The Year 3 Team

Online Advent Calendar

As Advent begins this Sunday with Advent Sunday celebrated in Churches, we would like to share this online Advent Calendar with you, produced by the Diocese of Guildford. It explores the Christmas story through Christian artwork, investigating a different artist and aspect of the story throughout the term time days of Advent. Please enjoy sharing this with your family as we prepare for Christmas in school and at home.

Term 2 Week 6 WB 3/12/25

Please continue to keep encouraging and recording your child’s reading at home your support really makes a difference. Thank you so much for everything you do!

Excitement is mounting in Staffordshire 3 as we have our dress rehearsal next Monday!

Please remember that costumes need to be in school on 4th December in a named carrier bag.

We are all enjoying our Christmas play songs and I am sure you will have heard some of these at home! If your child has any lines to learn, we really appreciate your support with going over these at home.

Thank you to those who have now brought in their Christmas play costumes, please bring any outstanding costumes ASAP. 

In Maths, we are continuing our work on multiplication and division. This week, the children have been focusing on the 4 times table, revisiting the 2, 5 and 10 times tables, and will soon begin the 8 times table. Thank you for supporting your child’s learning at home by using Times Tables Rockstars and practising times tables—it really helps! The children are now also competing against some Year 4 classes as well as other Year 3 classes, which has added an extra element of fun and friendly competition.

In English, we are continuing our work on Ug. This week, the children have been writing diary entries from Ug’s point of view, thinking carefully about how he might feel and react if he were suddenly transported to the modern day. They have been practising using descriptive language and the past progressive tense in their writing. To bring their ideas to life, we also enjoyed a drama session where the children acted out scenarios as Ug, exploring his reactions and interactions in different situations. This has helped them develop both their writing and speaking skills while really engaging with the story.

In History, we have begun learning about the Iron Age. The children have been comparing Iron Age tools, homes and daily routines with what they previously learned about the Stone Age, noticing the important changes in technology, farming and community life. This unit links closely to our class text Ug, which has helped the children imagine what life might have been like during these periods. They have particularly enjoyed discussing how people solved problems in the past and how these developments shaped the way we live today. It has been lovely to see their curiosity grow as they explore how much life has changed—and what has stayed the same.

In French, we have been learning vocabulary for colours and shapes and practising how to use them in simple sentences. The children have enjoyed playing games, matching activities and speaking tasks to help build their confidence. It has been wonderful to see how enthusiastic they are—some children have even started ordering their lunches in French, which has been a lovely way for them to use their new language skills in a real-life context!

We had a wonderful Christmas-themed author visit last Friday, which the children absolutely loved. They enjoyed creating their own elf names and imagining the jobs their elves might do to help Christmas run smoothly. The author will be returning this Friday to sign any books the children have ordered—an email with the details was sent out last week.

Finally, we are continuing to learn our times tables with some fun songs! Practising for just 15 minutes a week on the recommended website will make a huge difference in building strong multiplication and division skills, which are essential throughout Key Stage 2 and beyond. We have begun learning our seven timetables - here are 2 new songs you can practise your seven timetable to at home - 

7 Times Table Song | Skip Counting by 7 Song with Multiplication

Seven Times Table Song (Cups by Anna Kendrick Cover) with Classroom Instruments

3 Times Tables - Have Fun Learning!

4 Times table song (A Whole New World from Disney's Aladdin)

4 Times Table Song (APT be Rosé and Bruno Mars)

Counting By Sixes Song

The 12 Times Table Song | Skip Counting by 12 for Kids

Please ensure that fully named PE kits are in school Monday to Friday. Please ensure also that your child has a named waterproof jacket or coat in school everyday. 

In year 3 fruit snacks are provided by parents, rather than school as in the lower years. Please send your child with a healthy snack that they can enjoy mid-morning. No nuts please.

A reminder also please that children do not need pencil cases, all their stationery is provided in school. Please also keep soft toys and other treasures at home. Thank you for your support with this.

Spellings

Our next test will be Weds 9th December - all groups are keeping the same rules and words for this week to give a little more time to work on these both at school and at home.

Mrs Hughes' /Mr Grimes'/ Mrs Strudwick's groups

 adding the suffix ly

bad

badly

quick

quickly

kind

kindly

near

nearly

quiet

quietly

Mrs Smith's and Mrs Georgiades' groups -

Adding -ation to verbs to form nouns.

Plantation

Information 

Explanation 

Temptation 

Exploration

Sensation

Mrs Lambert's group (formerly Mrs Charlwood's group)

break 

steak

great

bread

head

read

Thank you for your continued support!

S3 Usual weekly timetable (please note that there may be changes to this at times).

Home Learning

Times Tables Rockstars! 

To keep practising the multiplication taught in class, and challenging yourself to keep the ones you already know fresh, don’t forget to log into your Times Tables Rockstars account. 

https://play.ttrockstars.com/

Challenge yourself to beat your score and build your knowledge as you become a Rockstar!

Please ask your class teacher if you need replacement log in details.

Reading

Children should bring their Accelerated Reading Book to and from school each day. When they have finished reading, children are asked to complete a quiz before changing their book. 

https://global-zone61.renaissance-go.com/welcomeportal/6704864

Parents please log your child's reading on the BOOM reader Parent Portal or by using the BOOM reader parent app on your tablet/mobile no more than once a week.

boomreader.co.uk/parents

Below is a list of the 100 most common words that your child is expected to know how to spell by the end of Year 4 (please see attachment).

The spelling strategies document below shows what strategies are used in class, and can be used at home to aid learning new words: 

Spelling strategies

• Spelling strategies to use at home (2).pdf
• spellingwordlist_y3-4.pdf