Year 3 outdoor learning

Year 3 will be joining Wrens for a day of outdoor activities on Tuesday 2nd June 2026.  Please can you make sure your child has suitable old outdoor clothes (long trousers) and a pair of sturdy shoes/wellies for this activity.

Summer Term Whole School Transition

To assist with a smooth transition into September, we are increasing the time children spend in their new classrooms with their new teachers.

Starting Monday 8th June, all classes will move up to their next classroom for the afternoon. Because of curriculum constraints, this requires moving entire class groups together. Consequently, pupils in Years 1 and 3 will experience their new classrooms a year in advance. To accommodate this whole-school move, Years 5 and 6 will be taught by Mrs Lightfoot and Mrs Mitchell.

On Thursday 9th July, we will welcome our new Reception children. On this same day, the majority of our current Year 6 pupils will visit their new secondary schools. This specific day will serve as a full rehearsal, operating the exact class structures scheduled for September.

Providing children with this extended time to adapt to their new environments and build relationships with their teachers will ensure a positive, reassuring, and smooth start to the new academic year.

The class structures for September will be:

Wrens - Year Reception Mrs Lightfoot                                                                                Skylarks - Year 1&2 Miss Rxon                                                                                            Kestrels - Year 3&4 Mrs Gregory                                                                                        Merlins - Year 5&6 Miss Harvey

This week in Wrens the children have been completing their work on "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" by retelling the story in their English lessons.  It has been really lovely to see how the children's writing has developed over this half term and how they are beginning to challenge themselves to write longer sentences with more interesting vocabulary.

We have also been carrying out our half termly phonics assessments and the children should all be very proud of how they have performed.  We will be using these assessments to restructure our reading groups after the half term holiday.

On Tuesday we made our own very hungry caterpillar fruit salad in DT.  The children chopped the fruit independently and the finished product was very popular with several people having second and even third helpings!

Our own hungry caterpillars are now huge and are getting ready to enter their cocoons.  If all goes according to plan we should have some beautiful butterflies shortly after the half term holiday.

In PE this week we finished our scheme of work on Ball Skills by practising our football skills.  Maybe the children will get chance to try these out at home over half term.

I hope you all have a lovely break and fingers crossed for some sunshine.  We will be starting a new topic after the half term holiday and it will be "out of this world.....".

For a four-day week, Skylarks have been very busy this week!

In English, the children have been working really hard on their explanation texts. They have been writing a different section each day, before carefully proofreading their work and editing it where appropriate.

In maths this week, we moved on to our topic of money. The children began the week by identifying and recognising the different coins and notes before moving on to counting pence and then counting pounds. Towards the end of the week, they combined the two and learned how to write different monetary values after adding up totals.

With our learning on money, there are wonderful real-world opportunities for your children to practise adding simple values, selecting the correct coins to pay and even identifying the change required when you visit the shops.

In geography this week, the children went into detail when comparing Shanghai with Abberley. They identified that Shanghai has many more human features than Abberley due to it being a densely populated city, located in the biggest continent in the world.

In RE, we finished our topic on Judaism. The children demonstrated everything that they had learned by creating a double-page poster in their RE books that they will be able to refer back to in the future.

In DT, the children began properly creating the structure for their Ferris wheels. They had to think carefully about how to make a stable base and how to ensure that their wheel spun around effectively using an axle and an axle holder.

With phonics screening coming up for Year 1s, please use their orange phonics books to help them practise all the phonemes they have learned and also blending these within words.

Have a great half term!

Timetable

Wednesday: Outdoor learning - please ensure your child brings appropriate clothing on this day

Wednesday: Swimming kits

Thursday: PE kits - please can those with longer hair have their hair tied up ready

In geography, we came to the end of our topic, “Where Does Our Food Come From?” by bringing together everything we had learned over the half term. The children used their research to produce a balanced argument about whether it is better to buy locally sourced food. Working collaboratively in groups, they discussed a wide range of advantages and disadvantages, including the impact on the environment, food miles, cost, freshness, supporting local farmers and the availability of certain foods throughout the year.

In computing, we fully immersed ourselves in our topic of investigating weather and climate. The children began by researching temperatures in cities around the world before plotting this information on maps to identify patterns and compare climates in different locations. We then explored how weather stations collect data such as temperature, rainfall and wind speed and learned how meteorologists analyse this information to create weather forecasts. As part of their learning, they compared different weather forecasts for several cities across the UK and discussed why forecasts can sometimes vary depending on the data and models used. To conclude the topic, the children planned, wrote and presented their own weather forecasts, using appropriate weather vocabulary and presenting their information clearly.

There will be no homework set over the half term holiday. The children should read for pleasure whenever possible and enjoy the good weather that we are predicted to have.

In English this week, the children have been focusing on creative writing. We have been practising how to correctly use speech marks within a story, as well as including characters’ reactions and emotions to help make writing more engaging for the reader. The children have also been working hard on telling a clear and detailed story, carefully describing both characters and settings.

Our Year 6 pupils have had an increased writing focus this week as we continue working hard to collect six pieces of writing for their final Key Stage 2 assessments. They have shown great determination and effort throughout the process.

In geography, we finalised our unit, “Where Does Energy Come From?” by selecting a suitable location for solar panels within school. The children used sketch maps and interview questions to help plan possible locations before interviewing members of staff about which areas would be most suitable and why. They then used this information to write their own conclusions.

This week we also enjoyed our House Football Tournament. All the children seemed to thoroughly enjoy taking part and it was lovely to see everyone showing enthusiasm, teamwork and trying their very best throughout the event.

In DT, we have continued working on our automata toys. This week, the children experimented with different cams to explore the types of movement they wanted their toys to make before beginning to add the finishing touches. We will complete these projects after half term.

Thank you for your continued support and we hope you all have a lovely half term break.

Please see below information within the community but independent of the school