Synonyms and Antonyms!
This week in Y3, we have been up-levelling our vocabulary using synonyms of words we commonly use to describe things.
We also found antonyms for these words, too.
As we’re preparing to write a setting description, the children made a bank of all the best, and relevant, pieces of vocabulary they found.
Here it is:
We used the iPads and thesauruses in order to up-level our vocab. The original words are displayed at the top with the synonyms below.
Ask your child if they can tell you what synonyms and antonyms are!
Living and Learning: United against bullying
This week, it’s Anti-Bullying Week and the theme for this year is ‘United against bullying’.
Don’t forget – we are also taking part in Odd Socks Day on Monday 16 November.
STOP is a key message linked to bullying. In our school, STOP stands for two things:
- the definition: Several Times On Purpose
- the solution: Start Telling Other People
Recently, our school council met to review our school definition of bullying and our child friendly anti-bullying policy. Thank you to the school councillors for their valued contributions. As a result, our definition and policy have now been updated.
Child friendly anti-bullying policy
What is bullying?
In our school, this is what bullying means:
Bullying is where you hurt someone, physically or emotionally (including online), several times on purpose.
What might bullying look like?
If any of these things happen several (lots of) times, it is bullying.
- Hurting peoples’ feelings, for example, name calling, teasing, threatening, ignoring, leaving people out or spreading rumours
- Hurting peoples’ bodies, for example, hitting, punching or kicking
This could be in person or online (cyber bullying) and could be because of someone’s race, disability, gender, appearance, age or any other protected characteristic.
What could you do if you are being bullied?
Start
Telling
Other
People
Who could you tell?
- Mrs Weekes/Mrs Freeman/Mrs Russell/Mrs Small (they are child protection staff)
- Mrs Taylor (Health Leader)
- Any other members of staff
- Friends
- Someone in your family
- A trusted adult
- Childline (0800 1111)
- Write a worry slip and put it in your Living and Learning box or the whole school worry box
- Email stayingsafe@spherefederation.org
Our views on bullying
STOP bullying – bullying is wrong! We’re a happy and healthy school.
Times Tables Rock Stars/NumBots
As you all know, Times Tables Rock Stars is an app and website that we use in school to quicken the recall of tables facts.
Here in Y3, we have been using this app on a regular basis and there has been progress in our recalling speed of our table facts.
This post is simply a reminder that it’s something that you can use at home, too. If you have any questions, send me an email and I am more than happy to help.
Each game is short so you don’t need lots of time – ten minutes each day would be ideal.
Regular practise has shown great progress with children’s times tables.
We also know that our times tables open up the door to many other areas of maths.
We’ve just signed up to Numbots, too. Perhaps more suited to younger children or children who need a bit of extra support with the basics, this is a great app and website for practising addition and subtraction facts. Your child can use it at home too – they login using the same details they use for Times Tables Rock Stars. There are 15 different games, each with a different focus. Topics covered include doubles and number bonds to 10, 20 and 100.
Thanks for all your support so far this year and as always, if you have any questions, comments or concerns, send me an email: oliwain@spherefederation.org
Living and Learning
Our Living and Learning statement this week is:
In Y3, we have been reflecting on this statement all week.
For our homework, we talked about and wrote down some of the things that make us special.
We also enjoyed an assembly about how we are all the same and different. The children in Y3 had lots to share about this statement – it was great!
I’m looking forward to our L&L session on Friday where we will revisit working cooperatively and remind ourselves to do this all the time!
If you haven’t done so already, ask your child what makes them the same and different!
Reading as Historians!
Continuing our Ancient Greece learning, we have been looking at the Golden Age – this was between c. 500-300 BC.
Here are some pictures of us ordering key events from Ancient Greece’s history chronologically.
Ask your child what chronology means!
For us to be able to do this, we had to carefully read the different events throughout Greece’s history and match them up with the correct dates.
Keep up the hard work, Y3!
Odd socks day
Next week is Anti-Bullying Week.
This year’s theme is ‘United against bullying’ and we will be taking part in Odd Socks Day on Monday 16 November.
Odd socks day is to raise awareness of our differences, individuality and personal choice. There is no need for any payment – your child should simply wear odd socks and join in the fun!
Thank you for your support.
Athletics!
This week, we have started a new P.E. topic: Athletics!
Ask your child at home which activity there favourite was! Was it sprinting, shotput, speed bounce or something else?
Here are some pictures of us in action!
Being Reflective
On Friday afternoon, we spent ten minutes reflecting on our week. We reflected on what went well, what was tricky and what we enjoyed.
Olivia said:
When I saw our maths learning objective: ‘counting in 50s’, I was worried that it was going to be really tricky. When you taught us that it was really similar to counting in 5s, I found it a lot easier than I thought I would and now I get it!
This week, we also begun creating our own maze games based on ‘Theseus and the Minotaur’ – a Greek myth.
The children in Year 3 were so excited about this project. When we were reflecting on Friday, many of them put their hands up straight away to show it was their favourite part of the week.
Living and Learning: 8Rs for learning
As you will know, this half term our Living and Learning focus is the 8Rs for learning.
Year 3 have shown one of the 8Rs in particular within maths lessons: resilience.
We have been looking at numbers to 1,000 and breaking them down (partitioning) into different parts, before plotting them on number lines.
We found it tricky to start with but we kept persevering and are now confident with it!
Showing resilience to overcome this has made us very happy indeed!
Science: classifying animals
In our current science topic, we have been learning about the different types of animals including: mammals, reptiles, fish, birds, amphibians and invertebrates.
We thought of our own yes/no questions to classify animals based on their characteristics. We called this a classification key.
Test your child’s knowledge of the different types of animals at home – they’re very confident!
