Music

On Tuesday afternoons, we have Swimming and Music.  In Music we are learning traditional Irish songs - we are taking turns to dance and play untuned percussion in time to the music.

Cicada Maths

Our challenge was to collect as many cicada shells as we could . . . and we beat all earlier records by collecting 1,769.

First of all, we placed them on a 100s board and then sorted them into tubes of ten to make it easier to count such a huge number.  Next we counted out ten tubes of ten to make larger pots of one hundred. We had to carefully balance ten lots of one hundred to make one thousand.  Some people used the flip chart to show the final number, and other people used the magnetic number boards.

It was interesting to find out that the tubes of ten cicadas actually sounded a bit like cicadas chirping when we banged them together.

It has been very helpful using the cicada tubes of ten to count in tens when we have been working out doubles.

First we counted in ones.

When we had one hundred, we put cicadas in groups of ten.

The 100 frame helped us with our sorting 

This is what 1,769 cicada skins look like!

Some people showed the total on the flip board, while others used the magnetic number frames. 

We also wrote the total on the whiteboard.  We had to change the final total from 1 729 to 1 769
after someone found four tubes of ten  hidden under a table!

The noise we made when we banged the tubes together was very similar to cicadas chirping.

The Awesome Acrobatics used the cicadas to help them solve doubles with tens.

New Chrome books

All the Year 3 classes now have eight Chrome books and eight ipads, so we have to share them out to give everyone a fair share.   To start with, we are learning to play new Maths games and Literacy games on the Chrome books and use the bookmarks efficiently.  Soon we will be writing on Chrome books too, and publishing some our work.  Next week we will all be doing our PAT Maths test on Chrome books.

Here we are having our first trial - we took turns so that everyone had a go on the keyboard.

Maths about Me

 In Maths, we have all made a Maths About Me page.  We had to measure length in centimetres to work out how tall we were and what the circumference of our head was.  We used Mr Bear's bathroom scales to measure how heavy we were in Kilograms.  We checked the postcode app to find out the right postcode for our home address. You can see everyone's Maths About Me page on the Maths page.

Gardening

People who were not swimming this week did some gardening with Mrs Bear.  We had to take old plants from the garden outside Room 19 in the wheelbarrow.  When all the old plants are pulled out and we have dug in some fresh soil and compost, we are going to plant swan plants for a Monarch Butterfly Garden.

Gardeners at work

Swimming

In Year 3, we have swimming on Tuesday afternoons.  This week, Mr Whatman was checking out swimming to make sure we were in the right group for the Middle School Swimming Sports.

Visitors

We have been lucky to have some special visitors in Room 19 this week.

We had a closer look of this dragonfly on the visualiser.  If you looked closely, you could see a wasp in the dragonfly's mouth. 

Look whose brother came to visit Room 19 after school.

Look whose puppy stopped in for a cuddle.

Tesselations

You can see the longest tesselation (a pattern made of repeating shapes) we have made in Room 19 this  year - you can even see the makers peeking over the table!  

Summer holiday recounts

On the very first week of term, we wrote a story about our Summer holidays.  When they were finished, we illustrated them with a picture that matched the text.  We enjoyed reading them with a buddy.  You can read them all in the Writing page.

Valentine cards

We were learning about symbols and how they say a message without words - we looked at road signs and hand gestures, like stop or come here.  The heart shape means love all around the world in all kinds of languages.  

We made a Valentine card to give to someone special we love, and wrote a Valentine's poem inside.  As is the tradition, we did not write our names inside so no one will ever know who sent them.  Can you guess who is holding their cards?  Look on the VISUAL ART page for more mystery writers.

Book bags are go!

On Fridays, we have to empty our book bags, hand in our reading logs and put away our reading books into the right group tubs.  One way to check if our book bag is empty, is to wear it as a hat. Very strange (and a little bit cool).

Tin telephones

In our theme, Ready Steady Go, we are learning about ourselves and how we learn.  This week we focused on hearing and listening.

We used recycled tins and string to make telephones.  We found that if we held the string taut and held the tin up to our ear, we could hear the speaker clearly, even if they were five metres away. This is because the sound waves make the tin vibrate when you talk into it, and this in turn makes the string vibrate so you can hear the other person's voice.

Science Club - investigating flowering plants

Luke made this display of parts of a flower

Daniel checked out some tiny insects he found in his flower.

On Thursday lunch times, Science club is held in Room 19 with Mrs Bear.  This week we looked closely at flowers and found all their parts: stem, sepal, petal, stamen, ovary, leaf.  Some people even found some insects nestled inside their flower.

Weka Team Sports

The whole Weka Team got together for the first time when we had Weka Team Sports on Thursday afternoon.  There are eight sports teams and only four Year 3 classes (Rooms 1, 2, 18 and 19) so we were all mixed up and work with different people at sports time.

Statistics - our favourite things we like to do

We made a graph about our favourite things to do.  It was interesting to find out that some people liked the same things and others not.  However, the lines were sometimes difficult to follow so then we made a picture graph using the same criteria.  We found this easier to read and to make comparisons.  We found most people chose swimming as their favourite holiday activity, but we were able to make lots of other statistical statements based on the data

Letters of welcome

On the first day of school, we all received a letter from a year 3 student who was in Room 19 last year.  They wrote about some of the exciting things we will do in Year 3 and also gave us some tips to help us settle into the Weka Team.