Year 3 Spotlight

Writing

This term in Writing, Year 3s are exploring the wonderful world of poetry! So far, students have had a go at writing “I Am” poems, Shape Poems and a Haiku. We have also been learning lots about figurative language, and have started incorporating similes, metaphors, alliteration, onomatopoeia and personification in our poetry writing. Take a look at some of our beautiful published work:

Inquiry

This term our Inquiry unit is centred around Design and Technology. We have been learning all about engineering, technology, and the six simple machines. 

Did you know that technology is defined as ‘anything made by a human to solve a problem or make life easier?’ Yep! That means, even the spoons we use for our morning cereal are technology! 

We have used time during our daily literacy block to read a range of mentor texts about simple machines, and learnt some interesting new vocabulary such as; force, mechanical  advantage, engineer, and transparent. 

Recently, we had a go at designing a solution to a problem using at least two simple machines in our design. Here are some examples of our fantastic work:

Inquiry Incursion

Today, Grade 3 students had a Hands on Science incursion, where we discussed and explored engineering solutions, materials and their properties, and had a go at designing our own structures. We designed a catapult, a tower and a bridge. We had to try and make changes to the design and materials we used in order to make our designs stronger or taller.

• ‘It was interesting and fun to make the catapults.” ~ Elke, 3B

•  “It was fun learning that there are different ways to make things.” ~ Lucy, 3B

•  “I loved trying to make the car  balance on the bridges that we made. You have to have support under a bridge for it to work.” ~ Liv, 3B

•  “ We learnt how liquids and air can be used to move the arms on a machine.” ~ Luke, 3B

•  “It was good to learn that to reinforce building materials to make our designs stronger." ~ Beau and Elon, 3B

Numeracy

This term in Maths, our Year 3 students have been exploring fractions in fun and practical ways. They have learned how to identify and represent fractions using shapes, objects and number lines. 

Students have been sharing and dividing objects equally to better understand halves, thirds, quarters, fifths and tenths. They enjoyed making their own fraction wall and discovered that some fractions are equivalent. 

Students have become more confident in representing unit fractions and their multiples in different ways and combining fractions with the same denominator to form a whole. 

It has been wonderful to see the students' confidence and curiosity grow as they explore fractions in so many different ways.

~ Year 3 Teachers (Millie, Clint, Sophie & Emilia) and Students