This issue

This term in Literacy we are beginning with the stories of Roald Dahl. Through this work we will look at several of his books and look at what makes his writing so effective and brilliant! We will also be looking at information texts, what sort of things are included in them and how they are organised.

At the end of this unit we will write our own information text on a chosen mountain. Our final unit will be about adventure and mystery stories. We will learn all about how authors introduce suspense and excitement into stories and then write our own adventure story about a Viking coming to England.

Numeracy

In Numeracy Miss Carter will be teaching number work and Mr Morrison will be teaching shape, space and measure.

This term we will start by working on place value of 3 digit numbers and ordering these. We will look at addition and subtraction facts of numbers totalling over 100. We will learn about adding and subtracting near multiples of 10.

We will continue to work on multiplication and division facts including 2, 3, 4, 5, 9, 10 times tables.

During our division work we will look at ‘rounding’ an answer up or down.

Spellings and Reading

Each week you have spellings to take home and learn. I have been very pleased with how well children are learning their spellings. Please keep up the good work!

Remember to write a sentence for each of your spellings and you can then earn a team point.

There will be additional homework set most weeks, usually on a Thursday and this should be returned by the following Thursday.

Each morning we all group read or do independent activities. We will continue to do this. We will be trying to develop our understanding of what we are reading and think about what they author is trying to tell us. We will also look at how effective the words used by the author are.

Science

Our Science this term is ‘Forces – Friction and Resistance’. We will be finding out about how friction can change or affect how something moves. We will also look at how air and water resistance affects the speed and effect of a force.

History

This term, our History topic will be the Vikings. Continuing from our work on the Anglo-Saxons, we will look at how the Vikings invaded and settled here. We will investigate what changes they made and how they affected life in Britain.

PE

Our PE lessons are still on Mondays and Wednesdays. Please make sure you have your PE kit at school at all times. (Also remember an outdoor kit.)

Geography

Geography this term focuses on ‘Mountains’. The main things we will find out about are how mountains are formed, where different mountain ranges are, the climates around mountains and the biggest mountain in each continent.

Design and Technology

Mr Morrison will be teaching our Design and Technology topic this term. We will be making and designing a magnetic game.

Readers wanted

In addition to group reading we will still be listening to you read individually. As we have 38 children in the class in the afternoon it will be quite difficult to get through everyone. Perhaps your mum or dad or maybe a grandparent, aunt or uncle might want to come in and help us out in the afternoons by listening to some of the children read.

If you do know someone who wants to help, ask them to come and see Miss Carter. We would be very grateful for anyone who wants to help.

Dogs Trust Sponsored Walk

Well done to all of you for completing our sponsored walk for the Dog’s Trust. We managed to raise £162. With your money we have sponsored two dogs for one year. Year 3 have sponsored Freddie and Year 4 have sponsored Arnie. If you want to see the dogs you can visit the Dog’s Trust website. We also donated the remaining money to them.

You can also find photos on the school website from the visit we had from the Dog’s Trust in December. We had a visit from Lazy Maisie and Dennis the Menace, two Jack Russell terriers and their owner Donna. It was a great morning getting to know all about how to care for a dog and what the Dog’s Trust is all about.

If you have any worries or concerns in class, don’t just ignore it, come and see me or Mrs O’Kane and we will try to help you. Parents are also welcome to come and speak to either of us if you have any concerns. You can either telephone school, pop in or email Miss Carter.