Grade 3 Community News
Dear Year 3 Families,
We hope that you and your family are enjoying Term 4 as much as we are here at TRPS! It’s been wonderful to see all the students working hard, having fun, and learning new things every day.
Knowledge Building Unit
We are now halfway through our new book, The One and Only Ivan by Katherine Applegate, and the students are making significant progress! They have been engaged in reading and exploring the story, using their predicting and inferencing skills to think about the characters and what might happen next. It’s wonderful to see their curiosity grow as they connect with the text. At home, you can help by asking your child questions about the story so far and encouraging them to share their ideas about what they think will happen in the following chapters. This helps build their understanding and love for reading even more.
In writing, the students are continuing their work on persuasive letters, expanding sentences, using conjunctions, and summarising. They have explored the purpose, structure, and key features of a persuasive letter to support their own writing. In weeks 3 and 4, students are working on planning and writing body paragraphs for their persuasive letters to the minister, urging a national ban on the use of wild animals in circuses. We’re excited to watch the students’ letters come together and see the fantastic final result of their efforts! It’s been wonderful to see how passionate they are about this topic! At home, you might like to ask your child to tell you some of their persuasive arguments and explain why they believe this issue is essential.
Numeracy
In week 3 in numeracy, the students have been working on location. They learnt all about position, direction, and orientation. The emphasis is on drawing symbols to represent objects, including from different perspectives. At home, encourage children to give simple directions using these words: above, below, left, right, across, near, and far.
In week 4, students will learn about probability by exploring the likelihood of events, from impossible to certain. They will carry out fun experiments, such as coin tosses and spinners, and record and compare their results using tables and graphs. Through these activities, students are developing a strong understanding of likelihood, possible outcomes, and why results can vary.
Vocabulary
Our target words this fortnight are from our novel, The One and Only Ivan. Our week 3 words were specialty, squabble, scornful, musty, spacious, and monstrosity. Our week 4 words are logical, coincidence, luscious, victorious, chuckling, and lousy.
Students enjoy sharing what they have learned about these words with you, and we encourage you to support and surprise them by using them when the opportunity presents itself.
Friendly Reminders
- We ask students to read for 20 minutes each school day and then record their reading nights in their student reading journals, which we keep at school to track their reading. Young readers who read frequently develop essential reading skills.
- We thank families and remind them to continue supporting their children by charging their iPads and bringing their headphones ready for each school day.
- We would like to remind students and families of our iPad expectations. Students must keep their iPads in their bags before and after school. Students have been reminded of this expectation, and consequences will be applied: they will lose their iPad privileges in the classroom.
- A reminder of our upcoming athletics excursion on Monday, 3rd November, and our health incursion on Tuesday, 18th November. Please make payment/consent for these events as soon as possible, thank you.
PLC 3