Year 3 – Room 17 Ms Gill & Mrs Matthews 

On a Tuesday afternoon the class are split into groups of 4 or 5 and given a challenge. The aim is to work successfully as a team to complete the challenge. These challenges will usually be STEM based involving science, design and technology, engineering and maths.

Each week they will be put into teams in various ways with different people so they learn to work, communicate and collaborate with all of their classmates.

Before beginning Team work Tuesday we discussed what teamwork( in particular successful team work) should look like, sound like, and feel like.

We also came up with an acrostic Poem for some ‘rules’ we should remember when working in teams/groups.

Challenges we have completed so far include:

The Cup Stacking Challenge

Using only a cup stacking tool ( a rubber band with 4 pieces of string attached) Students had to move 6 red cups from their starting position, into a pyramid. Great team work and communication was required to use the tool to stretch it over the cups, move them into position (flipping the cup upside down in the process) and removing the rubber band from the cup. It was certainly fun to watch. Students worked really well and only a few reminders were needed when little hands were tempted to touch the cups 🙂

Marshmallow Towers

Students had 20 sticks of spaghetti 1 marshmallow and 1 metre of sticky tape. Their challenge was to create the tallest freestanding tower with the marshmallow on top. It was interesting to see the designs students initially started with until they realised the marshmallow balancing on top was heavier than they thought and a more sturdy/stronger base was needed.

Paper Chain Challenge

Use one only one sheet of A3 paper, scissors and stickytape to make the longest paper chain you can in 20 mins.  At the end of the lesson we compared the length and discussed methods that resulted in the longest chains.

Krista 🙂

• This week students will be presenting their Animal speeches to the class. Last week they recorded their day to share, in their diaries. We look forward to hearing them.
• Due to Animal speeches there will be no Homework Bingo this week allowing time for finishing off and practice.
• Although no official Homework, once students have presented their speech they can read, go on Studyladder,  practice times tables or work on their spelling words.
• This week in spelling we will look at the various spellings of the ‘er’ sound – er, ir, ur and ear
• Parent Interviews – Suzy and I look forward to seeing many of you this week. If you haven’t booked a time feel free to come and see us as there are still available times. If it is not possible this week come and see us or send an email and I am sure we can arrange an alternate time. We are looking forward to sharing information about your child’s learning and how things are going for them so far this year. I intend these interviews to be between parents and teacher but your child is welcome to sit in on the interview if you’d like.
• Thank you to the parents that were able to come in and listen to reading this week. Although many of our students are in the higher levels it is still really valuable for them to read aloud on a regular basis. While they may not need as much support decoding or sounding out words, it is important for them to work on their fluency and expression even our independent readers.

Krista & Suzy 🙂

 

Thanks to the families who have already made a booking time online. Just a reminder for those still to book, that the bookings close this Friday. Interview times are Available Monday – Thurdsay. If you book a time on Monday you will be meeting with me (Krista). On Tuesday and Wednesday you will also see me and possibly Suzy as she will divide her time between our class and the year 1 class she also teaches on these days. If you book a time on Thursday you will meet with Suzy.

Krista 🙂

Tuesday the 21st of March is Harmony Day. We will be celebrating our diversity and cohesion as a school by wearing ORANGE, the recognised colour of Harmany Day. Students are to wear orange, orange accessories with their uniform, or their standard uniform on Tuesday. Please note that it is not a casual day. I look forward to the extra splash of colour tomorrow.

Krista 🙂

If you are available on a Tuesday, Wednesday or Friday Morning and would like to help in class we would love some parents to help listen to reading first thing in the morning. Even if you cant help on a regular basis but may have half an hour spare one morning we would love your help.

Krista & Suzy

Who blinked and missed the first 7 weeks of school? 😀

In Room 17 We have all settled in well and have made a good start to the year. So I thought I would give a quick run down of some of the weekly routines that are up and running and working well.

Daily Dash
Each Monday Student are given a Daily Dash sheet to glue into the back of their Maths Books. This contains 10-15 question for each day covering a range of maths concepts. Student get 10 minutes at the beginning of each math lesson to do these questions. They can discuss questions with classmates and ask for help when needed. It is great to hear the conversations student have when working on different questions. At the end of the time we go through and mark it as a class going through each question. On Friday Students do the Daily Dash in their Assessment book with their Spelling test. This is marked by the teacher and students bring home their results in their diary.

Spelling
I have split the class into three spelling groups. Each week students get 10 list words based around a sound, letter pattern or theme. We start the week by looking at the sound, the various spellings of the sound and then Brainstorming words. So far we have focused on:
Long a sound ai, ay, a_e
Long e sound ee, ea, e_e
Long i sound igh, ie, y, i_e
Long o sound oa, ow, o_e

This week we are doing the Long U sound. Students work on a variety of activities over the week and also bring home their words on a fridge list to practice at home (this is attached to their diary each week) On Friday they do a test in their assessment book and results are brought home in their diary.

Homework
Thank you to everyone who has been completing Homework Bingo. I hope the students have been enjoying choosing their own tasks from the activities provided. I try to include activities that cover practicing spelling words in some way, times table, using Studyladder, a literacy or maths task, plus home based activities.

You would have seen that last week and this week, instead of Homework Bingo Students are working on a speech about an Animal. Everyone did a fantastic job of sharing their All About me speeches that I would like to provide more opportunities for students to work on their speaking and presentation skills. So once or twice a term students will be given a Presentation topic to work on as Homework Task.

Krista & Suzy 😀