Welcome to the Year 3 page!
In Year 3, there is a big focus on reading. By the end of Year 3 we would expect the majority of children to be reading Grey or Black book bands and to be able to read with fluency. Throughout the year we will be teaching children how to accurately answer comprehension questions and will focus on identifying the different types of questions they could be asked (retrieval, inference and choice). Children will be able to frequently change their book banded book or bring home catch-up reading books.
We also use the Oxford Reading Buddy where children can access further texts:
Learning times tables will also be a key focus. By the end of Year 4 all children should have rapid recall of all of their times tables and will sit a government test in the summer term of Year 4. To ensure all children feel confident and ready to take the test we work hard in Year 3 to help prepare them and also highly value the benefits of having a rapid recall of these facts as this helps children to reduce their cognitive load when tackling more complex multiplication word problems. TT Rockstars is an exciting way to engage all our children and is something we would strongly encourage all children to have go at when they are at home. In school, we regularly check children’s progress and how often they are logging onto the app and it is also regularly celebrated within assemblies with ‘rock battles’ and ‘battle of the bands’ competitions between classes.
Times Tables Rock Stars (ttrockstars.com)
Log in details for Times Table Rock Stars can be found in your child’s diary. Your class teacher will be able to provide this as well.
Year 3 and 4 spelling words:
The national curriculum in England – English Appendix 1: Spelling (publishing.service.gov.uk)
Wider curriculum learning
As artists, the children will be creating and combining shapes to create recognisable forms. They will be using clay and Modroc to help them to sculpt and construct Benin Bronzes and large African mammals. They will also be developing their sketching skills, using different pencil force and learning about shading to create tone and texture. Finally, they will be using watercolours and paints to experiment creating mood with colour. As scientists, the children will be exploring magnets, observing how magnets attract or repel each other, and attract some materials and not others. They will be describing magnets as having two poles and developing their use of scientific terminology, including ‘attract’ and ‘repel’. As geographers, the children will first be recapping on what ‘human’ and ‘physical’ geographical features are and how to identify these.
Home learning
Children should read a minimum of 3 times a week and record this in their home school book by colouring the reading book picture each time they read. Children have a home learning book which they take home on a Friday and is due back in on the following Wednesday. Home learning will be a maths task which focus on increasing your child’s fluency and arithmetic skills. We also encourage all children to log on to TT Rockstars and Oxford Reading Buddy as much as possible.
