Year 3 - RE: Exploring Joy & Sadness
The Year 3 class began their Easter unit this week with an exploration of emotions. The unit focuses on the joy and sadness experienced in the Easter story and by Christians at this holy time, so we started by discussing emotions we experience during special times and in everyday situations. When we shared our personal experiences, we realised that there is often more than one emotion experienced in the majority of situations. The children were very respectful and responded sensitively to each other’s experiences.
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Year 3 - English- Generating Ideas
Today in English, Year 3 have been busy coming up with creative ways to trap the Iron Man. Instead of simply digging a hole, they have been creative and generated ideas such as using a giant magnet to lift him into the air, luring him onto a platform that drops him into the deep sea, or even trapping him under a heavy metal net. The children have shown great imagination in their ideas.
British Science Week-Year 3 Celebrates British Science Week with a Bang!
This afternoon, Year 3 had a full afternoon of science, celebrating British Science Week in style and truly living life in all its fullness! They took part in exciting hands-on experiments, exploring chemical reactions, gases, and surface tension. The highlight of the session was the Exploding Lunch Bag experiment! The children were amazed as they watched a sealed bag suddenly pop. By combining baking soda and vinegar, they observed how a chemical reaction produced gas, causing the bag to expand until it burst. They made predictions, discussed their observations, and thought scientifically about why the reaction occurred. Next, they investigated the fascinating science of surface tension by creating bubbles on the table and even bubbles inside bubbles. Using soapy water and straws, the young scientists discovered how a thin layer of soap traps air, forming bubbles that stretch and hold their shape. To conclude their exciting afternoon of science, Year 3 explored diffusion with the Skittles Experiment. Throughout the session, our Science Ambassadors Noah, Mathew, and Cassidy were fantastic role models, demonstrating techniques and encouraging their peers to think like real scientists.
Year 3- Class Worship-How can we make connections with others?
In our class worship, we explored the story of how the Princess of Wales recently shared portraits drawn by her and her children to highlight the importance of connection. Inspired by this, the class reflected on different ways we can connect with others, suggesting activities such as walking and talking, reading and discussing a book, or playing a board game while chatting. They agreed that while creative activities are a wonderful way to bond, meaningful conversations make connections even stronger. Arabelle led the prayer, thanking God for showing us how to love and care for one another. She prayed and hoped that our actions would lift others and bring kindness into the world.
Year 3- Year of prayer- Reflects on Forgiveness
As part of our Year of Prayer, Year 3 took a moment to think about forgiveness. Each child wrote or drew something they wanted to say sorry for on a piece of recycled paper. They then quietly said sorry to God and asked for His forgiveness. To show that God forgives us and takes away our sins, they scrunched up or tore their papers into pieces, reminding them of His love and mercy.
Whole School Worship - The Widow’s Offering
Today in our Collective Worship we acted out the Bible story of the Widow’s Offering. Mr Norris kindly acted in the role of Jesus, and we had 4 children from across Years 4 and 5 acting as the money givers. Each person acted out sharing a small portion of their wealth to charity, and then a poor widow came along and donated two coins. Jesus explained that the widow gave the most because she gave all she had. We all spent time reflecting on how we could give to others during Lent. Some ideas were we could take part in the Big Lent Walk and help to raise money for those who don't have as much food as us and we could show kindness to each other through our 40 acts of generosity such as donating our clothes and toys to charity. We said a special prayer for all of the things we are thankful for and each time Mrs Ham dropped a coin, we said Amen. We are thankful for our family, friends, pets, teachers, food, warm beds and God's creations. We finished our Worship by singing Rich in Kindness and Year 6 modelled the actions at the front.
Singing Worship and Year of Prayer
This morning in Worship we started by introducing the Year of Prayer to our classes this week which is about using rubbish to create sorry prayers and then throwing them away. We then learnt a special action prayer to help our love to grow as part of the Year of the Prayer. After that we had a joyous time singing some of our favourite Easter songs and hymns in preparation for Easter. We sang Lord of the Dance, We have a King who rides a donkey, Rich in Kindness and Give me oil in my lamp. We also started to learn a new upbeat song called 'He's Alive!'. What a joyous way to start a Monday morning together as a school family!
