Science – What are soils made of?
In Science, we have been chemists because we are learning about rocks, fossils and now soils!
So, what are soils made of? We spent the lesson using secondary sources of research (research done by someone else) and our own primary research (research done by us) to answer this question.
Soil is made of:
- tiny rocks
- humus (dead and rotting plants and animals)
- water
- air
We went out into the playground to find some soil to see if we could see these things! After we’d done this, we made lots of careful observations.
Here’s some of what we said:
- Some of our soils are wetter and darker than the others.
- I can see little roots (humus) in the soil.
- We’ve got a tiny worm in our soil!
- Our soil looks very similar to loam soil.
Help at home by trying to find all of those ingredients for soil at the park or at home! Can you see the air?
History – We are the Celts!
In our History lessons, we have been learning all about the Iron Age.
The Iron Age came before the Romans and the Celts, who lived in Britain at the time, led a very quiet life. They were farmers and lived in small tribes until…
43AD when the Romans invaded.
When the Romans invaded, the Celts had a choice:
Give in to the Roman rule which meant having to pay taxes but they got to stay on their land.
or
Resist and rebel against this and possibly end up dying.
It might sound like an easy decision but it wasn’t! As a class, we thought of all the reasons for and against and then had a class debate. We tried our best to be respectful by using sentence starters like, “I see what you’re saying but…” and “That’s a good point but I disagree because…“.
Here’s some pictures of us!
Help at home by having a respectful debate about what you might have for dinner! “I think we should have pesto pasta with chicken because it has protein and carbohydrates…”
Living and Learning – I know some drugs that are harmful and how to stay safe.
Over the last 2 weeks, we have had a focus on drugs, how they can be harmful and how we can be safe around them.
Drugs can come in all different shapes and sizes but they all do change the way the body or mind works.
We had a focus on medicines like Calpol and household items like cleaning products. We discussed when we might need to take or use medicines and how we might use these items.
We decided that:
- We should only take medicine if we are unwell and need it.
- We should always ask an adult before we go near a medicine or cleaning product as they can be dangerous if not used correctly.
- Even adults need to read the instructions on the medicine or cleaning product.
- These items should be kept out of reach of young children.
For example, dishwasher tablets could look really like a sweet to a baby and they might put it in their mouth! Help at home by asking your child to help you keep these products in a safe place.
Spring term after-school clubs
*UPDATE*
We do have the following availability for clubs should your child wish to sign up.
The after-school clubs for this term are available for booking. We hope your child/children can get involved with our extra-curricular activities.
Please contact the office if you have any queries about the after-school clubs.
Science – fossils!
Hello!
Our new science topic is Fossils!
Last week, we learnt about what a fossil is and what different fossils there are in the world.
A fossil is the remains or trace of a living thing that lived a very long time ago. They can be fossils of animals, plants or even animal poo!
We decided that fossils are important because they tell us a lot about the past. For example, we know a lot about dinosaurs, what they looked like and even what they ate because of fossils that we have found.
Mary Anning is our key scientist as she is known as one of the greatest fossil hunters to have ever lived. She found fossils in Lyme-Regis and she made amazing discoveries just from observing and studying them! We’ve been reading about her during our reading fluency sessions.
If you have a fossil at home that you are happy to bring into school, please do! We would love to have a look at different fossils in real life.
Help at home when you are travelling somewhere, quiz each other on whether an object is living or not living and whether it could be made into a fossil! Is this pen living? No! Is this rock living? No! Is this apple living?
Children’s Heart Surgery Fund
This week, Lauren from Children’s Heart Surgery Fund came to visit.
Children’s Heart Surgery Fund is our new school charity, voted for by the Junior Leadership Team, and we learnt all about their work and how our donations will support the charity over the next year.
Here are some of our Junior Leaders with Lauren.
Non-fiction reading!
This week in our Reading lessons, we have focused on a non-fiction book called ‘A Street Through Time’. This book shows us how life has changed throughout history. We used the page about Romans because that’s our new topic!
We first spent a lesson reading through the text and picking apart the language and features. Non-fiction texts have headings, sub-headings, labels and pictures to help the reader.
We then summarised each part of the text by matching it up to its correct sub-heading. Summarising means finding the main parts and describing it in a clear and concise way.
Here’s how we got on:
Summarising a text and deciding what the main, important parts are can be tricky! Help at home by practising summarising. Can you summarise your day in 20 words? 10 words? 5? 1?
New year, new topic!
Happy New Year! We hope you had a great break from school and are feeling refreshed.
With a new year, comes a new term and a new topic. This half term, we are being historians and learning about the Romans and Anglo-Saxons.
Before we spend time learning about how the Romans came to invade Britain and how the Anglo-Saxons lived after the Romans had left, we needed to know what the timeline of British history looks like.
A timeline shows us the chronological order of events.
Here is what we came up with:
From the longest ago to the most recent, we had Stone Age Britain to the Coronavirus. Before the Romans, was the Iron Age Britain so this is where we begun our learning.
The Celts:
- lived in tribes
- were farmers
- lived in wooden, thatched huts
- had no rulers but did have chiefs
- made tools and weapons out of bronze and iron
Help at home by comparing the Celts lives to our lives. What do you think the children did in the Iron Age? Is there anything that we have in common with them?
Final art sculptures!
After a few lessons of hard work, Year 3 have finished their sculptures and they look amazing! Here’s just some of them:
As you can see, they all look so different which is so lovely to see their imaginations coming to life. We set up a mini art gallery and walked around to observe each others sculptures. We did this silently as that’s what they’re usually like! After, we made positive comments about each other’s work using our art vocabulary. For example:
- I like this because they have used complementary colours.
- This one reminds me of the planets as it’s made out of big circles.
- I like this one because it’s so different and looks more figurative (the shape of a person) than abstract.
- They have used warm colours on one side and cool colours on the other.
A big well done to Year 3!
Basketball new year camp
City of Leeds Basketball Club, who run our basketball after-school clubs, are running a new year camp. Details can be found below.
