Well we had a great first half to the Spring term and produced some great art and written work based around our class text – How To Train Your Dragon! The standard of writing is really improving and looks great displayed in our classroom!
We have also been looking at ‘Animals Including Humans’ in Science and looking at different types of animal skeletons and their purpose and comparing them to our own.
Can our teams use their knowledge of the Nile valley and their understanding of the water cycle to become museum curators and explain how it all works to you at home?
Tomb raiders have disturbed the bones of the Pharaoh, making him very angry and cursing all archeologists! We have to use our scientific knowledge of anatomy to rearrange the bones correctly…
This morning, we were joined in Year 3 by 2 strange looking chaps:
They were 2 dummies that Mr. Swallow had brought it so we could see the way that the Ancient Egyptians removed the organs from a body when they mummified it. We concentrated on:
Ask your child if they can tell you what each organ does and where it is in their body!
We are also focussing upon our skeletal system We have learned the names of the most important bones and what their job is. Ask us all about it!
Today, we examined the results of the science experiment that we began before the half-term holiday. we checked to she which method of preservation had worked the best:
Mr Swallow had saved an apple with no types of preservation applied at all, we called this the control apple. We compared our apples to the control apple to see if they had been preserved any better than Mr Swallow’s.
We then compared our apples to one anothers and ranked the apples from best to worst. We then put up our hands to indicate which method we used, this allowed us to see which methods were generally the most or least effective
We have dusted off our Scientific Investigation skills in order to find out more about how and why the Ancient Egyptians preserved bodies by mummifying them.
To help us understand, we have looked at different methods for preserving food. Each team chose the method that they thought would be most effective and designed an investigation to compare that method to another. As always in my class, the children did everything themselves!
Each team ended up with 2 methods of preservation that they can compare. We also have my apple which I have sliced up the same way but not used any method of preservation at all. We call this the CONTROL APPLE.
Ask your child about which method they chose and what other methods of preservation that they can remember…can they tell you what that method is and how it works?
I’m sure you all guessed correctly that our class model was intact a replica of the journey that the river Nile takes through Egypt…obviously!!!
We are using the model to map out where geographical features of Egypt belong, such as the Red Sea, the deserts, the mountains, human settlements and the archeological sites like the pyramids. (They will be added as we cover them)
However, our model has also allowed us to examine and show how the water cycle works in Egypt…
1. Evaporation. The water is turned to vapour in the heat of the sun and rises up into the air
2. Condensation. The vapour cools & collects into clouds. As soon as the cooling vapour touches something solid (such as sand or dust particles in the air) In turns back into water
3. Precipitation. When the water gets too heavy for the clouds to hold, it falls back to Earth as rain. This tends to happen in cooler places such as mountains as the colder air makes more vapour condense.
4. The rain runs into valleys, streams and rivers where it returns to the sea so the whole cycle can start again.
Ask your child to tell you about the different parts of the cycle, use the photos and terminology to help. Try to encourage them to use the correct vocabulary:
Here is a couple of links to help you discuss it (See if you can make your mind out which narrator has the most annoying voice, I’m struggling to decide!)
…Don’t worry, we won’t blame you if you can’t tell just yet!
Year 3 are busy crafting something strange out of wood, card, tape and plaster! Can any of our grown ups guess what it is and leave their guess as a comment on here? (No cheating and asking your kids!)
Have you ever wondered why it is cold in some parts of the world but hot in others? Or why it is warm and sunny or cold and snowy at certain times of the year? It’s all to do with seasons.
What are seasons?
Here is a video to help you understand why we have seasons. Can you use it to answer some of these question below? Use illustrations and diagrams to help you.
OK! So we need to break the evil spell and free ourselves from the hot chocolate enchantment. To do this, we have to remove the hot chocolate from the water!!!
We split into teams and designed a scientific experiment to see if we could do this.
Each team decided on the equipment they would use and the method in which they would use it.
We planned this out on paper and carried out the experiments…
Today we drank something that we haven’t tasted before. It was something very sweet, foamy and creamy. It warmed us right down to our toes. It was the most delicious hot chocolate ever! We also ate something very sweet with a light centre; the best Turkish delight!
Little to our knowledge the hot chocolate was enchanted by the Queen… now we must get the chocolate out of the water!
Stayed tuned to see what happens…
Year 3 and Year 4 are having a competition to find out who can grow the tallest bean plant. They will be able to take them home after the competition has finished and hopefully enjoy beans all summer!
In science, we have been learning all about light and dark. On Monday, we investigated how a shadow is is created. 
Want to learn about sound? Watch these!
Today we have been doing experiments about how sound travels. We worked with our partners from Year 4 and built string telephones so we could research how the sound vibrations travel through the string.
Today we have conducted a science investigation looking at how sound is made. Take a look at our pictures below.
