Year 3
| Dickens Boulevard | Ruskin Drive |
| Otters Class | Panda Class |
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Miss Phillips Mirs Hawkes (supporting both classes)
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Mrs Ward Mrs Beach |
| Fox Class | |
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Miss Hodgson Miss Wilkinson (supporting both classes)
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Welcome
Welcome to Year 3!
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We have two classes at Dickens Boulevard site and one class at Ruskin Drive Site. Both classes enjoy learning both inside and out and we make use of the school’s grounds to bring our learning to life. We use the outside areas for a range of activities, including litter picking, environmental walks, and active counting/spelling games.
Every morning, you’ll find a morning activity to welcome you; this gets your brain working and ready for the day. In our lessons, we enjoy using practical resources, this might be maths equipment to iPads and laptops to a host of artefacts to help us understand more about geography or a time in history. Friends can help each other with their learning and there’s a number of school adults that can help you too. We enjoy developing our reading skills too and take the time to explore lots of different texts, develop our vocabulary while also becoming more of a fluent reader.
In Year 3, we help children continue their journey to become more independent learners and will provide them with lots of encouragement and support in this. We’re sure you’ll notice them organising their belongings and taking responsibility as they grow more confident in this.
Daily Routine
At Dickens Boulevard, children can access the Year 3 cloakroom by entering the gates from Nickelby Way. At Ruskin Drive, children enter the playground through the main gate from the car park and can walk down to the Year 3 classroom where they will enter the cloakroom.
The class door open at 8.45am and close at 8.55am and the school day is from 8:55am until 3:20pm. We have a playtime at 10:20am, followed by snack time in the class at 10:40am. In Key Stage 2, children can bring a piece of fruit or vegetables in a small named container to have at snack time. Milk is available to drink, if it has been ordered by parents or carers. More information about this can be obtained from the Office.
Upon arrival, children start the day with a Morning Challenge which might be a chance to put their memory to the test and recall information from last week, last month or even the previous year! Other Morning Challenges include: mental maths, handwriting, describing a picture, finding particular types of grammar or practising spellings.
We encourage all children to bring in a named water bottle; however we ask that only water is in them, not squash or flavoured waters. Children can access these water bottles regularly during the day and for during PE lessons too. Keeping hydrated is all part of keeping healthy and we promote and encourage this in Year 3.
Our lunchtime is from 12:30pm until 1:30pm. We go into the dining hall and then head outside to play with our friends and use the play equipment. We stay out in all weathers, so if rain is forecast, don’t forget to bring your coat with a hood so that you can keep dry!
At the end of the day, parents and carers can wait at the classroom door to collect the children. If you would like to give permission to someone else to regularly collect your child, please complete a green collection slip so that we maintain a record of who is authorised to collect your child as the safeguarding of your child is important to us. If your child will be collected by someone as a “one off”, for example for a play date, please complete a white collection slip. On the rare occasion, that someone comes to collect your child and they are not a parent/carer or listed on a safeguarding slip, we will call the parent/carer to obtain permission to permit the child to leave with that person.
Collecting Pupils from School – Safeguarding slips for One off collection / Regular collection
Curriculum
Click on the link below for the Year 3 curriculum map.
Here is a video for the Rolling Numbers that your children learn in school to help them with their counting, leading to learning their times table facts.
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In KS1 they are taught the 2s, 10s and 5s. (Year 2 will also teach the 3s Rolling Numbers.)
In Year 3 they are taught the 3s, 4s and 8s. (Year 3 will also teach the 7s and 9s Rolling Numbers.)
In Year 4 they learn their remaining times table facts.
Phonics, Spelling and Handwriting
During Year 3, our focus moves to spelling. We will explore different spelling rules, notice patterns and we always enjoy finding the exception to the rule!! Children may still use their phonic knowledge to spell trickier, unfamiliar words, however we encourage children to build on their Year 1 and Year 2 word knowledge and spelling rules and expand this by becoming fluent in the rules and spelling words that we will teach during their time in Year 3.