Mad Science After School Club- Super Sticky Stuff
This afternoon in the club, our future scientists got hands-on with exciting experiments, testing different types of tape, lemon, orange, and other sticky substances to explore their properties and strength.
Year 3- P.E- Gymnastics
Today, the children set up the apparatus and observed a model of a safe landing before exploring different jumps, including straight, star, and tuck jumps. They also practised travelling and balancing on smaller apparatus. They adapted their sequences and experimented with new movements as they rotated through various layouts. Some children pushed past their challenges, building confidence in their jumps and improving their balance along the way.
A Disco For the Value Award Winners
Today, Whitehall Park and India Mill celebrated their success of achieving the most value points last half-term with a non-uniform day and a disco. A huge thank you to Miss Flynn, Mrs Irshad and Miss Woods for the leading the disco and games! The children had a fantastic time!
Biggest Ever Girls Football Event
Today, we proudly took part in the FA’s Biggest Ever Girls’ Football Event, celebrating the joy of football and encouraging more girls to get involved in the sport. Reception, Year 1, and Year 2 participated in a fun, game-based session where they had to dribble the ball and score in any of the four goals while defenders tried to stop them with tackles. The session helped develop their dribbling, spatial awareness and teamwork skills in an exciting and engaging way. Years 3, 4, 5, and 6 took part in a series of competitive matches, showcasing their skills and teamwork. They then tested their nerves in thrilling penalty shootouts, demonstrating confidence and precision under pressure. It was fantastic to see so much enthusiasm, determination and teamwork throughout the morning. The event truly highlighted the growing passion for girls’ football in our school!
Friday Celebration Worship
Today, we started our celebration worship by signing the trinity and reflecting on our very busy yet enjoyable week in school. This week, we launched our challenge called ‘THE BIG LENT WALK’ which involves our whole school community working together to raise money to make a difference to the lives of those who don't have enough food. Please continue to let either Mrs Wilkinson or Mrs Ham know if you have walked anywhere and send photos if you can. We have also been thinking about how Lent is a good time to give things back so we have launched our 40 Day Kindness Challenge. This week, we have also celebrated Shrove Tuesday, World Book Day and enjoyed a great variety of after school clubs such as Craft Club led by Fred and Pearl, Cross Country, Mad Science, Choir , Dodgeball and Gymnastics clubs led by Edstart. We then congratulated this week’s individual value award winners. Well done to Evie, Alessia and Heidi in EYFS and KS1 and Lottie, Penelope, Nevaeh, Seb and Laila in KS2 for their fantastic work ethic, their commitment to demonstrating the Barney’s 4Bs (being ready, respectful, kind and safe) and showing full participation and engagement in lessons. Furthermore, we congratulated our Year 2 and Year 3 classes for being our attendance winners this week with 99.2% and 99.3% attendance, River Darwen as our value award winners this week with 509 points and our Year 4 Football team who kicked off their journey in the BRFC league with three exciting matches on Tuesday evening and represented school amazingly well. We also congratulated Year 3 and Year 6 as being the WOW (Walk to School) winners for the month of February. Well done to these classes for earning the most badges. We then moved on to congratulating our out of school sports award winners. This week, it was a week full of congratulating super swimmers. Well done to Zac for being a super swimmer and achieving his Puffin award, Phoebe for achieving her Stage 1 swimming certificate, Annabel for achieving her 15m swimming certificate, Ava for achieving her Stage 2 swimming certificate, Desmond for achieving his silver and gold swimming certificates, Iris for achieving her Stage 6 swimming certificate and Bluebelle for swimming an amazing 50m. We also said a huge well done to Carter for being a fantastic footballer and Lana for being the Star of the Week at Performing Arts. To end our worship, we read a beautiful Lent prayer together as a school and sang ‘We Have a King Who Rides a Donkey’. We wish you all a lovely and restful weekend.