WELCOME!

Year 3 Autumn Term 2022

Welcome back! I hope that you had a relaxing summer break and took advantage of the quality family time that you had together. The sun was certainly shining! I am so excited to be moving from Y6 to Y3 and teaching this class for the first time as their KS2 journey begins! This year I am joined in class by my teaching assistants Ms Turner & Mrs Dudley; they will supporting Y3 and helping the children with their transition to ‘the juniors’. Mr Napier will teach the class every other Thursday for PPA cover.

Our exciting curriculum theme for this Autumn term is ‘Back to the Stone Age!’. We aim to bring this theme alive for the children by creating some stimulating ‘hands on’ experiences for them. They will learn how life was back in the Stone Age through the use of role play/drama, story-telling, art, research and dance. The children will also use their DT skills to create various tools, weapons and jewellery. We will have Stone Age themed days in school where the children will be able to wear costumes and take part in some Stone Age cookery and raft building. So much to look forward to!

The curriculum letter and poster for this term can be found below:

Goodbye Year 3!

The Year 3 team would like to thank all the children and parents for a truly enjoyable and successful year, despite all the challenges that Covid has given. The children have all been a pleasure to teach and we shall miss them very much. We are extremeley proud of every child's achievements and wish them the best of luck with their move to Year 4. 

Thank you parents for all of the support that you have given your children this year and the encouraging words that you have given the Year 3 team, we really do appreciate it. 

A huge 'Thank You' for your very generous end of term gifts, so very kind and thoughtful of you. The photo of the children made made us cry! We will treasure it! We are all very excited about dining out in the sunshine too! 

We wish you all a wonderful and safe summer holiday.

With love from the Year 3 team xxx

Star of the Year! 

Throughout Year 3 all of the children have impressed us with their resilience, hard work and impeccable behaviour but there was one particular bright star that really shone and caught our attention. Congratulations for all that you have achieved this year Flo, we are all extremely proud of you. 

What a glorious Sports Day!

It was such a treat to be outside, cheering on our Year 4 team-mates from a distance! During the first part of the morning, we gave the older children lots of encouragement and got excited about the activities on offer.

Just when we thought we had run out of cheers, Mrs Dean told us a package had arrived. Inside, we found our green Blue Peter badges. Some of us were jumping for joy! It was a perfect end to a perfect day. 

Year 3 have been so lucky to be involved in a pilot scheme to develop science understanding for the topic 'light'. We ventured down to the HQ building on Union Street and have taken part in fun and interactive learning delivered by STEM ambassadors at Babcock. So far the children have learnt about engineering jobs at the company and made periscopes and shadow puppets.  It has been so much fun.

P.E Sessions with Miss Crow

Mini-Beast Hunting

Such a perfect morning for our outdoor Art lesson. Our seascapes are developing beautifully! 

Moths to a Flame Project

https://www.mothstoaflame.art/

Moths we found in our moth trap 15.6.21

Rose Footman

Old Lady

Orange Underwing

Heart and Dart x2

Hebrew Character

Black Arches

Female Muslin Moth

Moth-Making

Our beautiful moths are made from plastic milk bottles and will eventually be recycled. They will form part of a mass art installation in Glasgow at the United Nations Conference of Parties, COP26, where world leaders will meet to talk about the climate emergency. 

On our moths we have written in UV pen our ‘Whispers of Hope’ such as ‘Find another way to light the night,’ ‘Please help us save our planet before it's too late,’ ‘Take care of the planet - we only have one!’ ‘Save electricity,’ ‘Turn off unused lights’, ‘Check your devices; don’t leave them on standby’ and ‘Help us save energy!’   These moths and messages will be illuminated at the conference and we really hope we can spread these important messages to as many people as possible, including the important world leaders at COP26.

Our Blue Peter Green Badge Application

https://www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/findoutmore/blue-peter-apply-for-a-green-badge

As a class, we have been working together as 'Planet Protectors' and have put together a class application to Blue Peter to see if we can all achieve the Green Badge.  We have worked towards our pledges for two weeks - including planet friendly habits such as recycling, turning off appliances, growing bee-friendly plants and walking /cycling to school.

For our supersized pledge, we have been trying to select food options which do not contain meat (at school and at home).  Some of us have been selecting food from our school menu that does not contain meat.  We have done this for at least two days each week.  Some children have been doing this at home and have tried vegan menus.  Our vegetarian option at school usually only has one child ordering it, but on one day last week, seven children chose vegan ‘meatballs’. 

We have planted lots of bee-friendly plants and some vegetables at school. Some children have even been growing their own food at home on allotments, in gardens and in plant pots.  They are growing pears, apples, tomatoes, strawberries, sweetcorn, carrots, blackcurrants, raspberries, lettuce, beans, olives, beetroot, cherries, chives, rhubarb, mint, plums and potatoes.  We have written about this in our application for a Green Badge. 

Since returning from lockdown, we have also been trying hard to reduce the amount of food waste in our class food waste box.  We now have no meat waste at all.  Our waste is minimal and is usually a few peas and potato skins.  All children have strived towards our ‘Zero food waste’ goal and we have made our school cook very happy and proud!

