Author: Rachael Poole

KS2 production

Rehearsals are well underway for the KS2 production.  The stage is up (thank you Mr Atkins!) and the children are working hard to add the finishing touches before our performances next week.

The children have worked so hard to learn lines, get the songs pitch-perfect and to create costumes and props. We can’t wait for you to see it!

If you haven’t yet told us if you would like your child to stay in school between the end of the school day and the performance on Wednesday evening please let us know as soon as possible.

Living and Learning – I know how to identify drinks that are unsafe for me to drink and I understand some of the affects of alcohol on the human body

We had a great visit from D:Side and were excited to share our knowledge about how to identify drinks with alcohol in and drinks that are not safe for children to drink.

We also wore special glasses that made us feel dizzy. That’s just one of the potential side effects of alcohol we did not think is cool!

Telling the time

We have been revising converting between analogue and digital times today as well as converting from a 24 hour clock to the 12 hour equivalent.

Help at home: It would be great if you could check in with your child’s understanding of telling the time.  This could be as simple as asking them what time it is or by playing online games such as this one from Top Marks:

https://www.sheppardsoftware.com/math/time/clock-splat-game/

Going for Gold!

Well done to Year 4 for working hard all year to learn their times tables ready for the MTC check which we completed last week. We celebrated with our long awaited Gold Party.  We can’t wait to share the results with you in our end of year reports.

Steel Drums

Following our learning about the West Indies Carnival, we thoroughly enjoyed a visit from ArtForms to learn how to play the steel drums.

“They were amazing and really fun. We learned how to play different notes and I enjoyed playing it all at once.” (Jacob)
“I learned that if you bang them really hard they might go out of tune.” (Elara)
“Me and my partner showed other people how to take it in turns to play the song together.” (Alba)
“The carnivals sometimes have steel drums.  I went to watch them with my Mum and they had special bats to bat them with. When they were playing the drums it sounded like we did. They had some of the same drums that we had. It was really fun!” (Emily)
“I was amazing doing it my first time.  It felt like I was in an actual band!” (Vinnie)

Living & Learning

This week we are thinking about how humans change and grow over time.

As we are in the final term of Year 4 and reflect on all that our superstars have achieved within and beyond the classroom, it would be a lovely opportunity to dig out some old photos and reminisce about how far they have come.

You might choose to look at some photos of your child(ren) as a baby or toddler. What did they enjoy doing? Do they have any of the same interests now? Can they imagine a time before they could walk? If you are in the photo, have you changed?

You might choose to look at photos of when they started school and notice how their bodies have changed in the past 5 years. As well as getting taller, have other things changed? Has anything stayed the same?

If your child has a favourite photo they might want to bring a copy to school or email a copy to me for them to share with the class.

PE – cricket

We’ve enjoyed sharing Year 5’s expertise in our cricket lesson this afternoon.

Year 5 joined us as coaches to help us develop our skills hitting a ball with a cricket bat.  We started hitting a ball balanced on a cone then progressed to hitting a ball dropped close to us. Finally we moved on to hitting a ball that was bowled to us by a partner.

Thank you for the expert coaching, Year 5!

Spooky stories …

This week we’ve started getting ready for our next piece of writing … the start of a spooky story!

Today we’ve been hunting for words, phrases and sentences that we could use in our spooky writing.

We’ll collate our best ideas to use as a reference when we do our own writing to help us use ambitious vocabulary.

We look forward to sharing our spooky stories with you in a couple of weeks. If you’d like to help your child at home, you could share a spooky story together.  There are a list of recommended spooky stories for Key Stage 2 here: https://www.booksfortopics.com/booklists/topics/literacy-reading/horror-spooky-stories-for-ks2/

Happy half-term break

It’s been another great half-term in Year 4!

Reflecting on our experiences this half-term, the children say that they’ve particularly enjoyed:

  • the triathlon
  • stealing the chocolate cake from the staff room
  • using the cubes for improper fractions
  • playing netball
  • winning the TTRS trophy
  • being faster at TTRS than Mr Nash
  • learning about Arthur France

Although we are all ready for a rest, we cannot wait for all the fun we have lined up for the Summer Term!

We have reminded the children that they can use their Living and Learning knowledge to help them stay safe this half-term holiday.  They know they need to:

  • stay hydrated if they are particularly active or the weather is warm.
  • use sun cream and wear a hat if the weather is sunny.
  • stay active to keep them physically and mentally healthy.
  • eat ‘5 a day’.

We’ll be doing our times tables check when we return to school in June so please do keep those multiplication skills ‘topped up’ by playing TTRS for short bursts regularly during the holidays.  We ask for 15 minutes per week.

I look forward to seeing everyone happy and healthy back at school on Monday 2nd June!

Mrs Poole