Year 3/4 Blog Post 1.12.23

Dear Parents,

We have had a very busy week this week finishing off our poetry in English and moving on to looking at Christmas stories. Next week is Assessment week and the children will be completing assessments in English and Maths. Below is a link to the spellings that the children will be tested on:

Autumn 2 Spellings

ESSEX YEAR OF NUMBERS

The Lord Lieutenant competition has launched across schools in Essex

The Lord Lieutenant has launched a competition to kick-off the Essex Year of Numbers. We’re inviting children and young people to create a 2D/3D display (maximum size 1m2 or 1m3), with a short video presentation creatively showing the many ways numbers are used in everyday life.  

Entries can include number patterns, diagrams, calculations, explanations, photographs and models. The competition offers students the chance to think creatively about maths and its everyday use. Further information and terms and conditions are available in our latest news article.

Jennifer Tolhurst, Essex Year of Numbers Competition - Essex County Council

CHRISTMAS JUMPER DAY

Our Christmas Jumper Day is Thursday 7th December.  On this day children can wear their fabulous festive jumpers and donate £1 which goes to our continued sponsorship of Thoko in Malawi.  The charity Action Aid use this money to ensure that Thoko and the other children in her community enjoy their right to an education, just like all of us at Down Hall. (Articles 28&29)

 

                                  

HOMEWORK
Must Do:
Year 3/4  Homework Tasks - Due Thursday 7th December
Homework Pages:
Year 3
English Pg 10
Maths - Pg 27
Year 4
English Pg 7
Maths - Pg 28

• Reading: Remember 15-20 minutes at least 3 times a week is super important. You will have taken your Reading Record home for your parents to comment on. These will be collected by teachers and checked from time to time. Please make sure you bring your book and your reading record in with you every day. As soon as you are ready you can take a quiz at school. Remember that you need 3x 100% scores to move up a level.

• Practise the spellings for next week's assessment. 

• Times table practice - this week we are looking at 6s. Please practice these as we do in school.

• TTRS - Year 4 please can you log on and complete the MTC check and practise. Thank you.

Can Do:

• Continue logging on to TTRS, Sumdog - your log ins are stuck in the front cover of your Reading Records.

• Earlier this week, the children had an assembly all on Railway Safety. Can they create a poster reminding others of some of the important facts they learnt? 

Have a lovely weekend!
Mrs. Hurley, Miss Harvey & Mr. Greenfield 

 Dear Parents,

We looked at a lovely poem in English this week which ignited fabulous discussions about our emotions. We continued with multiplication and division and we have thoroughly enjoyed creating our rainforest dioramas.

Upcoming Events
A few notes for your diary - more details will be on the newsletter as we get nearer to the time:

Thursday 7th December - Christmas jumper day
Friday 8th December - PTA Christmas Movie Night
Friday 15th December - PTA Christmas Grotto
Wednesday 20th December - Last day of term

HOMEWORK
Must Do:
Year 3/4  Homework Tasks - Due Thursday 23rd November
Homework Pages:
Year 3
English Pg 14+15
Maths - Pg 26
Year 4
English Pg 16+17
Maths - Pg 27

Reading Skills

Every week we encourage you to keep up all your reading at home as this makes such a huge difference. We wanted to spend a little time this week speaking more about reading skills because as your children move through school they need to ensure that they understand a text as well as be able to read it. 

Understanding what they have read (or comprehension) is vital for your children and we support this through our VIPERS reading skills. This stands for:

Vocabulary    Infer    Predict    Explain    Retrieve    Sequence

You can explore these ideas with your child after reading using some of the following question prompts:

Vocabulary - have a good range of vocabulary in order to understand the text

• What does the word _____ mean in this sentence?
• Find a word that means _____ on this page.

Infer - understanding reached through reasoning about what you have read

• Why was _____ feeling _____? How do you know?
• Why did _____ happen? 

Predict - what you think will happen based on what you have read

• What do you think will happen next?
• How will this character's action affect what will happen next?
• What do you think this book is about?

Explain - what your thoughts and opinions are about the book

• Who is your favourite character? Why?
• Would you like to live in this setting? Why?
• How do you know ____?

Retrieve - discuss the characters, events and setting of the story or answer questions about a text you have read

• Who did _____?
• Where did _____?
• How many _____?

Summarise - retell the key events in the story

• What happened at the beginning?
• What happened at the end?
• Can you retell this story in your own words?

