Cultural Visit

We were lucky enough yesterday to get a visit from one of our parents, Tyrone Bell, to share part of the Ngunnawal culture. He brought a range of artifacts including axe heads, boomerangs and cooking stones.

Have you got any other questions you would like to ask Tyrone?

Week 2 Readers' Workshop - IN CLASS ONLY

Watch the following story online and then answer some of the questions by commenting below.

Enemy Pie   

What makes a great friend? Finish these sentences to answer:

Another name for friend is ____ (these would be nouns). 

Friends are always ____(adjectives). 

Friends always _____ (verbs, along with some other words if needed). 

Friends never ______(again, verbs). 

Optional

• Why didn't the main character like Jeremy Ross?
• Why did his father suggest enemy pie?
• So, did the pie work? 
• What else might his Dad have suggested? Why was the pie a clever idea?

What's Happening in Year 3/4 in Term 3 ?????

Civics and Citizenship  

We will investigate the different cultural, religious and/or social groups to which they and others in the community belong. 

History 

We will explore the days and weeks celebrated or commemorated in Australia and the importance of symbols and emblems. Students will complete a personal inquiry into celebrations and commemorations in other places around the world; for example, Chinese New Year, Diwali, Hanukkah, the Moon Festival and Ramadan. We will also research the symbols, emblems and history of the Olympic Games and students will participate in an Olympic simulation.

Science 

The Beneath our Feet unit provides opportunities for students to explore how natural processes and human activity shape their surroundings. Students’ understanding of soils, rocks and landscapes and how they change over time is developed through hands-on activities and student-planned investigations. Students also investigate factors that affect the erosion of soils. 


Maths

Year 3 

• Exploring a range of multiplication strategies and patterns
• Solving division problems with and without remainders
• Connecting multiplication and division
• Investigating lines and angles 
• Reading and writing numbers to 10 000
• Using the extending mental strategies to add and subtract
• Problem solving

Year 4 

• Read, write and compare common fractions, and explore the connection between fractions and decimals
• Working with polygons and symmetry 
• Explore the properties of 3D shapes (prisms and pyramids)
• Review a range of addition and subtraction strategies
• Reading times and working with timelines and timetables
• Explore the relationship between multiplication and division 
• Investigate the angles of polygons

English 

Reading 

Through our Readers' Workshops students will continue to work towards their personal goals (Comprehension, Accuracy, Fluency, Expanding Vocabulary) and make their thinking visible. 

Our mini lessons will focus on supporting students comprehension:
-  in fiction through thinking about the characters; and
-  in non-fiction by getting the most from text features


Writing

Text Types – Writing to instruct (procedures), writing to inform (explanations), writing to entertain (poetry)

 

Mini Lesson Focus – Selecting words carefully (adverbs, adjectives, precise nouns), complex sentences, adding detail, punctuation, generating ideas, organising ideas (graphic organisers), editing skills (pit stops)

Grammar Focus - Adverbial phrases, prepositional phrases, verbs and tenses, apostrophes, compound words, onomatopoeia, spoonerisms, contractions and homophones

Keep an eye out on our blog for regular updates on what's happening in our classrooms.

Inquiry - Civics and Citizenship

Welcome back to Term 3. We have jumped straight into learning with our first Inquiry for this term, Civics and Citizenship. We have been looking at different social, cultural and religious groups within our community that we may belong to. Today we used Google Maps to create maps of Canberra and pinned different religious buildings to them, that we had researched, we included a photo and some information about the building. Take a look at some photos of our hard work. 

Also remember to keep bringing in your soil and rock samples!!

What other religious buildings could we include on our maps?

Holiday Learning At Home

With holidays fast approaching we thought it would be a good idea to share some activities that families could do at home if they wished to during the holidays.

English- We are encouraging all of our Hogwarts students to continue reading daily during the holidays. During class time students work on making their thinking visible (writing it down on paper/post it notes) and sharing their thinking with others. We encourage everyone to continue this during the holidays. All students also have a reading goal that they are working on such as chunking words to sound them out, summarising what they are reading, asking questions, making connections to what they are reading or creating images. We would love if everyone continued working on these goals while reading during the holidays.

Maths- All of our Year 3/4 students will be able to access Mathletics over the holidays and will be able to continue to practise lots of the maths strategies that they have been learning in class.Youcan get to the Mathletics login page by clicking this link: \http://au.mathletics.com/
Year 4 students may also like to practise their times tables using the online game Hit The Button. http://www.topmarks.co.uk/maths-games/hit-the-button 

Science- When we come back to school next term, we will be starting a science inquiry called Beneath Our Feet. We will be investigating soils, rocks and landscapes and how they change over time.All Year 3/4 students are required to collect  a soil sample (about 1 cup) in a clear screw-top jar, as well as a small snap lock bag of different rocks that they have collected. Make sure each sample is labeled with your name and where you collected it from. 

We hope that all of our Hogwarts families have a happy and safe holiday break and we look forward to seeing you all next term!