Welcome to Class 3 - Squirrels

Spellings and Times Tables

Our spelling words this week are:

generous, interest, supermarket, different, energy

Learning Tip - these words all have -er in the middle of them!

These words will be on display in our classroom all week and we will complete a daily activity to practise spelling these words. We will have a brief spelling test on Friday morning.

Remember to log in to TTRockstars to practise your times tables (I can log in to see who is practising and who isn't - please remember this is a set piece of homework).

Mummification

We learnt all about the gruesome process of mummification and then had a go at mummifying our friends (only the wrapping part, NOT the embalming!!). We did a great job and had so much fun!

Computing - Presentations About Ourselves

This term we have been learning to create slideshows using PowerPoint. The children learned to safely search the internet, how to copy and paste images, and how to add text and format it. We used animations and transitions (judiciously!) to make our presentations more engaging. Finally, we delivered our presentations about ourselves to the rest of the class.  

Stig's Den

We spent the afternoon in the woods making dens for Stig. We used good teamwork and had lots of fun working out how to actually make our dens stay up!

Roots to Food

Today we had a visit from 'Roots to Food' where we learnt how to make Japanese Teriyaki Noodles. We learnt lots of new skills like stirring, whisking, chopping and peeling and enjoyed practising these when making our dish. We also learnt about the nutritional value of the food we were making and how different colours of vegetables have different vitamins/minerals. 

Rock Investigations 

We thought about the different ways that we could sort rocks based on their properties (hard/soft, bumpy/smooth, durability, high/low density, permeable/impermeable). We had a look at a variety of rocks under the magnifying glasses and then used water to investigate their permeability and density. We thought about the different ways that we could sort rocks based on their properties (hard/soft, bumpy/smooth, durability, high/low density, permeable/impermeable). We had a look at a variety of rocks under the magnifying glasses and then used water to investigate their permeability and density.

Cave Painting

We had  ago at our very own cave paintings today! We shuffled under our tables (which we had to imagine were caves!) and then had a go at doing water-colour painting on some tea-stained paper stuck to the underside of our desks. It was much trickier then we thought it would be but A LOT of fun!

Science - Different Types of Rocks

We learnt about how the different types of rocks were formed and then did a practical activity using sweets to represent this.

Igneous Rocks - lava or magma from volcanoes cools downs and hardens into rocks. We made honeycomb to represent the hot lava cooling down and hardening.

Sedimentary Rocks - layers of 'sediment' (dead plants, dead animals, small rocks, soils) become rocks over thousands of years due to pressure. We layered two different colours of Starbursts and then used the pressure of our hands to compress them into 'rock'.

Metamorphic Rocks - Igneous or Sedimentary Rocks that have been changed over time through exposure to extreme heat or pressure. We had a slice of Mars Bar which represented a Sedimentary Rock (layers!) and then changed it using the heat and pressure of our hands.

Skip2bFit!

We took part in a skipping workshop. We had to see how many skips we could do in 2 minutes and then (after a break) used our determination and perseverance to beat our own scores!

Computing - Scratch Animations

This term we have been making animations using block-based coding in Scratch. You can view everyone's animations here: https://scratch.mit.edu/studios/32277012 Well done! You've done lots of great coding to sequence them. If yours isn't finished, you can click on See Inside, continue to work on it and then save the new version to your home computer.

Book Week - Dressing Up!

Can you guess who we are?

Book Week - Deal Poet's Society

Some members from the Deal Poet's Society came in to share some their poetry with us, and teach us a cool trick for writing poems based on the short date of our birthdays! Some of us then very bravely shared these poems with the rest of Key Stage 2 in assembly. 

Book Week - Sharing Poetry

As an introductory activity into our poetry themed Book Week, we shared a variety of poems with our friends.

Healthy Dessert

For our healthy dessert, we made a fruit salad! We had to write a list of the fruit we would like to include, then we cut it and mixed it in our bowl (and then ate it!).

Healthy Main

For our healthy main course, we made a pasta dish by adding our own choices of toppings to some pasta.

Healthy Starter

We have begun our D.T. project of designing, making, evaluating (and eating!) a healthy 3 course meal. For our starter, we made vegetables and dips!