We hope this helps you discuss the books your child reads at home as the more they practise these skills the more fluent in comprehension they will become.

• Reading: Remember 15-20 minutes at least 3 times a week is super important. You will have taken your Reading Record home for your parents to comment on. These will be collected by teachers and checked from time to time. Please make sure you bring your book and your reading record in with you every day. As soon as you are ready you can take a quiz at school. Remember that you need 3x 100% scores to move up a level.

• High Frequency Words - Learn the words in your Reading Records. Practice spelling them out loud and writing them down.

• Times table practice - this week we are looking at 6s. Please practice these as we do in school.

• TTRS - Year 4 please can you log on and complete the MTC check and practise. Thank you.

Can Do:

• Continue logging on to TTRS, Sumdog - your log ins are stuck in the front cover of your Reading Records.

• Create a poster on your favourite book. Imagine you had to sell it to us. What do you like about it? Why? What is your favourite part? Who are the characters? Why should we read it?
  **EXTRA CHALLENGE** Rewrite your own blurb for your favourite book on the back of your poster.

Have a lovely weekend!
Mrs. Hurley, Miss Harvey & Mr. Greenfield 

Year 3/4 Blogpost 16.11.23

Dear Parents,
This week we have had a very busy week across all 3 classes. In English, we have begun to write more formal recounts based around the story of Helen Skelton's Amazon Adventure. In our maths groups, we have been looking at Area and Multiplication and Division.

Upcoming Events
A few notes for your diary - more details will be on the newsletter as we get nearer to the time:
Friday 17th November - Non Pupil Day
Tuesday 21st November - Flu immunisations
Thursday 23rd November - Individual photographs
Friday 8th December - PTA Christmas Movie Night
Friday 15th December - PTA Christmas Grotto
Wednesday 20th December - Last Day of term

CHRISTMAS CARDS
Thank you to everyone who returned Christmas card designs.  If you placed an order online, it will be delivered in time for the end of term and will be given to you child when it arrives in school.

DESIGN TECHNOLOGY
Thank you for everybody who has kindly brought in a shoe box for Project lessons. If we could ask that you could please keep the shoeboxes and card coming in as we will be beginning this over the next few weeks. If you have any of the following spare it would be greatly appreciated also:
Pebbles
Real leaves
Toilet roll tubes
Sticks
Bark

HOMEWORK
Must Do:
Year 3/4  Homework Tasks - Due Thursday 23rd November
Homework Pages:
Year 3
English Pg 67
Maths - Pg 29
Year 4
English Pg 67
Maths - Pg 26

• Reading: Remember 15-20 minutes at least 3 times a week is super important. You will have taken your Reading Record home for your parents to comment on. These will be collected by teachers and checked from time to time. Please make sure you bring your book and your reading record in with you every day. As soon as you are ready you can take a quiz at school. Remember that you need 3x 100% scores to move up a level.

• High Frequency Words - Learn the words in your Reading Records. Practice spelling them out loud and writing them down.

• Times table practice - this week we are looking at 8s. Please practice these as we do in school.

• TTRS - Year 4 please can you log on and complete the MTC check and practise. Thank you.

Can Do:

• Continue logging on to TTRS, Sumdog - your log ins are stuck in the front cover of your Reading Records.

• Children in Need - https://www.bbcchildreninneed.co.uk/fundraising/introducing-pudsey-bearpees/ Time is running out- sign up for the Pudsey Bearpees Challenge today and recieve a FREE Pudsey sweatband if you’re in the first 10,000 to sign up and raise £50*

  Our brilliant new challenge has options for almost any level of physicality, so you can fundraise while getting fit. Joe Wicks can tell you all about it below, and scroll down for links to sign up to the challenge and our How to Bearpee guide.

Have a lovely weekend!
Mrs. Hurley, Miss Harvey & Mr. Greenfield 

Year 3/4 Blogpost 10.11.23

Dear Parents,

This week we have had special lessons lined up to celebrate Remembrance Day, including in Guided Reading sessions we have been looking at the poem 'Lest We Forget' by Angela Marie Jameson. In English, we have finished writing recounts based around the story A Forest Next to the Sea and will now be moving on to writing more formal recounts such as reporting as a news reporter.

REMEMBRANCE DAY
This week we took sometime away from English to write poetry around Remembrance Day. The children participated in the BBC Remembrance Day Live Lesson and used this to explore the significance of Remembrance Day through poetry and real-life accounts from veterans. On Thursday afternoon, we all came together to share our poetry.