When learning spelling rules, it’s really helpful if children can recall which letters are a consonant and which are a vowel, if you’re able to practise this at home it will help them in school. We enjoy a multi-sensory approach to spellings, you will find children in Year 3 learning their spellings actively with jumping jacks, writing in ‘squiggles’, singing, echoing the lead speller and also finger-writing on others’ backs! We try and make it fun and engaging while also practising the more traditional ‘look, cover, write, check’ approach too. On our classroom doors, you will find our “word of the week” too and we encourage children to look at it every time they pass!
Spellings will be sent home each week on the learning log (which is our approach to homework); this will comprise of the spelling rule we’re learning, key words that we need to practise and our word of the week too. In class, children have access to word mats, prompts and displays around the class to help them recall their spellings.
The National Curriculum sets out a word list for children in Year 3 and 4. We have then broken this down into Year 3 and you can find the spelling words that we learn during this year here.
Please refer to this Spelling Booklet to find out more about how we teach spellings at Fairfield Park and also give you some ideas on how to help practise spellings at home.
Handwriting is also a key part to presenting our work neatly. Click here to see the best grip for holding a pencil. You can also find more about how Handwriting is taught at Fairfield Park in our Handwriting Guide.
PE
Our PE days are Mondays and Fridays. Our PE kit includes a white t-shirt or polo top and either burgundy shorts or tracksuit bottoms and trainers. Please ensure they have the most suitable clothing for whatever the weather, this includes their Fairfield Park hoodie to wear outside and if it is really cold, gloves and a hat. If it is very cold, your child can wear their coat on top of their PE kits.
All long hair should be tied back for PE lessons and earrings should be removed or covered with micropore tape if they cannot be removed. Please send your child in with a roll of micropore tape for your child to cover their earrings if this is appropriate for them.
Homework
Our learning logs come home on a Friday and are returned on a Wednesday. The learning log is emailed to parents and children can complete the learning in their book.
Any learning logs returned after Wednesday may not be marked that week. We encourage all children to complete the learning log work as it is an opportunity to consolidate their knowledge or to practise new knowledge; we recognise however, that there will be some occasions where this is not possible – just let us know and return the learning log at the next opportunity.
There will be Maths and English activities and also opportunities to practise times tables, spellings and maths facts that we don’t necessarily use all the time, such as measuring or telling the time. We have subscriptions to Oxford Reading Buddy which has online books that your child can read and complete short quizzes on and also your child has access to Times Table Rockstars which enables them to practise their times table knowledge and design their own rockstar avatar as they gain coins from playing frequently.
We also encourage children to read daily to an adult at home and for this to be noted in their reading record.
Reading and Library Books
Reading books are grouped into ‘phonics’ books that match our phonics sequence and ‘real book approach’ scheme books that form of a coloured book band scheme. Phonics book will match the phase(s) that your child is learning or has learned and enable the child to practise or re-visit previously learnt sounds. ‘Real book approach’ scheme books are appropriately pitched for your child, however some may need adult support to read some of the vocabulary.
If your child is reading phonics books, they should be re-reading these a number of times as your child will then begin to recognise sounds and words and become increasingly more fluent.
In Year 3, we encourage children to read daily to an adult at home and for this to be noted in their reading record. We change books when a child has finished their book, please writing “finished book” in the reading record so that this can be arranged. Our class libraries have a range of books for children to read during the course of the day and we also encourage children to read for pleasure, share their book recommendations and encourage others to read those that they have enjoyed. In Guided Reading, we experience a host of genres – poems, non-fiction texts and extracts of fiction books that develop the children’s vocabulary and also reading comprehension skills. We also have a class reading book too, enjoying this at moments during the day.
When reading with your child, you may find it helpful to ask questions to support their comprehension. To access these questions please click here .
10 Things to do before you are 8
There will be times throughout the year for you to share your journey with your class teacher:
| Practise mindfulness | Go stargazing | Learn to fold clothes | Play a new board game with your family | Help a younger child on the playground |
| Learn 5 ways to say 'Hello' from around the world | Learn to wash and dry up | Fly a kite | Raise money for charity | Make lunch for you and a special person |
