Y3 - Otters | Kingfisher Primary School

Y3 - Otters

Otter Class

Otter Class is taught by Mr Green with Miss Darch as the Learning Support Assistant. Other staff members working with the class include Mr Frisby for Music on a Wednesday and Mr Bourne for PE on a Friday.

Mrs Worley and Mrs Ostridge also work with the class as support staff to our pupils.

Updates throughout the year can be found on both this Class Page and on our School Twitter page.

Tasting Roman Food

Otter Class recently delved into the fascinating world of Roman cuisine as part of their history lessons. The children explored the types of food that Romans would have eaten and learned how these reflected their culture and lifestyle. To bring the learning to life, we organised a special Roman food tasting experience—a real treat for their taste buds!

The children had the chance to try a variety of foods inspired by Roman traditions. They sampled olives, baked their own bread, tasted Italian cheeses, and enjoyed some cured Italian meats. While the bread was favourite, the olives received mixed reviews, with many deciding that they might be an acquired taste! Nevertheless, it was wonderful to see everyone giving the new flavours a try and stepping out of their culinary comfort zones.

This activity not only expanded the children’s historical knowledge but also gave them an opportunity to engage their senses and experience history in a fun and memorable way.

Edward Hopper Sketches

This term, the children have been exploring the captivating work of Edward Hopper. They have delved into researching his art and thoughtfully comparing it to the styles of other artists, sharing their insights and opinions along the way. In addition to studying Hopper, the children have been honing their sketching techniques, focusing on pencil work to enhance their drawing skills. They have practised using line and shading to create realistic effects, applying these techniques to develop their own impressive sketches. For their final project, the children were challenged to create a winter scene, emphasising originality and mastery of shading. The results were truly outstanding, showcasing their creativity and growing artistic abilities.

Friction Mr Green's toy cars

In Science this term, we are looking at forces. We have talked about some of the different forces acting on an object and this week we looked at friction. We explored friction and how some surfaces offer more friction than others. We completed an investigation using some of Mr Green's favourite toy cars to see if changing the surface would alter the ability of the car to travel on the ramps. It was great fun!

Trip to the Museum

Today, we braved the snow and had a fantastic trip to the Museum in Taunton as part of our topic on the Romans. The children were able to handle Roman artefacts and learn about the importance of being a historian and interpreting the evidence. We also got to explore the museum and have a walk through the chronology of Somerset and see how it has changed since pre-historic times. The children loved finding out all of the amazing periods that have shaped the county we see today.

Family Learning - Viking Masks

Today, we have Darrell Wakelam in to make some Viking masks with the children and their families. We had a fantastic turnout and the masks were all amazing. It is always lovely to see the children working with their parents and a professional artist and the outcomes were brilliant.

Coding an instrument

This term, the children have been looking at coding and as part of their final project, they had to apply their skills to code a piano. Since the outset, I have been so impressed with their knowledge and they had great fun creating the different notes for their pianos.

Making Leaf Bowls in the style of Georgia O'Keeffe

In art this term, the children have been looking at the work of Georgia O'Keeffe. We have looked at how she used detail and nature to create amazing sculptures and pieces of work. Over the last few weeks, the children have been learning shaping techniques and planning their own leaf bowls. The result so far are amazing.

Careers Day

We had great fun on careers day talking about all of the different jobs that we would like to do when we grow up. It was lovely to see all of the different costumes and hear what the children had to say. During the week, we had been looking at Goldilocks. On Friday, we became CSI investigators and talked through how evidence is used to build a case. The children then looked at the evidence and built a case against Goldilocks. We also took some fingerprints too.

Visiting Author

As part of our drive on Reading here at Kingfisher, we have worked to get an author into school to visit the children. We were lucky this week to have a visit from Annelise Gray. Annelise has written a series of children's books about the adventures of Dido, a Roman girl who dreams of chariot racing. It was amazing to learn about chariots and the Romans as well as to become inspired by the journey to becoming a writer and the ins and outs of the writing process.

Making Water Bridges and Towers

Today, we split the class in half for outdoor learning. The children focused on teamwork in their groups. One group was tasked with making the tallest free standing tower and worked well to make it even taller than Mr Green! The other group worked with Miss Darch to make a water bridge focusing on the gradient needed. A great afternoon all round.

Learning to Code

Today, the children had their first experience with scratch 3. They became familiar with the basic controls and created algorithms to get their sprites to create sound from different events.

European Day of Languages

Celebrating the European Day of Languages as a class was an incredible experience! We had the chance to explore and appreciate different languages and cultures, especially focusing on German. The children really enjoyed trying all the different foods such as traditional German pretzels and sausages. They were so good!

In addition to the food, we also learned a lot of German. We practiced basic phrases like “Guten Tag” (Good day), and “Danke” (Thank you). Our teacher even introduced us to some fun German songs, and we tried to sing along, which was both hilarious and challenging! By the end of the day, we all felt a little more connected to Europe and excited about the variety of languages spoken across the continent.