DESIGN TECHNOLOGY
Thank you for everybody who has kindly brought in a shoe box for Project lessons. If we could ask that you could please keep the shoeboxes and card coming in as we will be beginning this over the next few weeks. If you have any of the following spare it would be greatly appreciated also:

Pebbles

Real leaves

Toilet roll tubes

Sticks

Bark

HOMEWORK
Must Do:
Year 3/4  Homework Tasks - Due Thursday 16th November
Homework Pages:
Year 3
English Pg 30
Maths - Pg 23
Year 4
English Pg 29
Maths - Pg 54

• Reading: Remember 15-20 minutes at least 3 times a week is super important. You will have taken your Reading Record home for your parents to comment on. These will be collected by teachers and checked from time to time. Please make sure you bring your book and your reading record in with you every day. As soon as you are ready you can take a quiz at school. Remember that you need 3x 100% scores to move up a level.
• High Frequency Words - Learn the words in your Reading Records. Practice spelling them out loud and writing them down.
• Times table practice - this week we are looking at 8s. Please practice these as we do in school.
• TTRS - Year 4 please can you log on and complete the MTC check and practise. Thank you.

Can Do:

• Continue logging on to TTRS, Sumdog - your log ins are stuck in the front cover of your Reading Records.
• Create a poster for Anti-Bullying Week which is next week. Please watch the video below to find out more information.

Anti-Bullying Week 2023

Have a lovely weekend!

Mrs. Hurley, Miss Harvey & Mr. Greenfield 

 Dear Parents,

It was lovely to have the children back in school this week and we hope you have had a lovely week celebrating Hallowe'en. This week we had a fire safety assembly in preparation for Bonfire Night. Next week, we have some special lessons lined up to celebrate Remembrance Day. In English, we are looking at a very interesting story called Where the Forests Meets the Sea which has some amazing pictures and sparked some great discussions about the past, present and future states of forests. In maths, we have continued with addition and subtraction.

DESIGN TECHNOLOGY
As part of our topic on Rainforests we will be making a shoebox diorama relating to the layers of the rainforest. Please keep the shoeboxes and card coming in.

HOMEWORK
Must Do:
Year 3/4  Homework Tasks - Due Thursday 9th November
Homework Pages:
Year 3
English Pg 26-27 (Past and present tense)
Maths - Pg 24-25 (Written addition and subtraction)
Year 4
English Pg 26-27 (Past and present tense)
Maths - Pg 24-25 (Estimating)

• Reading: Remember 15-20 minutes at least 3 times a week is super important. You will have taken your Reading Record home for your parents to comment on. These will be collected by teachers and checked from time to time. Please make sure you bring your book and your reading record in with you every day. As soon as you are ready you can take a quiz at school. Remember that you need 3x 100% scores to move up a level.
• High Frequency Words - Learn the words in your Reading Records. Practice spelling them out loud and writing them down.
• Times table practice - this week we are looking at 8s. Please practice these as we do in school.
• TTRS - Year 4 please can you log on and complete the MTC check and practise. Thank you.

Can Do:

• Continue logging on to TTRS, Sumdog - your log ins are stuck in the front cover of your Reading Records.
• Next week, we will be remembering those who fought for us so it would be really nice if you did a little bit of research as to what Remembrance Day is and why we celebrate it every year on the 11th day of the 11th month. What happens at 11am? Why? Please note down your thoughts on paper and bring it in or create a Google Doc on your Drive and share with your teacher.

Have a lovely weekend!

Mrs. Hurley, Miss Harvey & Mr. Greenfield 

Year 3/4 Blogpost 20.10.23

Dear Parents,

We made it! Thanks for all so much for your support. May we take this opportunity to wish you and your children a happy and restful half term. It has been an absolute pleasure to teach all of your amazing children and I know that I speak for all of us when I say we could not be more proud of them all.

CHRISTMAS CARDS

Your child has bought their artwork home. Please read the accompanying letter and follow the instructions. The artwork must come back to school on the first day back after the holidays  please.

