Bringing Meaning to Reading.

Reading for meaning is an important skill as without meaning children are just decoding words. The role of the teacher is to develop in the children a variety of strategies, which allow them to make links between the text and themselves, the world and other texts. These connections allow them to bring meaning to and extract meaning from texts. According to the new NSW syllabus the key comprehension strategies include:  

• activating and using prior knowledge
• identifying literal information explicitly stated in the text
• making inferences based on information in the text and their own prior knowledge
• predicting likely future events in a text
• visualising by creating mental images of elements in a text
• summarising and organising information from a text
• integrating ideas and information in texts
• critically reflecting on content, structure, language and images used to construct meaning in a text. (glossary - comprehension)

Throughout the week, the children in Year 3 participate in a variety of activities to enhance their comprehension skills. Gabriella, Eden and Declan reflected on one area of our reading program:

Learning Centres

Everyday Year Three work in teams for Learning Centres. There are four groups; pink, green, purple and blue. Each week we rotate throughout the activities, which include Reader's Theatre, Comprehension Activities, Guided Reading or Reciprocal Reading  Sessions with the teacher, Whisper Phones and Published Writing. Gabriella, Eden and Declan

Guided Reading sessions allow us to develop our reading strategies

Readers' Theatre helps us develop our expression.

We love using the 'Whisper Phones' as it is a great way to hear ourselves reading so we can improve our fluency.

Our favourite part of Readers' Theatre is using expression to show different characters and emotions.

Fern Gully Helps Us See How We Are All Connected.

During Religion we have continued learning about God's creation, as part of our unit we watched the movie "Fern Gully'. It was an outstanding movie and helped us understand how we are connected to God's creation. It also showed us how important it is for us to look after our world.
By Darby, Ashton, Callum and Giada.

This week for homework Miss Veling and Mrs Standring have asked us to read Genesis 1:1-31. We have to retell the main events and draw a picture showing our understanding. They are going to choose some to share on our blog. Good luck everyone! Will yours be one of the chosen ones?

The children did a great job summarising the creation narrative from the Old Testament, in particular the book of Genesis. I have included some of the drawings and a collection of their summaries below.

God created everything and this is how it started. On the first day God created light and the night and day. On the second day God created the sky and sea. On the third day God created the land and the plants and seeds. On the forth day God created the sun, moon and stars. On the fifth day God created the animals for the sea, land and sky. On the sixth day God created all living things, animals, woman and man.

God first made heaven and earth. He made morning, night, evening and dry land. God also made, plants, creatures, light, dark, water, fruit, vegetables, trees and seeds. God also made male and female.

In the beginning the earth was covered with nothing but darkness. But then God said, "Let there be light". So he made light and he named the light day and the darkness he called night. There was the evening and there was the morning. On day 1 God made the water and he called water - sea.

Once the world was empty and darkness all around. Day 1: God made light and called it "day' and called the darkness 'night'. The night went and day came.
Day 2: A dome was made to keep the water in two places. The dome was called 'sky'. Night went and day came.
Day 3: Then the water came to one place and the land was shown. It was called 'earth'. Night went and day came.
Day 4: God made two larger lights the 'sun' and 'moon' and he added stars. Night went and day came.
Day 5: God made birds and animals and other animals and said 'reproduce'. Night went and day came.
Day 6: God made humans and blessed them that was day 6. The whole world was done and God rested. That was day 7.

On the first day God created the heavens, earth, day and night. On the second day God created the sky, and water. On the third day God named the earth and seas, grassland , trees bearing fruit. On the fourth day God created the sun, moon and stars so there was light. On the fifth day God created creatures for the sea, land and skies. On the sixth day God created mankind. On the seventh day God rested and made the day a Holy day.

On the firt day heaven and earth was created. On the second day God created the sky. On the third day God created the sea, land, plants and trees. On the fourth day God created the stars in the sky. On the fifth day God created the living animals on land and in seas as well as in the sky. On the sixth day God created man and woman.

On the sixth days of creation God created all the beautiful things we see now. On the 1st day of creation God created light and dark. On the 2nd day God created sky and water. On the 3rd day God created plants and land. On the 4th day God created moon, sun and stars, On the 5th day God created creatures on the sea and sky. On the 6th day God created the wild animals. This is the 6 days of creation.

