Grade 3 News
Welcome to Week 4!
We’re currently reading The One and Only Ivan by Katherine Applegate—a touching and beautifully written story inspired by a real gorilla.
The book follows Ivan, a silverback gorilla who has lived for years in a shopping mall, performing for visitors. He spends his days watching TV, drawing pictures, and thinking about life. Through Ivan’s eyes, we learn about friendship, hope, and the importance of freedom. When a baby elephant named Ruby arrives, Ivan begins to see his world differently and finds the courage to make a change.
This story encourages empathy, compassion, and reflection on how animals are treated. It’s a wonderful way to spark meaningful conversations with children about kindness and doing what’s right.
In our writing, we have been looking at persuasive texts around the topic that “Circus should not keep wild animals”. Looking at persuasive devices, such as language features (connectives, thinking verbs), use of language (using words such as must, definitely) as well as rhetorical questions and subtle warnings.
In our current maths unit, we’re exploring chance and probability—a fun and practical way for students to understand how likely events are to happen.
Students are learning to describe events as certain, likely, unlikely, or impossible, and use these words to talk about outcomes. We’re also introducing basic probability concepts using everyday examples—like rolling dice, flipping coins, and predicting the weather.
This helps children develop logical thinking and decision-making skills, and encourages them to ask questions like:
- “What are the chances of this happening?”
- “Is this fair?”
- “How can we predict outcomes?”
We’re making it hands-on and engaging, so students can see how probability is part of real life—ask your child today- What is impossible? What is certain?
During Religion, we’ve been exploring the story of The Good Samaritan—a powerful lesson about kindness, compassion, and helping others.
In the story, a man is hurt and left on the side of the road. Several people pass by without helping, but one man—a Samaritan—stops to care for him, even though they were from different backgrounds. This teaches children that being a good neighbour means showing kindness to everyone, not just those we know or who are like us.
We’re using this story to talk about:
- Helping others in need
- Treating everyone with respect
- Doing the right thing, even when it’s hard
It’s a beautiful way to encourage empathy and remind students that small acts of kindness can make a big difference.
Important Term 4 dates:
Places we are going-
On Thursday 30th October we will be heading to Kyabram Fauna Park!
We are all so excited to see a range of different animals. So, look at this space for some wonderful photos to come!
Please also watch out for any notifications regarding Wizard of Oz, the Galen Production on Thursday 13th November.
We also have swimming week coming up Monday 17th until Friday 21st November. Please make sure all students have swimmers, towel, goggles and slip on shoes.
Grade 3 Liturgy- Week 9 Wednesday 2.45-3.15pm.
Well done to our award winners!
Savannah R, Natalie, Caitlin, Lillian, Lexi, Sophie, Anton, Audrey and Ollie.
Well done to 3 Smith-Price for winning the Bernie Trophy.