Forest School

This week, Year 3 had their very first Forest School DAY! Despite the cold, we were outside all day doing lots of fun activities and learning what we can do and see in the nature around us. We did some leaf identification, den building, building a fire, sawing wooden discs, and, of course, making hot chocolate!

Odd Socks Day

Odd Socks Day is an opportunity to encourage people to express themselves and celebrate their individuality and what makes us all unique!

On Tuesday, children around the school wore odd socks to raise awareness of bullying during this Anti-Bullying Week. It is also a way of showing how we are all unique, and should not be treated differently because of it.

Maths - Measurement

In maths, we have been looking at metres, centimetres and millimetres. We have measured, converted and estimated using different units.

International Day - Japan

International day was a blast! We looked at the country of Japan and learnt lots of different things about its history, geography, culture, art and food. We started by using Google Earth to 'walk the streets' of Tokyo and find other landmarks such at Mt Fuji and Toshugu Shrine. We learnt some of the history behind its government, once being ruled by family clans and shoguns as well as emperors. Japan is the only country still with an emperor, but they have little power over the law. Since World War 2, they have had a government much like ours. We also looked at the art of manga and origami. We made origami boxes to hold the sushi we later made! 

Artist - Laura McKendry

This week, we looked at the art of English artist Laura McKendry. She uses mixed media and we linked this in with our learning on tonal contrasts and chiaroscuro. We used both watercolours and charcoal to create light and dark tones, using the charcoal mainly for line making. Using watercolour helped us to create shapes without a defined outline.

Year 3 leads Prayer and Liturgy

On Friday, Year 3 led our school in their Prayer and Liturgy. We thought about the Gospel of Mark, Chapter 9: 30-37 in which Jesus tells his disciples  “Whoever welcomes in my name one of these children, welcomes me; and whoever welcomes me, welcomes not only me but also the one who sent me.” 

We shared ways in which we can be welcoming towards others and sung the song, 'He's got the Whole World in His Hands' using sign language for the actions. Thank you Year 3 for leading us so well. 

Science - Uses of rocks

In science, we thought about where you may find different rocks being used and why. We did a permeability test to see which rocks would allow water to pass through. If a rock was dropped in water and produced bubbles, we could see that water can pass into and potentially through the rock. Rocks like chalk would be no good for a roof! Granite was impermeable, but was quite heavy, so again not good for a roof, but useful as a kitchen worktop. 

Art - Drawing: Lines and Marks, Tone

In art, we have been looking at the work of Caravaggio who used chiaroscuro, which is using light and dark tones in a piece. We have linked this to our history learning of the Stone Age by using charcoal and chalk to create this contrast of tone. 

We drew pictures of African masks simply because there is a clear contrast in tone. 

Science - Chocolate Rocks! 

In science, we are learning about rocks and this week thought about how rocks are formed. We did an investigation called 'chocolate rocks' whereby we imitate the conditions that happen in order for different rock types to be formed. We started by scraping chocolate to create sediment, then squashed the sediment together to create sedimentary rock. Then we heated some of this with another whole chocolate chunk, and pieces started to mix, creating metamorphic rock. Finally, we melted the pieces completely and when the 'lava' had cooled, we had igneous rock.

Homosapiens

In history, we have been learning about the Ice Age in Britain. We looked at what evidence there was for different animals living here (with an exciting discovery near us only last year! See BBC Ice Age Discovery) and also at the human species living here. Before us, there were neanderthals. But they evolved into homo sapiens and eventually became extinct. Now we, homo sapiens, are left! 

We created homo sapien faces out of salt dough.

Trees of Sevenoaks - The Pine

St Thomas' has started their new year with each class focussing on a different tree found around Sevenoaks. Year 3 had the pine and are very lucky as we have a Scots Pine on our playground. We thought about all the things this tree must have experienced on our playground, from dropping heaps of snow on our heads, to shielding us from the sun. We wrote poems about the tree's memories. 

We also created some art with the pine needles and linked it to maths. We worked out how many needles were needed to connect each dot to the others, starting with 2 dots, 3 dots, 4 dots and so on. From this, we found a pattern and could predict how many needles were needed for 7 and 8 dots.