Year 4 Autumn Term 2014

A warm welcome back to all Year 4 pupils, their parents and carers.

Topic 

Temples Tombs and Treasures

There have been a lot of strange goings on in Year 4 lately!!, Sand was left on the carpet in an unusual pattern, a lost hat and a strange map were among other discarded items. After some very clever detective work Year 4 have discovered that this term we will be looking in closer detail at the lives of The Ancient Egyptians and the archeologists and Egyptologists who found out so much about them.

Shake It Up

Later in the term, we will start our science topic. We will look at the properties of lots of different materials; solids, liquids and gases, and how they act when they are combined together or changed. Scientific investication and fair testing will make up a large part of this unit.

Art and D and T

This term Mrs.Sharples will be taking the class for art and D and T on Thursday afternoon where she will explore a range of Egyptiona art and technology. She will also cover RE on Thursday when she wil be looking at the lives of a range of inspirational people and their relevance to us today.

English

This year we will access our language and literacy skills through a a range of fiction and non fiction texts which will be studied for 2-3 weeks each. This term we will be looking at information texts, biographies, poems and podcasts. Each unit will give the children the chance to improve;

• Reading comprehension via regular activities
• Spelling of key words, enriching vocabulary and revision of phonic patterns
• Understanding of short and long sentence structures. The children will be encouraged to talk a sentence, write a sentence and re read to check that it "sounds right". Children will be encouraged to think about the differences between the way they speak and the way the write.
• Their own report and storywriting. This will be built up over the unit. They will have the chance to show their knowledge of new and different genres every other Monday during "All Write"

Reading

The children will read weekly in a group and regularly with an adult. Children who read at home three times a week receive a dojo and those who read more than this will be rewarded with two. Additionally, Year 4 support their Year 1 reading buddies every Friday afternoon.

Maths

We will cover number and place value, mental and written addition and subtraction and mental multiplication and division. The children will also be measuring length in more than one unit, using a decimal point and time on a digital and analogue clock, so practise at home would be appreciated. 

In addition, the children will be finding fractions of amounts and making links with multiplication and division facts.

Children also have a weekly tables test. They will be assessed and given a times table to learn in the first few weeks of term. There will be a rewards system in place; bronze for children who know their tables in order, silver for mixed order and gold for those who know them backwards (the division facts). 

 P.E.

Takes place on a Monday and Friday afternoon. This term the children will do games and gymnastics. Swimming begins after Christmas and we will be in touch about this.

French and Music

Are taught on a Tuesday morning by Madame Kale and Mrs.Madden

Homework

We now have some lovely new homework diaries. These will be used to let parents know about homework, send messages to and from home and record our reading sessions. Please make sure that your child brings their diary to school every day and places it in the green box by our classroom door.

Please aim to read at home as often as you can. Anyone who reads three times a week receives a dojo. More and they will get two. Children will be encoraged to take home spellings and learn them. They will have topic homework this half term and maths next.

This starts off with a small task where children have to come home, talk to you about the clues left lying around the room in the first week,  then do some research as to who our mystery visitor might be. A longer topic based activity will come home in a couple of weeks.

Rules

Our school rules form a really important part of school life in terms of how we get on with our work and other people. Please encourage your children to discuss them at home and understand their importance.

Beeston

Year 4 will have a two night residential trip to Beeston beginning on 28th January 2015. We will be in touch cloder to the time.

Mrs Sayers is looking forward to meeting you at parents evening at the end of September. In the meantime please let her or Mrs. Roberts know if you have any unanswered questions and please do come and introduce yourself so Mrs S can start to put faces to names.