On this page you can find the curriculum notes for Year 3, for the Autumn , Spring and Summer Terms.

English

To include the Literacy Programme Read Write Inc. at a level appropriate to the individual child.

Within the English curriculum there is constant graded development of the following, which underpin all of the English course throughout the year:

• Grammatical knowledge
• Handwriting
• Vocabulary development
• Phonic awareness
• Sentence building
• Punctuation skills
• Essay planning, editing, presenting
• Reading skills
• Skills of listening and speaking

Specific to Year 3

• To encourage children to speak clearly and respond to a variety of stimuli.
• To know the 44 ‘Speed Sounds’ and the corresponding letters/letter groups.
• To learn to read words using sound-blending.
• To read lively stories with a strong phonic structure featuring words they have learned to sound out.
• To comprehend stories through partner discussion.
• To show comprehension of stories by answering ‘Find it’ and ‘Prove it’ discussion questions.
• To answer simple, literal and inferential questions on the text.
• To justify answers and opinions by looking for evidence in the text.
• To improve skills in reading out loud with expression, paying attention to punctuation and meaning.
• To increase the number of whole words children can read by sight. To encourage children to read for enjoyment.
• To encourage children to use skills taught in phonic lessons for decoding unfamiliar words.
• To read and spell key words in common usage.
• To continue practising a neat, cursive style of handwriting.
• To write with increasing independence and structure.
• To learn to write the letters/letter groups which represent the 44 sounds.
• To learn to write words by saying the sounds and graphemes (letter names).
• To demonstrate simple sentences with full stops and capital letters.
• To learn to join simple sentences with connectives.
• To compose a range of texts using discussion prompts.
• To write extensively through story and letter writing.
• To study and begin writing in character.
• To compose structured poems.

Autumn Term

English

• Writing book reviews
• Adventure stories
• Sentence starters
• Writing in character

Maths

• Number bonds to 10/20/100
• +/- using number bonds and number lines
• Number patterns +/-1,10,100
• Counting to 999
• Introduction to multiplication and division
• Length – cm, m, km
• 2D shape
• Direction N,S,E,W
• Money – simple change from 50p

Science

Teeth and Eating
Types and functions of teeth, tooth patterns in humans, herbivores and carnivores.  Role of bacteria in causing decay.  Need for a healthy diet, including dairy products to provide calcium, dental hygiene and care to prevent decay.
Magnets and Springs

Magnetic and non-magnetic materials.
Understanding that magnets exert a force on other magnets and magnetic materials.  Magnetic poles.  Comparing the strengths of magnets.  Understanding that when springs are compressed or stretched, they exert an opposing force – practical experience of these forces.  Use of springs in everyday objects e.g. car suspension, ball point pens etc.

French

• Family
• Pets
• Animals
• Numbers 1-20
• Nature
• Colours
• Christmas

Topic

Mapwork:

• World Scale

Know the 7 continents, the equator

• National Scale

Focus on SOuth America and Ecuador

• Local Scale

Making village maps and decision making

• Letter/ number grid references
• Human/ physical features

• Independent research on animals in the forest
• Compare home locality to Ecuador

R.S.

• Creation
• Cain and Abel
• Noah
• Joseph
• Religious Festivals around the world as they occur:
  • Harvest
  • Divali
  • Ramadan

Art

• Primary and secondary colour mixing – flower wheels
• Collage – toucans
• Rousseau – detailed painting and creating layers
• Papier mache - rainsticks

Music

• What is Music? An introduction to melody, harmony and rhythm
• Simple notation using crotchets and quavers
• Music Appreciation linked with stories of the boyhood of JS Bach
• Correct singing techniques (warm-up exercises)
• Preparation and performance of material for the Middle School Harvest Festival
• Preparation of material for the Spring Term Concert

Drama

• Movement and Control
• Confidence building
• Vocal exercises

P.E.

• Swimming – 4 weeks.  Safety rules. Hygiene. Confidence building. Safe entry.  Development of front crawl.  Ability groups for differentiation.  Breathing techniques.  Back paddle.  Water games.
•  Tennis – 2 weeks.  Red mini tennis.  Movement to the ball.  Technique of basic ground strokes.  Underarm serve.  Basic point scoring.
•  Gymnastics – 7 weeks.  Body tension and control.  Explore pathways.  Stretching, curling, arching.  Roll spin turn and twist on various rotations.  Apparatus work.  Symmetry and asymmetry.  Similar movements to small sequences.

Boys' Games

• Football - Basic skill acquisition
  Dribbling.  Passing.  Control.  Shooting. Ball skills – individual and small groups. Throw-ins – rules. Goal-keeping introduced.
• Tag Rugby - Basic skill acquisition, Introduction to passing, running, dodging and catching, setting up the ball. Tag rugby 9-a-side non-contact.
• Cross Country - Junior course undertaken once every week.

Girls' Games

• Hockey – Basic skill acquisition.  Training in the sports hall.  Control of the ball.  Dribbling.  Push pass.  Hitting. Shooting.  Positional play.  Small sided games.
•  Netball – Basic skills introduced.  Size 4 balls 8’ post.  Passing, catching, footwork rules.  Shooting.  Moving into space.  High 5 games.
•  Cross Country – Weekly runs on junior course.  Frequently timed.
•  Tennis – Mini red.  Agility.  Balance.  Co-ordination.  Basic ground strokes.  Underarm serves.  Small matches.

