what is Year 3?

For the youngest children on the Junior Campus, Year 3  can be daunting. The focus for the year is developing independence and taking the first steps into using personal technology through Seesaw. The children work across different classes and share there learning through events and the varied IPC topics taught through the year. 

Meet the Team

Welcome to Year 3. Our brand new classrooms help us share our learning and tackle problems together. In Year 3 we always strive to do our best and think about the next steps in our learning. A highlight of the year is the sleepover where we will spend the night in school playing games and sleeping in the gym! All the teachers and teaching assistants are very friendly and love to chat so please come and say hello. 

What is Year 3 like?

Communication with parents

Most of the communication with teachers in Year 3 is done though the class SeeSaw group. Parents can contact the teacher directly through the app and teachers will usually respond with 24hrs. Teachers are always happy to meet face to face and appointments with them can easily be made through the SeeSaw app or direct email. Don't forget to contact the class parent representative if you need information about class events. 

What will your child be learning?

Below you will find an overview for the learning in Year 3. The curriculum is varied but has a strong focus on developing and using English language for purpose. Children will further develop their critical thinking skills as they begin to manipulate information and texts and consider how they can be used to inform their learning. 

Curriculum booklets : English    Maths 

Y3 Long Term Plan

What will your learning environment look like?

The new classrooms have been designed with our school philosophy of 'learning together' in mind.  They help us share our ideas creatively and have large display areas to help with our learning. Each class has access to a shared learning pod where teams of children can work together across different classes. Y3 also get to go out into to the city to visit art a musuem and art gallery where we can compare art from around the world. Community is really important to us and everyone in Year 3 also gets to visit work with children in a local Giong Ong To primary school too. 

Age related expectations

Our Age Related Expectations, or AREs for short, outline our end-of-year success criteria for what a child who has been through each phase at BIS HCMC should expect to be achieving. As your child progresses from year to year, so to will the AREs become increasingly more complex. This gives teachers the opportunity to target areas of development within individual pupils. 

Progress through the AREs will be shared with parents at various points throughout the year, namely through Parent Teacher Student Conferences (PTSCs) and written reports or updates. At the end of the year these will be explained using the statements Support (S), Developing (D), Meeting (M) and Exceeding (E). All AREs for Year 3 can be found on the following document. Click on the arrow to open the whole page.

Assessment and Tracking

At BIS we use both formative and summative assessments to meet the needs of the students. 

Formative assessment refers to a wide variety of methods that our teachers use to conduct in-process evaluations of student comprehension, learning needs, and academic progress during a lesson, unit, or course. Formative assessments help our teachers identify the next steps in a child's learning.

Summative Assessments which are used to evaluate student learning progress and achievement at the conclusion of a specific instructional period—usually at the end of a term.  We use the GL suite of assessments to support teacher judgement at the end of every  Academic Year for students in Year 1 to Year 6. 

Reporting effort, progress and attainment to parents is extremely important and an integral part of what we do as a school to ensure that we are working with parents to meet the needs of the students. There are two written reports each year in Term 1 and Term 3. There are also two Parent Teacher Student Conferences (PTSCs) each academic year where there is an opportunity to meet the teachers to discuss progress and what parents can do at home to support their child. At BIS, we have an open door policy and parents are welcome and encouraged to make further appointments throughout the academic year with their child's class teacher should they want further updates or have any concerns about their child. 

Specialist Lessons

PE

Physical Education is a fundamental part of the curriculum at BIS with every pupil having two lessons a week with a specialist P.E. teacher. The curriculum covered is broad and balanced allowing pupils to grow physically, mentally and socially. The lessons will develop motor skills, tactics and strategies, assessing performance, and sportsmanship. 

Physical Education at BIS allows pupils to learn about a healthy, active lifestyle in a fun and dynamic way, and is delivered through a range of different sports such as basketball, athletics, swimming and outdoor pursuits. 

Pupils are encouraged to try new activities and stay as active as possible. There are a large number of clubs on offer to accommodate all age ranges and abilities, focusing on skill development and enjoyment. For our elite athletes we also run a range of squads and teams, giving them the opportunity to play in a competitive environment and with a greater emphasis on performance, whilst still having fun!

As a department we have high expectations, and expect all pupils to participate at all times, and in the appropriate full kit. This includes bringing a hat and water bottle to every lesson. 

Music

The Music Department at BIS HCMC believes strongly that the Performing Arts play a significant role in your child’s educational journey from FundinoTots to Year 6 and beyond, and every child should be able to fulfil their musical potential. Our overall aim is for the students to develop a lifelong love of music through an enjoyable, immersive and challenging musical curriculum. The curriculum focuses on singing, movement, the playing of different instruments and introducing music theory. During their music lessons students will learn about the elements of music such as pitch, dynamics and tempo, through a variety of practical activities. All students will have the opportunity to learn a musical instrument for at least one year through our whole-class band programme. 

Our collaboration with the world-renowned Juilliard School allows us access to their innovative Creative Classroom, through the exploration of 12 core works and specially-designed creative activities to complement these. This supplements our already rich musical curriculum which features a balance of performing, composing and listening. The Juilliard Creative Classroom encourages the children to develop confidence in the three main areas of ‘ways of doing’, ‘ways of being’ and ‘ways of thinking’ and visits from Juilliard alumni allow the children to see and hear world-class musicians.

In addition to our thriving curriculum music lessons, at BIS HCMC Primary we are able to offer a wide range of extra-curricular musical activities designed to engage as many students as possible and to further extend their creative learning. This includes multiple choirs, orchestras and ensembles. We are also able to provide access to individual instrumental lessons at the school through a team of highly qualified and experienced musicians. Children can start lessons from Year 1 upwards and are strongly encouraged to do so. Many children take advantage of our link with ABRSM to further their progress through this established and respected examination system. 

ICT

In Year 3 and 4 students have begun to use technology as a tool to aid their learning, but still spend time developing their skill set and advancing their understanding of technology in the world around them and how it affects their lives. At the start of Year 3 students are given their personal email account and this allows them access to the full range of Google Apps for Education and is an introduction to cloud based learning – the classroom is no longer restrained by 4 walls.

Emails, cloud storage, collaborative documents and greater access to the Internet means that we look closely about what we need to do in order to become digital citizens, what is safe to share online and the ways that we need to act in a digital environment. Our robotics takes the next step from simple movements and we incorporate Lego WeDo 2.0, which adds motors and sensors to our robotic creations. We continue to learn about coding and use a coding language called Blockly and a program called Scratch to create video games and animations. We use a combination of devices to create digital content and share our learning by working on projects in areas such as animation, short movies, collaborative presentations and digital story telling.