SCHOOL COUNCILLORS

This week children have voted for their School Councillors. Those who wanted to be considered needed to give a speech to their class who then voted on who they wanted to represent them. Well done to everyone who stood for election as it takes determination and bravery to write and deliver a speech. Democracy is important at Down Hall and the following children were elected as their class:

School Councillors:

Garnet - Sienna

Moonstone - Olly 

Opal -  Aiden 

DESIGN TECHNOLOGY

As part of our topic on Rainforests we will be making a shoebox diorama relating to the layers of the rainforest. Please can we ask you to start collecting a shoebox and card to enable us to make these after the half term. 

Thanks for you support.

HOMEWORK
Must Do
Year 3/4  Homework Tasks - Due Thursday 2nd November
Homework Pages
Year 3 - English Pg 18-19
Maths - Pg 9

Year 4 - English Pg 14-15
Maths - Pg 23

• Reading: Remember 15-20 minutes at least 3 times a week is super important. You will have taken your Reading Record home for your parents to comment on. These will be collected by teachers and checked from time to time. Please make sure you bring your book back when you are finished and your teacher can change it for you. As soon as you are ready you can take a quiz at school. Remember that you need 3x 100% scores to move up a level.
• High Frequency Words - Learn the words in your Reading Records. Practice spelling them out loud and writing them down.
• Times table practice - this week we are looking at 4's. Please practice these as we do in school.
• TTRS - Year 4 please can you log on and complete the MTC check and practise. Thank you.

Can Do

• Continue logging on to TTRS, Sumdog - your log ins are stuck in the front cover of your Reading Records.
• Create a shape poem to do with Halloween. It could be in the shape of a pumpkin or you could let your imagination run wild. Please bring into school to share after the half term.

Have a super holiday and see you on the 30th of October.

🎃

Mrs Hurley, Miss Harvey & Mr Greenfield 

Year 3/4 Blogpost Friday 13th October

Dear Parents,

We hope you have all had a lovely week.
In English this week we have started to focus on Acrostic Poetry. In Maths, we have begun to focus on addition and subtraction, focusing mainly on the mental strategies that can be used for addition. 

Please remember that with the onset of colder weather, all children need a warm and waterproof coat at all times. The weather can be very up and down this time of year.

World Wellbeing Day

It was lovely to see all the children come into school on Tuesday in their comfortable clothes for World Wellbeing Day. In school, we used the film 'Inside Out' as a way of discussing our emotions, answering questions and completing tasks.

East of England Sumdog Maths Contest

Calling all of you amazing mathematicians! 

You have been entered into the Sumdog Competition. It starts on Friday 13th October at 3.30pm, and finishes at 3.30pm on Thursday 19th October.

Why not have a go and get your class on the school leaderboard?

I will be monitoring how well each class is doing. The winning class will get extra playtime!

Let's show our school what great mathematicians we are!

Good luck

Mrs Hurley 👍

SCHOOL COUNCIL

If your child would like to be a school council representative then please prepare a presentation for your class to be shared on Wednesday and Thursday afternoon of next week. We will be delighted to have a child from each class represent Year 3/4 children on our Down Hall School Council.

HARRY POTTER DAY

Thank you to everyone who came along to the Harry Potter Book Day event! It was very busy but it was lovely to see so many people attend. 

We didn't have time to fit everything in so here is a link to the activities should you want to have a go at them or finish your drawings and of course for anyone else who did not attend. At the end of the video, there are some spells and it shows you how you use your wand to cast them which looks really fun!

https://www.twinkl.co.uk/resources/twinkl-partnerships/harry-potter/book-day 

HOMEWORK

Must Do
Year 3/4  Homework Tasks - Due Friday 20th October
Homework Pages
Year 3 

English Pg 5
Maths - Pg 22

Year 4

English Pg 5
Maths Pg 22

• Reading: Remember 15-20 minutes at least 3 times a week is super important. You will have taken your Reading Record home for your parents to comment on. These will be collected by teachers and checked from time to time. Please make sure you bring your book back when you are finished and your teacher can change it for you. As soon as you are ready you can take a quiz at school. Remember that you need 3x 100% scores to move up a level.
• High Frequency Words - Learn the words in your Reading Records. Practice spelling them out loud and writing them down.
• Times table practice - this week we are looking at 3's/4's. Please practice these as we do in school.

Can Do

• Continue logging on to TTRS, Sumdog - your logins are stuck in the front cover of your Reading Records.
• In this week's assembly the children learnt all about Digital Wellbeing. The following link has a number of games that reinforce the messages and tips that were given during the assembly. 

Interland

Have a wonderful weekend!
Mrs Hurley, Miss Harvey & Mr Greenfield