Hedgehog Class (Year 3) 2025 - 2026

Dear Parents and Carers,

Welcome to the class page for Hedgehog Class.

Here you will find all of the exciting and wonderful things that your child will be learning during their time in Year 3. If you have any questions, please use Class Dojo or speak to a member of our team at drop off/ pick up.

Thank you

Mr Edwards

Teaching Assistants: Mrs Bebbington (Mornings) and Miss Karle

Autumn 2

We have two English lessons a day; a reading lesson and a writing lesson.

Reading:

In reading this half term, we will are reading the book 'Rumaysa', a Fairytale by Radiya Hafiza.

Step into a Once Upon a Time where anything is possible . . . Radiya Hafiza's enchanting and funny debut weaves together three stories, spinning the classic fairytale to show that anyone can be a hero.

We will be using our different VIPERS skills: Vocabulary, Infer, Predict, Explain, Retrieve and Summarise to improve our understanding of what we read.'

Writing:

In writing this half term, we will be looking at the book 'Into The Forest' by Anthony Browne. 

It is a picture book that explores a journey a boy takes where he chooses to follow a forbidden shortcut through a mysterious forest on his way to visit his sick grandmother

'Reading for Pleasure' has great amounts of benefits for your child. In Year 3, we ensure your child has time to read for pleasure and each day, we set time aside to read our class book for pleasure.

Benefits of 'reading for pleasure':

Inspires imagination and creativity.

Enrinches cultural awareness and understanding. 

Increases empathy and improves relationships with others.

Lifts well-being levels and improves mood.

Improves progress in vocabulary, spelllings and even maths.

Encourages children to take a screen break.

Read with your child every day even if it is just 2 minutes- this can make all the difference. 
Record in their reading diaries to ensure that your child is receiving their stamp for their book from the vending machine, or reading buddy. 

You could ask your child about what they think might happen next in the story, how do they think the character is feeling, who is the author and what do they do. 

In maths this half term, we will be exploring addition, subtraction, multiplication and division.

We will also be doing some work on our timestables every day! It is really important for the children to build their timestable knowledge as they will be required to apply it to their mathematics learning. We will also be completing weekly timestable tests. 

This half term in science we are going to be looking at Rocks. In this topic we will be conducting lots of observations and investigations look at all things rocks such as the different types and how they are formed!  

In Georgaphy, we are looking at the Antartica! We are learning all about the climate in Antartica, who lives in Antartica, who Shakleton was and how to plan an expedition!

Your child will have 2 PE lessons each week. Our lessons will be on a Monday and Wednesday.

 Mondays- Each Monday morning, your child will be given 10 spellings to learn over the course of the week. They will then complete a spelling test each Friday, and, if they receive a mark of 10/10,  they will get a Dojo. They will have opportunities to learn their spellings some mornings in class so extra practice at home is essential.

Every day -Your child should read as often as possible when not in school and this should be logged in their reading diaries. Please ensure your child is also practising their timetables whenever they can as well. 

Other useful links:

Please see below links to useful websites for your child to use when they are at home. I will be adding to the list throughout the course of the year so please make sure you check for updated links.

Oxford Owl - Linked to our phonics Read, Write Inc programme https://home.oxfordowl.co.uk/reading/free-ebooks/   

Story Nory - A range of stories by classic authors as well as poems musicals and fairytales. https://www.storynory.com/archives/classic-authors 

Story Berries- Read along with audio clips. https://www.storyberries.com

Monkey Pen-  Free downloadable children’s books in PDF format. https://monkeypen.com/pages/free-childrens-books

Free Children’s Stories-  https://www.freechildrenstories.com

Keeping Safe Online-  www.esafety.gov.au/kids 

Topmarks- A great way for children to practise many of their maths skills https://www.topmarks.co.uk/Search.aspx?Subject=16&AgeGroup=3

Newsround is a very good outlet for your child to watch each day to gain a wider understanding of what is happening not only in our country, but the rest of the world. We will be watching newsround every afternoon in class.