Year 3 Newsletter update

Year 3’s summer topic, ‘Take a Walk on the Wild Side’, has taken a very exciting turn as we have been given the challenge to help Mrs Moore develop the outdoor learning provision!  We brainstormed some ideas on how we can do this and decided that we need some information posts with plant and animal identification cards around the grounds to help all pupils to learn more about the wildlife living around us.  We began last week by completing an audit of the wildlife in our school grounds.  We identified four main habitats in the grounds – the forest, the garden, the field and the playgrounds – and split them between the two classes so that we could collect as much data as possible.  We then pooled this information and will use it to help us decide where to put the posts.  Some of the interesting things we found: slow worm, ground beetle, centipede, millipede, large long-horn (a type of day flying moth), hairy shield bug, hawthorn (hedge), maple and silver birch (both trees) and cowslip! 

In other areas of our learning, we have been reading more fables in English and have created a toolkit to help us write some in a few weeks.  In Science, the children have been building on their previous learning in Year 2 on food groups and what our bodies need for a healthy balanced diet.  We are developing our throwing and catching skills in PE so that we can play games such as rounders later in the term. They have worked hard with this and so all children have made great progress! 

And to top off a great week, we finished with Zero Discrimination Day!  We learned about a Welsh artist called Gwen John who, like many other female artists at that time, was not given the same chances and recognition as the many male artists.  We practised our colour mixing and painted fabulous self portraits in her style.  In another activity, the children discussed discrimination and focused on racial discrimination, particularly in football matches.  We watched a clip from Newsround with an interview with Raheem Sterling who has unfortunately experiences racial discrimination at matches.  Then the children came up with ideas about how to prevent this type of discrimination in the future.  They designed T shirts and badges to try to get their message across.  We also had a fabulous visit from Julian who taught us some sign language and spoke to us about what it’s like being deaf.  It was a truly fantastic day!