Lower Key Stage 2: Year 3 and Year 4
Reading
Children will bring their book bags into the classroom everyday and select a book from a basket that has their name on. These books are colour coded according to the level that your child is reading. Children can change their book as often as they like and they can also select as many books as they wish. The books are an opportunity for children to practise their reading at home with you and enjoy sharing a book with their family. Please use the reading record as and when you like to communicate about your children's reading with school. Reading at school consists of small group Guided Reading sessions and whole class Reading Comprehension sessions. Children identified as needing intervention are targetted for Daily Reading. Children are assessed regularly to encouarge them to move up through the colour bands using PM Benchmark and Bug Club and rewarded with certificates and prizes. Click on the link below to find out more about Bug Club.
Writing
At Southmere Primary Academy there a number of approaches we use to make writing fun and give children the skills they need to write to entertain, persuade, inform and discuss; in short, children are learning to write for a purpose.
It's Only Words
Each day the children are taught a new word. This word should be challenging and chosen to improve children's vocabulary.
Talk for Writing
Children learn how to retell and create texts orally using well structured sentences with a high level vocabulary. Children also have fun using actions to remind them of certain aspects of the text language.
Alan Peat Sentence Types
Alan Peat has designed a range of sentence types that children learn to include in their writing. These sentence types give children a scaffold for structuring their writing.
For more information about recent developments in the teaching of English and how you can support your child at home please visit the National Literacy Trust
Maths
The current National curriculum document says: ‘The expectation is that the majority of pupils will move through the programmes of study at broadly the same pace. However, decisions about when to progress should always be based on the security of pupils’ understanding and their readiness to progress to the next stage. Pupils who grasp concepts rapidly should be challenged through being offered rich and sophisticated problems before any acceleration through new content. Those who are not sufficiently fluent with earlier material should consolidate their understanding, including through additional practice, before moving on.’ (National curriculum page 3)
What do we mean by mastery?
Integral to mastery of the curriculum is the development of deep rather than superficial conceptual understanding. ‘The research for the review of the National Curriculum showed that it should focus on “fewer things in greater depth”, in secure learning which persists, rather than relentless, over-rapid progression.’ It is inevitable that some pupils will grasp concepts more rapidly than others and will need to be stimulated and challenged to ensure continued progression. However, research indicates that these pupils benefit more from enrichment and deepening of content, rather than acceleration into new content. Acceleration is likely to promote superficial understanding, rather than the true depth and rigour of knowledge that is a foundation for higher mathematics.
Please click on the link below to see the Maths curriculum your child will be taught in Year 3 and Year 4.