Welcome to Cedar Class Year 3 2022-2023

Welcome to Cedar Class!

 Cedar Class has 27  bright, smiling, sociable, friendly, caring and enthusiastic children who have a great appetite for fun and learning.  The Cedar team are  Mrs Giles,  Mrs Bones, Miss Dearlove and Miss Mills.  Making learning fun is our speciality!  There are so many fun things  to look forward to in the year ahead.

Please do not hesitate to get in touch if you ever have any queries  or concerns. 

PE days for term 1 are Tuesday and Thursday. Please wear your PE kit to school on these days.

We are inviting members of Cedar Class to put themselves forwards to  represent our class in different roles. We require 2 school councillors - (a boy and a girl),  a Values representative and an Arts Ambassador.  Candidates should be prepared  to give a short talk to the class about why they would be good in that role. We have discussed in class the sorts of things they can include in some detail.   Class members will each vote for the candidates who have impressed them the most. This will take place on Monday  3rd October.  Results will be announced  later in the week.  We look forward to listening to your  brilliant ideas.

Useful Information and Links

How did people communicate ideas in the Stone Age?

What ideas did they want to communicate?

What did people use before paints, pencils, pens and sketch books or paper?

What things were important to people living in the Stone Age?

These were some of the ideas we considered prior to beginning our artwork using large paper, charcoal and our hands only to recreate Stone Age art. 

Art activity

The children were challenged to complete a picture having only been given a small piece of it (before actually seeing what the whole picture was about!)  Some children thought the picture had a dinosaur featured in it. Here are some of the finished results.

Parents - What would you have drawn in response to this challenge?

After revealing what our Take One Picture was in full, the task was to give the painting a title that suits it best. (The actual name of the picture given by the artist is quite boring!)

We had to choose and use exciting vocabulary. In Cedar Class we call it using ‘Ninja Vocabulary!’

We had to consider not using too many words because we wanted the titles to be memorable.

We were encouraged to ‘magpie’ (steal) good word choices from each other because all good writers borrow ideas. If someone borrows a word from you it is a compliment!

Some people choose to use alliteration (sounds starting with the same letter) because it grabs attention.

Parents – What would you have named the picture if you were the artist?

Asking questions

When we got a first, proper, close up look at the picture, we had many questions that we wanted to know the answer to.

We tried to find a range of questions to ask that started in different ways using the words ‘who, what, where, when,  why, did and how’.

When writing down our favourite questions, it was important to remember to use a capital letter at the beginning and a question mark at the end.

Debate about ‘St George and the Dragon’ story.

Should the king have allowed Princess Sabre to be tied to the stake and fed to the dragon?

“Yes, because all the other people had to let their children go so it is fair.”

“Yes, because the lottery made it fair for everyone!”

“No, because she is the princess and one day she will be Queen.”

“No, because it she should be a different rule because she is royal.”

“But the King could have gone instead of her because he hasn’t been much good at protecting his people from the dragon.”

Parents - What would you have done if you were the King?

If there had been a lottery in our class, Benjamin would have been the first person to be fed to the dragon, because his name was pulled out first using our lollypop sticks!  So glad we don’t have to really feed you to the dragon Benjamin, we need you in our class team!

Mark making

We have been exploring different ways of mark making so that we can make our future drawings look effective and full of different textures.

We looked at different examples and then had a go ourselves to fill up 16 boxes in different ways.

It was quite a challenge to fill each box!

The smaller the detail, the more challenging it was and the more control was needed.

Some of the techniques used have got names like ‘scumbling’, (overlapping lots of circles), ‘cross hatching’, (parallel lines that cross over each other), and ‘stippling’ (using dots).

In term 1  we shall be getting to know each other, establishing classroom agreements and good learning behaviours. Our overriding goal this term is to settle the children back into school routines and support their social, emotional and academic progress.   Please drop us an email  with any worries or concerns you or your child may have  as ensuring a smooth transition is very important to us.

We begin the academic year with a 'Take One Picture' project which will explore a  painting in depth through many different curriculum areas. We shall also be looking at the artist, his life, location and inspirations. 

Our main project is ‘The Stone Age’, with an emphasis on history.