We cannot wait to see if we will all recive a Green Badge to reward our amazing team effort!  Thankyou to all the parents and families who have got involved and supported our pledges. 

Barbican in Bloom artwork

We really hope that some of our masterpieces will be chosen to brighten up the planters on the Barbican.  Hopefully, we will hear from Plymouth Waterfront Partnership soon!

Moor to Sea Dance in progress -

The Legend of the Bowerman's Nose

St Andrew's Number Day!

We've had so much fun learning about numbers and complicated algorithms today. We even did some outdoor learning in the school garden to support the length and perimeter unit we are learning. 

Science Week

Year 3 have been very busy carrying out a range of planting activities. These include: planting carrots, tomatoes, strawberries, lettuce, radishes, herbs, sunflowers and much more! We’ve experimented with growing cress in different environments and even removed the leaves off a plant to see what happens! 

We are in the process of painting our garden mural and creating our own bee and ladybird planters using tyres. 

We’re looking forward to nurturing these plants and feasting on them when they are ready to harvest! 

Summer Term - 'From the Moor to the Sea'

Welcome back to a very exciting, fun filled Summer term. We hope that you have all had a wonderful and relaxing break and are set for the term ahead. 

Our topic this term is 'From the Moor to the Sea' and is geography based. We will focus on Dartmoor and the journey of rivers down to the coastline. 

Please see the class letter and curriculum map below for more detailed information about the term ahead.

Happy Easter everyone!

Spring Term

It has been so lovely having the children back in school again over the last few weeks. We really missed them. 

We have been fully engaged in our Roman topic since returning and have done some fabulous work. We have been particularly impressed by the quality of the Roman research that was completed for homework. What a phenomenal effort Year 3! Well done!

Science

This week we've learnt lots about how sound is made and travels in waves to our ears. We made straw instruments and listened to vibrations, investigated sound insulators, used cup telephones and watched how vibrations travel in water. So much fun! 

Lockdown Learning for Year 3

Please head over to Google Classroom to find details of your daily Maths and English tasks as well as activities to complete at your leisure.  You will also need to continue with your daily practice on Mathletics, Spelling Shed  and Times Tables Rockstars.  If you are unable to access this learning, please ask your parents to contact us as a matter of urgency.  Lost log-in passwords can be obtained from the school office by phoning 201660 (or by emailing admin@st-andrews.plymouth.sch.uk).

We look forward to learning together on Google Classroom and making some amazing memories in this unusual time.

Mrs Dean and Miss Mann.

Happy Christmas Wishes!

What a fantastic term it has been for these resilient and hard-working children! Thank you parents for all your support. We are so proud of the class. We would like to wish you a very ‘Merry Christmas’. We hope you will enjoy our medley of Christmas songs to get you in a festive mood! 

We are all extremely touched by your kind and thoughtful gifts, such a wonderful surprise to be given. Thank you all so very much!  

Have a fabulous holiday with your family and we look forward to welcoming you all back in the New Year, where our new topic will be: The Romans. 

This term Year 3 have been working really hard on improving their musical skills on the ukulele.

We are lucky that Miss Royle’s Grandad is a carpenter and graciously gave us this ukulele to gift to one of the pupils that worked really hard on improving their skills. 

All the the names were put in a hat and the lucky recipient was... Iyla.

Well done everyone for your ongoing work ethic and enthusiasm for our music sessions together.

Maths Morning

Unfortunately we were unable to invite parents to join us for a maths morning this term, but we'd love you to see examples of the hard work that we have been doing. Below are links to various different addition and subtraction methods that we use in Year 3. 

Virtual Ukulele Lessons

Thanks to Miss Smith the Year 3 class were still able to continue with their ukulele lessons virtually. Miss Royle was a super support leading the children in class. We're very excited that Miss Smith will be joining us in person this Friday for our lesson too. 

Our Stone Age Adventure Day!

Year 3 had so much fun going back to the Stone Age. We created jewellery from stones and leather, painted rocks, drew cave designs using charcoal and chalk, played cave games, attempted to light the fire using flint and steel and also toasted marshmallows. What an action packed morning we had.

We've had such a fun day wearing mufti, completing our regular Friday bootcamp of exercises  and learning all about thanksgiving.

We hope that you all have a wonderful half term break. We look forward to an exciting first week back where we'll discover all about the Mayflower voyage and go back to the Stone Age for our forest school experience. 

Our Stone Age fun day!

We had such fun going back to the Stone Age yesterday. The children made Stone Age tools using drawing and cutting skills. Once assembled they used paper mache to make the head of the tool stronger. 

We also foraged for food, berries and sticks. Look how much we found! Such a fun day! 

Welcome back to the Autumn Term!

Welcome back to a very action packed and fun-filled Autumn term. The children have already impressed us with superb behaviour and enthusiasm towards learning. It really is wonderful to be back with a full class again. Mrs Dean has already filled our web page with fantastic photos of the children's first few days. It's wonderful to see their happiness and excitement about returning to school. 

Below are the links to our curriculum map and letter. Please keep checking our web page for up-dates and photos.

Best wishes,

The Year 3 Team