Welcome to Primary 3

We hope you had a lovely summer! We know that the children will be looking forward to seeing their friends again. We will be doing lots of activities which will help your child settle back into routine again. We will regularly publish information and pictures via Seesaw, so remember to keep looking out for these updates. It’s a good way of keeping in touch with your child’s learning and progress.

We also welcome our new team members Mrs McBurney and Mrs McKeown (P3CM) and Mrs Millar and Miss McKergan (P3CMC).

Please ensure that your child has everything they need for their school day.

• Healthy break in a disposable bag (name on the bag)
• 2 sharpened HB pencils
• 1 Pritt stick (white)
• 1 rubber
• 1 sharpener
• Pencil case
• A 12 pack of colouring pencils
• Box of tissues

Homework

On Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday nights the children will have:

• Reading
• Spellings
• Tables

Written Homeworks:

Monday: Literacy homework (game or written activity)

Wednesday: Numeracy homework (game or written activity)

Thursday: Make a special effort to revise tables and spellings for the Friday Test the next day.

We thought you might appreciate these Homework Hints.

Preparation

Your child will need:

• A quiet place
• A flat surface
• A sharp pencil, a rubber
• Time-don’t leave homework until it’s late

Once your child has completed his/her homework, please make sure you sign it.

Tips for learning spellings

1. Look at the words
2. Say them
3. 3. Cover them
4. Write them
5. Check them

Have your child spend some time learning spellings for him/herself. Teach them to use these steps.

Ask your child to write down the words as you call them out.

Make sure they have completed the spellings section in their Spelling Booklets.

Learning Tables

• Have your child say or write tables at least 3 times
• Jumble up the order of the tables
• Ask some ‘quick fire’ questions to develop good mental maths skills

Reading

It is important to practise reading aloud. Choose a few pages to read aloud, focusing on fluency and expression.

Discuss what your child has read and sign the reading log book.

April - May

The Final Countdown!!

Where has the time gone? Terms one and two have flown by very quickly and we are now on the countdown to Primary 4! In this final P3 term the children will work hard as they prepare for the year ahead. We would greatly encourage you to continue supporting your child at home with homeworks which consolidate the learning being done in school.

World Around Us:

We are excited to go to Carrickfergus Castle for our school trip on Tuesday 16^th April.

 Our theme is ‘By Land, By Sea, By Air' and within this we are going to discuss:

• Transport - the different vehicles which move by land, sea and air.
• Road safety - taking care as a pedestrian and following the Green Cross Code.
• Transport in the past and some famous inventors.
• Holidays - travelling to the seashore.
• Comparing and contrasting holidays to the seashore now and in the past.
• Animals and plants which inhabit our local seashore.
• Hobbies - activities people do for fun on land, sea and in the air.

 Please send anything you think might ‘link-in’ with this – books, pictures etc.

Mathematics

 Number: This term we will be continuing to learn tables each night so children have quick recall of number facts up to 20. We are aiming to know our numbers to 100. We should be able to count to this number and recognise all numbers in written form. We will use little ‘word problems’ to help your child develop problem solving skills and decide whether to add or subtract to get the correct answer. Please help them with this at home by giving them little puzzles to work out for themselves.

Measuring Capacity: In measures we will do some activities involving weighing things (hopefully not the teachers!) and measuring liquids. They will become more familiar with terms like ‘heavier’ ‘lightest’ and ‘half-full’ ‘empty’. Check the website for pictures of the children playing at the water tray and carrying out investigations with a variety of containers.

 Shape and Space: We will recap on the 2D and 3D shapes learnt this year. The children will revise the names and properties of these shapes. They will also be able to identify and sort them in a variety of ways.

 Time: We have already learned how to tell the time using o'clock, half past, quarter past and quarter to. The children have been taught how to read both analogue and digital times e.g. 6:30 and 8:00. Please encourage your child to read the time from a digital clock at home e.g. an alarm clock.

 Literacy

During this final term we will be encouraging the children to check their own written work for good sentences which make sense and which contain correct punctuation e.g. capital letters, full stops, question marks. Neat and tidy handwriting is essential as always in every piece of written work.

In Grammar, we continue to learn about recognising and using adjectives, nouns, verbs and adverbs. This term we will learn to recognise verbs in sentences. The children will be introduced to tenses (past, present and future) and how to use these in sentences. The children will work on plurals and compound words as well. You will see this learning as it comes home with the children on a Wednesday evening for homework!

Please continue to check your child is using these skills properly in their written homework.

Thank you,

C. Montgomery and C. McConnell