Geography and D.T. day

We had so much fun on Geography and D.T. day! We started our day with a walk in the local fields to see how they looked now that the crops that we saw growing last Geography day had been harvested. We also found a big green caterpillar! Then, we came back to make some Apple Crisp which we later baked at home. This recipe uses lots of ingredients that are grown/produced locally. In the afternoon, we had an assembly with Mr Gaskain and produced some posters to encourage people to eat locally.

Autumn Art

We thought about how we know that Autumn is coming - the chill in the air, the crispy leaves on the floor, the conkers and the beautiful colourful leaves! We used this as inspiration for a piece of autumnal art using oil pastels. We found the pastels were great for blending and mixing colours and was a particularly effective method for helping the tree trunks to look 3d and the clouds to look fluffy. 

P.S.H.E.

In our P.S.H.E. lesson, we thought about the ways we can be similar or different to other people. We discussed why it was important to celebrate differences, and also how easy it can be to find connections based on things that make us similar. We used some wool to make our connections visible - as you can see, we got in a bit of a tangle. 

Small Worlds!

This week, we made small worlds for Max (the main character from 'The Hodgeheg'). We thought about what Max would need in his environment and then used these to help us write a description of Max's little world from his point of view. 

Clothes Making!

This term, we've been working on a big project! We had to design an item of clothing that matched a specific brief. Our design had to show how the item of clothing was fit for purpose, with notes about any special features it has and some reasons for fabric choices. We came up with our initial designs by discussing our ideas as a group and we then developed these ideas and created a big poster which we used to help us present our ideas to the class. We then answered questions from our peers about our designs and the choices we'd made - it was very much like Dragon's Den! Next, we began making a prototype of our design.

Sports Week

We had so much fun trying out new sports during Sports Week, many of us loved Boxing and enjoyed the more relaxed pace of Golf. We also made some motivational posters to cheer our friends on during Sports Day and did some sports based geometric art too!

R.E.

We went to St James' Church to support our learning in R.E. Rev Peter told us all about Holy Communion and showed us the chalice and bread that they use. We also talked about the symbolism of the ritual and what Christians remember during Holy Communion. 

Groombridge Place

We had the best time on our school trip to Groombridge Place! The children all looked magical in their outfits and were at home in the Enchanted Forest where we saw giant tee-pees, wishing wells, a little Jurassic valley and a fort. We also spent lots of time enjoying imaginative play in the various playgrounds and saw a Birds of Prey display too!

Jubilee Celebrations

We had a lovely time celebrating the Queens Platinum Jubilee! We spent the afternoon playing some party games in our classroom (a riddle quiz, charades and Pictionary) and then at 2:45, joined the rest of the school on the playground to sing the national anthem and have a party tea!

History Day

Our History Day theme was 'The Queen's Reign'. Each class had a decade to learn about and will contribute pieces to go on a whole school timeline in the hall. Class 3 were very lucky - we learnt all about the Swinging Sixties! We begun by seeing what we knew about the 60s already as we were trying to answer the question 'Why were the 60s so great in Britain?'.

To help us answer our question, we got some cards featuring events that took place in the 1960s. We tried to put them into the order that we thought they happened in. We then found out the answers and made a timeline to reflect all the amazing events that happened in the 60s. Later in the day, we watched some videos of key historical events (World Cup win, 'I have a Dream' speech, concorde taking flight) and learnt about some other events in more detail (the Bristol Bus Boycott, Space Race). We then designed a commemorative postage stamp to reflect an important event of the 1960s. 

MfL Day

We spent all day learning about Germany and studying the German language.

In the morning we:

• Discussed the languages we have heard being spoken before

• Shared what we know about Germany

• Learnt about the culture in Germany

• Learnt some basic greetings and the kind of things we might say when meeting someone new, such as how they are (Wie gehts?).

• Tried some German breakfast food (der Käse, das Brot, der Schinken, die Salami) and expressed whether they were ‘gut’ or ‘nicht gut’.

• Learnt the colours in German

• Had Mr Wallace come in and teach us some Spanish – turns out we already knew more than we thought!

In the afternoon we:

• Made magnets featuring a German phrase that we had learnt

• Learnt the numbers 0-20 and then played a few games of bingo!

• Went outside and played the Fruit Salad game, but with colours instead of fruit

It was a very busy day but we all had so much fun!

