Year 3
Spring, 2026
Welcome to Year 3!
We hope you had a lovely Christmas break and are ready for more learning in year 3 with lots of new things to learn.
Start time - 8:40am Pick up time - 3:15pm
If you have any questions, concerns or worries, please contact me at year3@cpa.dsat.education and we will do our best to respond as soon as we can.
Key information
Please ensure that your child brings a labelled water bottle to school everyday as well as ensuring that all items of your child's uniform is clearly labelled too. Snacks are not provided in Key Stage 2, please send with your child a healthy fruit snack or cereal bar for break time.
Reading books will be changed on Thursdays, please ensure your child brings their reading book and their reading record to school.
Homework will be sent out on a Thursday and will be due back the following Thursday.
Please click on the link below to find the information shared during our Beginning of Year meeting in September.
Curriculum
Please see attached the Year 3 curriculum for 2025-2026
Here is a summary of what we will be learning in Year 3 during the first half Spring term:
Reading
This term we will be reading a variety of small texts. The pupils will be learning how to answer a wide range of questions linked to the text following the VIPERS questioning (Vocabulary, Inference, Prediction, Explanation, Retrieval, Sequence/Summarise).
Children will be consolidating their knowledge on their reading VIPERS. Children will explore a range of texts each week with a focus on vocabulary and retrieval skills. Children will practise their oracy also by predicting what might happen in the story next based on clues read.
Every 2 weeks children will complete an unseen read and answer questions based on a text they are unfamiliar with.
Writing
We will be reading the story book of ‘The Stone Age Boy’.
In our writing unit we will write and publish our own Non-Chronological Report to inform and teach readers about the Stone Age.
The class will focus on ensuring their punctuation and capital letters are used consistently through their writing.
Children will focus on learning what a main clause is and how to compare a main clause by using co-ordinating conjunctions. Children will also learn how to use subordinate conjunctions to further extend and explain their main clauses.
Children will revisit commas for lists and how to write in paragraphs. Finally, children will expand their vocabulary by using subject specific words and spelling their Year ¾ common exception words within their writing.
Maths
This term in maths we will develop our fluency in our 8 times tables. We will learn how to use known calculations to help solve tricker 8 times table facts. We will then apply our knowledge of our times tables to answer word problems.
Later in the term we will develop our understanding of fractions. The children will learn how to:
- Count up and down in tenths, recognise how a tenth is formed and link it to decimal tenths.
- Recognise and write fractions of a set of objects.
- Recognise and use fractions as numbers (unit and non unit fractions)
- Show a fraction using diagrams
- Add and subtract fractions
- Compare and order fractions with the same denominator
- Solve word problems
- Recognise equivalent fractions.
Music
Compose Using Your Imagination
Children will learn a range of songs and then they will begin to compose (create) their own song by changing lyrics and musical notation. Children will play the recorder and consolidate their knowledge in B, A and G musical notation. Children will also read music sheets with notation to determine how long a note is played for.
Religious Education
How do the ‘Five Pillars’ help Muslims live a good life?
The unit of study includes work on Muslim beliefs and practices, including the belief in Allah and the importance of the Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him) as a role model and inspiration for Muslims. It expands and develops learning about the Five Pillars of Islam as a way of focusing on key Muslim beliefs about the right way to live. Pupils will learn and draw on specific religious language to explain Islamic values and how they are shared with other religions and worldviews.
Science: Forces, friction and magnets
In this module, children will learn to:
● Compare how things move on different surfaces.
● Notice that some forces need contact between two objects, but magnetic forces can act at a distance.
● Observe how magnets attract or repel each other and attract some materials and not others
● Compare and group together a variety of everyday materials on the basis of whether they are attracted to a magnet, and identify some magnetic materials.
● Describe magnets as having two poles.
● Predict whether two magnets will attract or repel each other, depending on which poles are facing.
Art
In Art this term we will develop our use of tone using different shapes and shading techniques. We will then look at face proportions and develop our drawing skills of noses. We will then also look at our painting techniques to help create Easter cards.
History
What impact did the Roman Empire have on Britain?
Children will learn about the chronology of when the Roman Empire began after the Stone age which they last in the previous unit. Children will also learn about who the Romans were and why they came to Britain.
PE
PE will be taught every Wednesday afternoon. Please ensure that children wear their school uniforms to school and their PE kit in a bag to get changed into. Earrings must be taken out or covered for PE and children must be able to do this themselves.
Dance – Pupils will create dances in relation to an idea. Pupils will work individually, with a partner and in a small group to share their ideas. Pupils will develop their use of counting and rhythm. They will learn to use canon, unison, formation and levels in their dances, They will be given the opportunity to perform to others and provide feedback using key terminology.
Year 3 will also have an additional PE lesson with Miss Amelia from Premier Education on a Thursday afternoon.
Computing
This unit allows children to explore and create branching databases. They learn how binary questioning is used to sort data records and about the importance of testing and debugging databases that they create.
Key Learning
To understand the concept of using 'Yes' or 'No' questions to sort objects.
To understand and use a branching database effectively.
To plan and create a branching database.
To test and debug branching databases to correct errors.
French
Year 3 will begin to learn French as their Modern Foreign Language (MFL).
French
In French we will be learning how to say instruments in French! We will link this to our music topic when we listen and appraise music too.
PSHE
In PSHE this term we will learn the following about equality:
- How do we make the world fair? Why is this important.
- Where do you feel like you belong?
- How can we help the people around us?
Thank you for your support. If you ever have any questions, please feel free to speak to a member of the Year 3 team.
Miss Westwood (Class Teacher)
Mrs Ridgeway and Mrs Creighton (LSA)