Welcome back, Year 3!

Hello! Mr Freeman here welcoming you back to another fantastic year at St James. Year 3 have started extremely well in lots of ways:

• We know our school rules and how to follow them well every day.
• Our effort levels in learning have been superb!
• The children have really enjoyed their new classroom layout and the table points.

Most importantly, the children have had a really happy and healthy return to school. Here’s a brief look at our journey this week:

History

For our first topic unit this year, we are exploring the depths of Ancient Greece! Above is our first class novel, ‘Greek Myths’, by Marcia Williams. The children have really enjoyed listening to these stories and discussing links to our Christian Values. Here are some of the links from the children.

“Arian showed compassion when he let the sailors live who stole his treasure that he earnt from hard work” – Max

“Orpheus showed perseverance to travel a long way to reach the underworld, so that he could get his wife back” – Lillie Jane

Science

Today, we put on our biologists’ uniforms and uncovered our first unit – skeletons, movement and nutrition. We focussed on 5 bones in the human body today (shown above). Some of these bones are there to protect certain parts of our body, and others are used to support our movement.

Help at home:

Please read regularly with your child and sign their reading record. A good strategy would be to read for a short while, every day, to build up fluency. Also, your child has gone home with their Times Tables Rockstars logins (stuck to the back of their reading records. Please encourage your child to practise for at least 5 minutes per day – focus on the 5 times tables this week!

Finally, if you have any questions, please feel free to have a chat with me (Mr Freeman) and I’ll absolutely do my best to help.

Living and Learning: I folllow the school rules.

Our Living and Learning statement for our first week is:

I follow the school rules.

Our three school rules are short and snappy to remember:

We are respectful.

We are ready.

We are safe.

As a class, Year 3 have discussed what the rules mean and how to follow them in school. We know that being respectful covers lots of things, such as listening to others, being kind to everyone and using our manners in school.

Help at home:

Talk about the three school rules with your child. Which is the easiest to follow? Which is the most difficult? Come up with some top tips on how to follow our school rules every day.

Staying safe week

The RNLI – staying safe around water

As part of our staying safe week, we have had a visit from Alan from The RNLI (Royal National Lifeboat Institution).

He gave a brief introduction to the work that The RNLI carry out. In the last 200 years, they have helped to save over 146,000 people from drowning! The RNLI is a registered charity that is able to run through voluntary contributions – it costs £188 million to run the service each year!

Alan spoke to us about how to keep safe when around water (coasts, rivers, canals, swimming pools, baths, paddling pools in the garden).

It only takes a little bit of water to get into trouble.

Willow Y4

Useful advice to stay safe:

• At the beach, swim between the yellow and red flags.
• Stop and think before you enter the water – can you spot any dangers?
• Stay together
• Float on your back like a starfish, with your ears in the water.
• Call 999/112

The children have each been given a Water Smart leaflet to reinforce the important messages they have learnt today.

Help at home – Read and complete the Water Smart leaflet at home. What do the different coloured flags mean? What number should we call if we see someone in danger in the water? What is the best way to float?

Staying safe week

First Aid – staying safe

Our children have learnt about how to deliver CPR to someone who may be unconscious and not breathing.

We learnt:

• to check to see if the person will wake up;
• to shake and ask if they are ok;
• to check if they are breathing;
• to shout for help/call 999;

If the casualty is not breathing then we start CPR – 30 compressions: 2 breaths.

We would continue CPR until help arrives, we can’t go on any further or the casualty wakes up.

The children also learnt about stings and burns and what to do should we experience either on these.

Help at home – ask your child what to do should a bee sting them. How long should we cool a burn? How do we cool a burn? Is there anything we can put on a burn?

Staying safe week

d:side – staying safe online.

Today, we had a visit from Dave from d:side.

Dave talked to us about how to stay safe online. Firstly, he discussed posting things online and how it is important that we think carefully before we share. He taught us that once we have posted something online, it is there forever and can’t be deleted. This may lead to problems for us now and maybe in the future. We know we must tell a trusted adult if we are unsure about what to post.

This is called our digital footprint.

Tommy-Lee Y4

If you share, do it with care.

Share smart, share safe, share kind.

d:Side Dave

Dave went on to talk to us about social media. Most of the social media platforms have a guidance age-rating of 13, whereas WhatsApp has a guidance age-rating of 16. He recommended that we make our social media private and use safe sites, such as YouTube Kids.