Music

This term we have been thinking about how music makes us feel. We listened to a variety of different pieces of music and then discussed what emotions we felt when we listened to that music and what it was about that music which had made us feel that way. We thought about the sounds we could hear and tried to identify some of the instruments, we thought about the speed of the music, the use of pauses and the pitch of the music too. Next, we used our learning to try to compose our own pieces of music in groups which would help us to portray a certain emotion. We thought carefully about the instruments we chose and how we used them.

Geography Day

Mrs Dixon organised a fantastic Geography Day for us! We went for a walk around the local area in the morning and thought about all the different ways the land had been used. We saw a chalk pit (like in Stig!), wheat fields, rape fields, a cherry orchard (where we stopped for our snack - lots of us had Jazz apples kindly donated by Mr Macey), Lime Tree Avenue, Lees Court and some forested areas. While we were out, we tried to follow our walk on a map so that we could create our own maps when we were back in the classroom. We walked for 2.5 hours and covered 3.2miles of the local surroundings. 

In the afternoon, Mr Dean, the gamekeeper of the Lees Court Estate, came to talk to use about his job. We all found this very interesting and managed to impress him with our knowledge of the local wildlife. Then, Mr Gaskain came to speak to us about his fruit farming in the local area (although really, he mostly spoke to us about tractors!!).

Easter

Look at our gorgeous Easter Bonnets! It was a very hard choice, but our class winners were Sophie and Jemima. 

Performing Arts Week

We had so much fun delving into the work of 'The Beatles' during Performing Arts Week. We tried to learn a few lines of 'Here Comes the Sun' on the glockenspiel, had a dance party in the hall with Class 4 where we learnt some typical 1960s dance moves, designed our own album covers and had loads of fun with the students from Kings School who taught us a dance! 

Science - Plants

In Science, we have been identifying parts of a plant and thinking about their roles. We recapped the flower, leaves, stem and roots and have also learnt about some of the parts of a flower (stigma, style, filament and anther). These parts of a flower are needed for a plant to be able to make new plants. To help us with identifying these parts, we each dissected a daffodil.

English - Oliver Jeffers

We began our new English topic by looking at a variety of books by the author and illustrator Oliver Jeffers. We explored a variety of books that he has written or contributed to and created some posters to show what the book was about, what we liked/disliked about the story, who the characters were, where it was set, what the problems and resolutions were and who the intended audience might be. We explored 'Stuck' and 'The Heart and The Bottle' together and were struck by how different the stories were. We thought 'Stuck' was so funny because of the ridiculousness of it all, but thought 'The Heart and The Bottle' was sad and serious.

Fantastic Friday - Cafe Class 3

For Fantastic Friday, Mrs Minty set up a cafe! We came in and were offered a drink of squash or hot chocolate, we could sit anywhere and chat with our friends/read a book/do some drawing and we listened to some slow jazz while a fire blazed away on the interactive whiteboard. What a great way to start our day!

Art Week!

During Art Week, we have been looking at an illustration by Reza Devland from the book 'It's Up to Us'. The picture consists of a colourful depiction of 4 different environments: the Savanna, wetlands, a coral reef and a forest (which some of us have interpreted as a rainforest). Each day, we have been trying to recreate one of the pieces in a different medium. We have painted, collaged and created a diorama featuring a small clay animal that would be seen in our chosen environment. Also, for our Fantastic Friday activity, we had the paints out and could paint anything we wanted! We have had so much fun!

Our Favourite Works of Art!

STEM Week

We had a great time thinking about our future in STEM week. It was a great opportunity for us to focus on Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths whilst also learning about important current issues. We made torches with Mr Blair, which we then designed and made a cover for, Mrs Blair taught us a lot about climate change and what we can do to help and Mrs Hayhoe bought her chameleons in. We also tried making and flying paper aeroplanes and designing inventions that would be helpful in the future.  

R.E. day

We really enjoyed learning about Diwali and how it is celebrated in Hinduism and Sikhism. We had a go at creating our own Rangoli Patterns. Some of us worked in small groups, making them with sand and rice in the traditional way, and the rest of us tried to use a repeating pattern of circles (drawn using a compass) to create one. This was very tricky! We also learnt some Bollywood style dance moves, made friendship bracelets (and learnt to plait) and designed our own Mehndi hands.

Bollywood Style Dancing