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Spring Term

English

• Story Openings
• Story poems
• Non fiction writing

Maths

• Ordering numbers to 999
• Adding multiples of 10 and 5
• Bridging 10
• Learning times tables
• Fractions
• Revise Analogue time – Digital time
• Constructing/interpreting tally chartsMoney problem to £10

Science

Light and Shadows
Luminous sources.  Knowledge that light travels in straight lines.  That we see a luminous object when light enters our eyes. Opaque, transparent and translucent materials.  Shadow formation. 

Characteristics of materials

Testing the properties of a range of materials.  Development of practical skills (fair test, measurement, recording of results).  Properties might include viscosity of liquids, elasticity, strength etc.  Relating properties of materials to their use in manufacturing everyday objects.

French

• Days of the week
• Months of the Year
• Seasons
• Awareness of France

Topic

• Where are the Vikings on the timeline?
• Ordering events on the timeline
• Viking place names
• Who were the Vikings? Where did they come from?
• What was Viking life like?
• Runes – Viking writing
• Longships!
• The Viking Gods and religion
• Viking warriors and weapons
• Viking home life
• King Cnut

Geography

R.S.

• Jonah - Eid ul-Fitr
• Daniel - Holi

Art

• 3d collage – Viking shields
• Breuhel – paining in style of using variety of tools
• Observational drawing – daffodils
• 3d modelling - Viking warriors

Music

• Introduction to time signatures – the concept of the bar-line
• Simple notation using crotchets, quavers and crotchet rests
• Writing simple rhythms on paper and playing them using percussion instruments
• Performance – Spring Term Concert (Instrumental and Vocal items)
• Music Appreciation linked with stories of the boyhood of GF Handel
• Correct singing techniques (warm-up exercises)

Drama

• Script work
• Basic characterisation
• ‘The Magic Paintbrush’

P.E.

• Dance – Giraffes can dance. Respond imaginatively to character and narrative.
  The Rainforest. Explore improvise and combine movement ideas fluently.
  Traditional English Country Dances

Boys' Games

• Rugby: Basic skill acquisition continued
  Passing, running, dodging and catching developed. Group work furthered. Concept of teamwork introduced. Setting up the ball. Touch rugby played. Tag rugby 9-a-side non-contact.
• Football / Hockey:  Skill acquisition developed
  Dribbling, passing, control, shooting. Ball skills – individual and small groups. Games developed. Rules – Kick offs.  6-a-side game – small sides, small pitches.

Girls' Games

• Netball
  Dodging, marking. Attacking and defending principles. Getting free, changing direction. Matches teamwork.
• Tennis
  Orange mini outside. Over arm serve. Consistency, tactics. Matches.

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Summer Term

English

• Mystery stories
• Paragraphing

Maths

• +/- h/t/u without carry/exchange
• Rounding to nearest 10/100
• Doubling/halving
• Fractions of amounts
• Relate multiplication/division
• 3d shape & properties
• Capacity l/ml
• Time hrs/mins/secs problems
• Frequency tables/bar graphs

Science

Helping plants to grow well
Observation of the effects of variations in light, temperature and water. Understanding that plants absorb carbon dioxide from the air to make food.  Understanding that plants use light energy from the Sun to make food and that the green pigment in the leaves and stem captures the energy.  Role of the roots in anchoring the plant in the ground and absorbing water.

Rocks (and Soils)
Description of observable characteristics on a variety of rocks.  Sorting according to observable characteristics.  Sedimentary, metamorphic and igneous rocks and how they are created.  Formation of fossils.

French

• Shops
• How to shop
• Holiday Activities

Topic

• Timeline – where on the timeline will we find Ancient Egypt?
• Buildings and Treasures – The pyramids, the tomb of Tutankhamun, Abu Simbel.
• Rameses II – profiling the Pharaoh
• The River Nile - flooding and the seasons
• The Egyptian calendar
• The Egyptian farmer’s year – tomb paintings as evidence
• Ancient Egyptian domestic life – food, bartering
• Good years and bad years – using Nile flood records
• Egyptian society and the importance of religion
  Mumification!
• The Afterlife and how to get there successfully

R.S.

• Moses
• Passover
• Sukkot

Art

• Tones and Colour mixing – Egyptian sunset
• Printing – Egyptian fans
• Clay - Canopic jars
• Tesselating patterns

Music

• Introduction to triple time – the idea of pulse
• Dotted rhythms – revise crotchet rests – simple conducting 2, 3 and 4 beats to the bar
• Music Appreciation linked with stories of the boyhood of WA Mozart
• Writing simple rhythms on paper
• Singing a variety of songs from the 18th to the 20th centuries
• Introduction to the “Groovy Music” educational software

Drama

• ‘Mr Once Upon A Time’

P.E.

• Swimming
  Develop confidence in the water.
  Front Crawl and Back Crawl
  Practises for Diving
  Relays and games

Boys' Games

• Cricket - Basic skill acquisition
  Throwing – accuracy and distance. Catching – short and high. Stopping. Batting – basics – grip, stance back lift, forward & backward, defensive shot development. Bowling – basics – under arm. Over arm introduced – coil, bound grip, soft ball.
• Athletics
  Basic Sprints/ Long Distance. Throwing and jumping events introduced.
• Tennis - Basic skill acquisition
  Grip. Racket Ball familiarisation skills. Forehand/backhand. Rallying – non-competitively, competitively.

Girls' Games

• Rounders
  Basic skill acquisition of throwing, batting using a tennis ball / incrediball and a flat sided bat. Small sided games.
• Mini Tennis Red
  some play outside using Outdoor Red Ball. Continue to develop skills.
• Athletics
  Intro to sprinting, throwing -ball/soft javelin, high jump and long jump.

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