with Team Chocolate C in Silver position and Team Lovers (Taylor Swift inspired name I think) in Bronze! All the children demonstrated their excellent Spanish knowledge!

Today, Green Class created their own volcanic eruptions and were chemists, who combined different ingredients to create the chemical reaction that caused the volcanic eruption. As you can see from the videos, some of the eruptions were more powerful than others and we will be analysing why this may have been the case. The children will also be applying their knowledge of volcano making into their English lessons this week, as they write their own set of instructions on how to make a volcano at home. What an explosive start to the week, year 3 have had!

Green Class begun their Christmas hoops today. We don't want to reveal the theme but as you can see there was a lot of painting of toilet rolls and even a glitter station. Each child will make their own decoration for the hoop and we think ours will look beautiful hanging in the hall!

Today, Green Class recorded their Christmas C.D song - Feliz Navidad! They all looked the part in their headphones and sang beautifully to the backing track. We were one take wonders and everyone is in for a treat when they hear their beautiful singing and of course Spanish! It may only be November but Feliz Navidad everyone! It is never too early to get excited for Christmas.

Green class began the week by becoming geologists! This morning, they investigated the properties of a number of c=rocks, considering whether they were soft, hard, strong, weak, smooth, rough, permeable and impermeable. We had lots of fun and enjoyed breaking chalk!

Continuing Friendship week, Green class made friendship flowers for each other. We had a lovely conversation, discussing the qualities that a good friend has, such as kind, respectful, trustworthy, funny, cheerful, fun, energetic. The children were then given a name of someone in the class at random to make a friendship flower for. They put the name of the child in the middle of the flower and the qualities that this friend has in the petals. At the end of the session, they exchanged flowers and as you can see, there were a lot of smiley faces.

As part of Black History Month, Year 3 studied Hamza Yassin, wildlife photographer, television presenter, documentary maker and Strictly champion. We discovered that Hamza came to the U.K when he was eight from Sudan. Not only did he have to adjust to a new country, culture and language but he also had to find ways to cope with his undiagnosed dyslexia. Hamza's resilience and determination led him to becoming one of the BBC's most successful wildlife photographers. The children created character profiles of him and even made their own birds of prey (Hamza's most favourite animal) to film in their own documentaries. The children have decided that Hamza is an inspiration and some, now want to follow in his footsteps.

Today, Year 3 went to Wildwood to learn all about predators. They took part in two workshops, one where they discovered biological features of predators, such as the fact that predators have their eyes at the front of their face and prey at the side of their face. The children also had the opportunity to be a bat and a moth and test out the way bats hear their prey. As well as this, the children were also Crime Scene Investigators and had to solve a series of clues to find out who exactly killed Mr Bunny? They used scientific methods and analysis to discover that it was the Polecat. It was an excellent day and the children were actively engaged in their learning throughout the day!

Year 3 have been hot seating today. The children thought of questions to ask characters from the book that they are reading, "Akimbo and the Elephants" by Alexander McCall Smith. Three children played the part of Akimbo, Akimbo's Father and an Elephant Poacher. Their questions were excellent and the answers even better. The children kept in role really well, even when the "Poacher" shocked us with their answers, hence the shocked faces in one of the photos!

Today, we began to learn the lyrics to the song, Home is where the heart is. We also practiced playing some of the notes from the song on the glockenspiels. The tempo was tricky to keep up with! 

Year 3 have been comparing three-digit numbers using the greater than, less than and equals sign. They rolled a dice to create two 3-digit numbers and then used their number knowledge to decide which mathematical symbol would complete their number sentence. 

Green Class have been using pencil line to sketch predator's faces. The children have focused on scale, proportion and the markings of the predator's face. We are sure that you will agree that they did an excellent job!

Year 3 have been learning about the different types of skeletons that predators may or may not have. Today, they learnt that there are three types of skeleton - endoskeleton, exoskeleton and hydrostatic skeleton. We decided that we are very glad that we do not have hydrostatic skeletons because it would make it very difficult to keep upright!

Year 3 logged onto First News for the first time today and had an excellent time catching up with news from across the world. They read a variety of articles, including ones on celebrities, gaming, sport, animals and even an article on the discovery of a new species of dinosaur in Morocco. 

As part of their Predators topic, Year 3 have begun studying the art of Henri Rousseau. Today, they started to re-created one of his paintings, using bold outlines and a focus on perspective and as you can see they have got off to a great start.