Year 4
Hello everyone and welcome to Year 4!
Our amazing team in Year 4 starts with the 31 BRILLIANT children we have, Mr. Card, Miss Dyke and Mrs. Riley. It is a pleasure to be part of such a wonderful team and we are all looking forward to the year ahead!
P.E. this term in Year 4 will be on a Wednesday and Friday afternoon so please ensure that the children have the correct kit in school on these days.
The expectations remain the same for the children and their reading – four times per week to earn stars in their reading diaries – and for their reading diaries to be brought into school each day. We also promote sustainability and would appreciate it if the children could bring reusable water bottles into school with them.
Our topic for this half term is “The Great Outdoors” and within this, we will be exploring many different aspects of the World. We will be looking at physical and human features of the World and what different elements affect the World that we live in.
Autumn 1
In Maths we have spent several weeks focusing on place value looking at 4-digit numbers. The children have been amazing at this and constantly pushed themselves to be the best they can be. Their consistent, positive attitude towards their work demonstrates just how well they want to do. New learning this half-term using problem-solving and reasoning skills has shown just how well the children are coping with the increased expectations in Year 4!
In our Topic lessons, we looked at physical and human aspects of Geography. We have conducted a range of research on various mountains and even used this to help create a non-chronological report in English! We learnt how mountains are formed, how many people have attempted to climb Mount Everest, and we even had a go at sketching our own mountains using our Art skills. We have improved our map-reading by identifying well-known rivers in the UK, and we have looked in-depth at the water cycle to understand how clouds are formed and where rain comes from.
Autumn 2
This half term in Year 4, we have been studying the classic novel "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe". We have looked in-depth at the characters within the book and analysed the settings, before writing our own amazing versions of "Narnia". Later in the half-term, we created poems around the "Sainsbury's Greatest Gift" advert from 2016. We created free-verse poems and then used our knowledge of rhyming couplets and rhyming words to have a go at creating rhyming poems!
In Maths, we have really pushed on with our times tables and these are improving each day. We have learnt the written method of multiplication and even began to multiply more than one number. To finish off the term, we used our problem-solving skills to solve a range of problems using all four operations and began to look at dividing some quite tricky numbers with remainders.
In our Science lessons, we have been learning all about electricity and how dangerous it can be! We learnt the definition of an insulator and a conductor and found some examples through our own investigations where we used a range of materials to see if they would create a "full circuit" to light a bulb or make a motor work. We now also know some of the symbols for a Scientific circuit, for example: a bulb, a battery and wires.
During the run-up to Christmas, we made our very own paper mache penguins, Christmas cards, wrapping paper and gift tags for the Christmas markets.
Spring 1
This half term in Year 4, we have been learning all about The Vikings and we have been reading "How to Train Your Dragon". For the first two weeks of the half term, we learnt all about The Tudors and more specifically, Henry VIII. We created formal and informal letters as part of reading "The Prince and The Pauper", and towards the end of the half term, we wrote our own diary entry as a Viking warrior! To make our diary entries even better, we looked in-depth at the importance of including a range of thoughts, feelings and emotions to really gain the reader's attention.
In Maths, we continue to push our times tables on a daily basis, but the main focus of this half-term has been fractions. We have learnt how to simplify fractions, how to add and subtract fractions and we have even looked at converting improper fractions to mixed numbers!
In Science, "Sound" has been the main topic, where we learn all about the ear and how it works. We know that soundwaves are made from a sound source and those soundwaves travel to our ears, getting weaker the further they travel. We labelled an in-depth diagram of an ear, including the outer ear and the inner ear - we have really boosted our Scientific vocabulary using terms such as: stirrup, cochlea, hammer and anvil!
On Safer Internet Day, we created our own avatar to look like ourself and learnt all about the importance of staying safe online by never giving out personal information on social media sites.
We held an assembly where we showed off all our learning so far this half-term and we really hope you had as much fun as we did!
Spring 2
In Year 4 this half term, we have been learning all about World War Two and in particular we have looked at The Diary of Anne Frank. Within our English learning, we even created our own diary entry as a child evacuee during World War Two.
In Maths, we have still maintained our focus on times tables and we have furthered our knowledge of fractions and decimals – even looking at hundredths!
During this half term, we had our Science week which was amazing! We looked at living things and their habitats, meaning we got to go on our very own habitat hunt around the school. We listed all the habitats that we could find and the animals that lived in these habitats.
Unfortunately, due to unforeseen circumstances, we were unable to perform our Y3/4 performance in full… However, we were able to sing our best songs in front of the whole school during assembly and we even had the songs professionally filmed!
Summer 1
In Year 4 in what has been a very strange half term, we have been continuing our learning of World War Two. We introduced the amazing story of Rose Blanche in our English lessons and looked at the contrasting settings between World War Two and how we live today.
In Maths, we began to look at money and used our problem solving skills to find totals, change and differences between the cost of items.
Our Science lessons have been completed on Seesaw, where we have looked at the human body – in particular, teeth and the digestive system. Some people even created their own digestive system! In Art, we have looked at pattern artists such as Kandinsky and we were able to have a go at creating our own patterns.
The children have worked exceptionally hard this half-term, in very strange circumstances and we are all extremely proud of them! We are looking forward to returning to school and continuing our learning in Year 4.
Summer 2
We have had a very busy end to our Summer term in Year 4! To begin the half-term, we began by reading the fantastic story of ‘The Lorax’ by Dr. Seuss. This linked really well with our topic of ‘Sustainability’ where we looked at how we can help the environment even more than we already do at Forsbrook!
In Maths, we have looked at shape, symmetry and position/direction using co-ordinates on a grid.
Our topic and Science lessons have been based around ‘Sustainability’ where we have discussed different forms of pollution, what can and can’t be recycled and we looked at the Air Quality Index of some of the major cities across the world!
We are so proud of how hard the children have worked again this half-term and they have produced some wonderful work.
Have a lovely Summer!