Some things are age appropriate, some things are age inappropriate.

Shae Y3

Finally, Dave spoke to us about gaming and why games have a particular age rating. He introduced the PEGI (Pan-European Game Information) age rating system.

He explained that games such as Roblox and Minecraft are age rating 7 and why games such as Fortnite (age rating 12) and Call of Duty (age rating 16) have higher age rating and are not appropriate for younger children.

Help at home – How is your child keeping themselves safe online? Are accounts private? What date of birth is assigned to the account? Are we checking with an adult before we post something online?

Staying Safe Week

The Dogs Trust – staying safe with dogs.

Today, Mrs Hill from the Dogs Trust joined us to talk to us about how to stay safe around dogs.

We learnt three important rules when approaching a dog:

• Ask the owner for permission to stroke the dog.
• With your hands by your side, ask the dog if they are happy to be stroked.
• Calmly approach the dog and stroke gently from the side.

Mrs Hill taught us how to stay safe if a dog comes towards us:

• Cross our arms across our chest.
• Look the other way.
• Lift our arms higher if we feel that the dog may jump up to our face.

We then worked as ‘Doggie Detectives’. We thought about how dogs might feel in a variety of different scenarios and how to make the situation best for the dog and the people involved.

There are lots of children in our class who either have a dog(s) or see dogs regularly around our community. We learnt so much that we can’t wait to share with people back home.

Help at home – Ask your child about important rules when approaching a dog or if a dog approaches them. How can we keep ourselves safe? What actions can we avoid to keep a dog calm? What do The Dogs Trust do?

Living and Learning

Body image

In Year 3 and 4 this week, we have thought about our bodies and about how they might change. Changes in our body can occur through a variety of reasons, some things we can influence and some things we can’t.

The children wrote down their thoughts and we had some in depth discussions about their ideas. The children were very mature and spoke with respect whilst building on each other’s ideas.

We then focussed on ourselves and wrote down three things that we are good at. We shared our strengths and found that others had the same strengths too. Children understood that even though we are all different in many ways, we can all share similar attributes.

Help at home – Ask your child what they are good at. Can you make opportunities to do something they are good at? How will we change over time? Are there any changes we can/can’t influence? How do you feel about that?

Maths

Identifying angles

We have had a fantastic maths lesson this morning, searching for and identifying angles. We found right angles, acute angles and obtuse angles. The children were fantastic when using the correct names for each angle and could clearly tell me how they know what type of angle it was.

Help at home – can you find any right angles, acute angles or obtuse angles at home or in your garden. How do you know it is a right angle? How do you know it is an acute angle? How do you know it is an obtuse angle? Can you draw them and put them in order of size? How many quarter turns make a right angle?

Design and Technology

We had a fantastic opportunity this morning to listen to and speak to Joel Wilson. Joel is a footwear designer for DR Martens, he has previously worked at brands like Lacoste and Ellesse.

Speaking to Joel fits in perfectly with our current Design and Technology work. We are currently in the process of creating a pouch. We follow a design brief and specific design criteria to produce an end product. We found that Joel follows a similar process in his area of work.

He told us all about his childhood and how he loved to draw and then about his journey into designing clothes. Can you believe that he didn’t even know that being a designer was a job?

We learnt about the process of creating a pair of Dr Martens – it takes about 18 months from the first design stage to a completed pair of shoes!

The children were extremely engaged and had lots of questions. We have been inspired by what Joel had to say.

It’s inspired me to design clothes.

Shae

I have always wanted to design clothes but now I’m thinking about shoes because when he answered his questions I gave me ideas about what I would like to do.

Emily M

It’s inspired me becasue now I am keen to draw and design clothes and footwear.

Emily G

I never knew that people drew the shoes that we wear!

Beau

Help at home – Ask your child about what they remember from Joel. What design criteria do we need to incorporate into our pouches? What is the purpose of your pouch? Who is it for?

Armley Mills

As part of our Design and Technology topic we have visited Armley Mills Industrial Museum in Leeds and learnt about the process of weaving. We followed the process of wool being brushed (carded) and then spun. We then worked as a class to weave and then produced some of our own. The children had a lovely time and behaved impeccably – they were a credit to the school.

Here are some pictures from the day:

Help at home – Ask your child about the day. What was the best thing they learnt? Can they remember what ‘warp’ and ‘weft’ means? Can they produce some weaving at home?