In the beginning God created the heavens and earth. But the earth was dark with no light. On the first day, God said, Let there be light. On the second day, God said,"Let there be water under a vault.' then God called the vault sky. The other days, but not on the seventh day, God made ground, plants, trees, fruit, sun,moon,creatures, birds, male and female. On the seventh day God said it was good.

God said "Let there be light and there was day and night. Next God made water and clouds. Then he made land and hills. Next God made the sun, moon and stars. Then he made bids and fish. On the last day God made every sort of animals and the first people, Adam and Eve.

First God made light and called it day and darkness, night. Then God seperated water and sky. He made land and called it Earth. He made plants and fruits. Then he made animals and humans. He told them to have lots of children and to look after the animals and plants. He was always happy with what he saw.

On day one God created light and seperated the light from dark. He called light, 'day' and dark ' night'. On the second day God created a vault, he called it sky. On day three God created water spots and called it sea. God created vegetation. On day four God created lights thatwere in the sky to seperate the day from night. On fifth day God created the sea animals and the birds. He said to them 'reproduce'. On the sixth day God made the trees and plants and other living things reproduce according to its kind.

Healthy Habits
Throughout the year the children in Year Three have learnt about the importance of keeping healthy. During Term1 the 'Healthy Harold' van visited our school and the children learnt about the importance of healthy eating habits as well as the role medicines play in our lives. They also were kept active by participating in weekly gymnastic lessons, where they learnt how to complete somersaults and use the mini trampoline.  During term 3, 'Sports In Schools' came to our school and the children were involved in weekly skills development lessons. It is a fun way to high the importance of keeping active.
This term the children will participate in swimming lessons during week 6/7. 
At the moment the children have been developing their ball skills by participating in class activities based on the popular playground game of "Handball".

Lewis: We enjoy playing handball.
April: Mrs Tannous taught us the proper way to play handball.
Zac: Year Three have enjoyed playing handball since Kindy. Now we know how to play fairly.
Tahli: We have taken some pictures of handball. 

Handball is getting harder now we all know how to play.

It is an enjoyable way to add some exercise to our day.

Creativity continues!
Every Friday we are lucky enough to participate in art. This week we continued our simple machine drawings by using soft pastels to add colour to our pencil drawings.
Mrs Standring gave us a short input session on how to look for shadows and light as we colour our art work. 
Ebony, Emily and Madison

We have included some of our art work below.
 

Mrs Standring explaining how to add tone.

Adding tone to a slide.

A screw is a simple machine.

The water looks amazing. Great shading.

Another example of amazing shading using soft pastels.

We Love Reading!
In Year Three we love to read and also understand the value of reading. Every day the children experience reading in many different ways from shared reading, independent reading, readers' Theatre, Read-a-louds and guided reading.Isabella worte the following blog about reading:
On Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday we do silent reading after lunch. It is a great way to read by yourself and we get to choose a book from home or from our class library. On Wednesday afternoons the teacher does a 'Read-a-loud'. This is where the teacher reads to us and shares the different strategies she uses to help her read. We love Wednesdays. Isabella.

Independent Reading is an important part of our day.

While we read we try to make different connections with the text, 

as this helps us understand what we read.

Simple Machine Art
On Friday we did art on simple machines. We were given  half of a picture and we had to draw the other side. We used lead pencil for this art activity. Next week we are going to use oil pastel to colour them. Eliza.

Term 4 Religion
 This term we are going to learn about God's creation. On Monday, 14th October we were given a task to try and find things that God created. Some of the things we found were plants, flowers and insects. Can you find any more in our photos?
Daniel and Jessie.

Place Value
On Friday 11 October Year Three were learning about place value. We have been learning about ascending and descending order, using three, four and five digit numbers. We developed our understanding by participating in 'Round the Garden' and the 'Target game' as our warm up.
Alyssa, Ryan and Jacob.

This is a great activity to play at home. Make your own 'Round the Garden' and 'Target Game' sheet at home. (Use the picture above as a guide.) Then drop five counters on the target. (If you do not have counters use small pebbles from your garden). Use pop sticks to make the number. Write your number using numerals. This is the number you can start on.
Then roll the dice. Start anywhere on the board and move forward the amount on the dice. Do what the square tells you. The idea is to use mental strategies to work the answer out. 
Add to the comments section if you would like to share your experiences!

ART IN YEAR THREE
NICK: We have been learning to make amazing art with little bits of paper.

Austin:  We have made some of the best pieces of art including the watercycle art and Echidna art.

Holly: We have also been drawing and painting pictures of different places and their reflections.