Welcome to Hazel Class

Welcome to Year 3/4 and Hazel class. We have lots of great things to learn this year and are excited to welcome you back to school.

Please make sure your child has the following things in school:

• a PE bag with black pumps inside (this will stay at school)
• a reusable water bottle
• a fruit snack
• reading record every day

Please can children come into school in their PE kits on Mondays and Fridays each week. They will need a red PE top, blue tracksuit bottoms (not leggings) and trainers.

Our classroom staff are:

Mrs Bowman (class teacher- Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday)

Mrs Salkeld (class teacher- Thursday and Friday)

Mrs Roberts (class teaching assistant)

Things to do with your child

You can help ensure your child learns and practises key skills by doing the following every week:

• reading at least 10 minutes, 5 times a week
• practise and learn spellings
• practise and learn times tables
• complete and return homework tasks

We will update this list throughout the year as more appropriate tasks become relevant.

Our Autumn Curriculum

We use ClassDojo where you can keep updated with any amazing achievements.

English - Our first topic will be reading information about The Loch Ness Monster and learning about language used to write information texts. This term we will also read the story of The Mousehole Cat and write a story based on it. We will study fairy tales and read The Pied Piper before writing a fairy tale of our own.

Maths – We will be following our maths scheme, Red Rose Maths, which gives children a mastery approach and teaches using equipment to understand and explore different areas.

It is very important that all children practice their times tables nightly. We will be completing daily times tables activities to support them. To encourage children to practice and learn their tables we have a reward system. On completion of each award, children will be presented with a badge.

Bronze - 2, 5, 10, 3 times tables

Silver - as bronze plus 4, 8 times tables

Gold - all facts up to 12x12

Platinum - all times tables and division facts to 12x12

Science – In the first half term, we will be looking at rocks and soil, including fossils. We will be using skills of scientific testing and how we can investigate the properties of rocks and soil.

After half term, we will learn about electricity and how circuits are constructed. We will experiment with insulators and conductors to see how this affects their circuits.

History – We start the year by studying History and learn about Lancashire Cotton Mills. We will look at the impact of the industry to local people and to people across the world.

Geography - After half term, we will change to a Geography unit and learn about earthquakes around the world and why some cause more damage than others.

Art – We will learn about printing and focus on the work of Japanese printmakers. We will link this to our science topic of rocks and soil and create prints of fossils in a variety of methods.

RE – We are learning about Islam this first half term and discussing about why Muslims fast during Ramadan.

After half term we will be learning about Christanity and discussing about how people use the bible.

Computing – We will be using computing technology to learn about branching databases and how to create one. We will use yes/no questions to gain an understanding of what attributes are and how to use them to sort groups of objects.

Each half term we will have a week outside of the normal lessons to learn about e-safety and how to be safe and look after each other while using the internet.

PE – On Monday PE lessons children will be outside doing a variety of outdoor activities. On Friday PE lessons children will be in the hall doing gymnastics. Please make sure that children have the correct PE uniform as described above.