Welcome back to the Summer Term!
Welcome back to the Summer Term! I trust you had a restful Easter break and are looking forward to all of the excitement of the Summer Term.
Reading
I hope you enjoyed sharing the final chapter of The Wolf Wilder. It was quite an emotional rollercoaster with some very nerve-racking points but hopefully the children enjoyed seeing that friendship, courage and being true to yourself can lead to great achievement and happiness.
We will be voting for our next class novel this week. The current shortlist is:
- A Kind of Spark by Elle McNicoll (recommended by Aria)
- The Last Bear by Hannah Gold (recommended by Arthur)
- The Wild Robot by Peter Brown (recommended by Jack)
There may be some late additions if anyone has found any other great books this holiday – I will let you know the outcome!
Following feedback, I will continue to send a chapter of our class novel home for you to share together – any further feedback on whether this is something you enjoy (or not) would be very welcome.
Writing
The first skill we will be working on this half term will be how to write direct speech.
The children will learn the rules needed to write direct speech:
When you are reading together, it would be great if you could occasionally pause and discuss the direct speech. Has it followed all of the rules? Below is an example from the first page of A Kind of Spark by Elle McNicoll, note how this example doesn’t have a reporting clause – you could ask your child why they think the writer has not included a reporting clause for this direct speech.
Handwriting
I am really proud of how hard the children are working in class to ensure that their handwriting is joined and legible. If your child does any handwriting practice at home, please do encourage them to bring it in to show me so we can celebrate (and reward!) this effort.
Spellings
| Test Date | 27th April | 5th May | 11th May | 18th May |
| position
mention possession pressure special should delicious machine mission brochure |
chemistry
scheme architect chaos mechanic character technology choir echo school |
misinterpret
reconsider readdress misguided reposition misremember regroup misunderstood misheard reappeared |
submarine
substitute submerge automatic autobiography television telephone teleport telescope telepathic |
Maths
We will be completing our unit on multiplication and division this half term including learning what happens to numbers when you multiply or divide them by 10 or 100. If your child would like some fun extra practice at home, they could play this game: Multiply by 10 and 100 game
In the next couple of weeks, we will have looked at all of the times tables facts up to 12 x 12. If your child has some facts that they are not yet secure with (this will have been communicated with their Learning Updates at the end of last term) it would be great if you could continue to practise these. As always, please do let me know about any consistent effort from your child or increases in confidence in recalling times tables facts so that we can celebrate and reward this in school. Just a quick reminder that the national Times Tables Check will be held during the first two weeks of June.
Science
This half term we will revisit our enquiry to find out how the animals in Forest School change over the year. We will then move on to learn about the difference between urban and rural habitats and how humans can impact habitats.
When I have taught this unit of work previously, lots of children have wanted to know more and to know how they can help. If your child is feeling inspired, this would be a good place to learn more: The Regenerators (BBC)
Geography – Explorers
This half term we will begin by thinking about the concept of location and scale. We will learn about imaginary lines used to split the world into parts. We will then recap the difference between a city, a country and a continent.
We will then think about the concepts of place and interdependence. Over a series of lessons, we will use York and Venice as case studies to think about the impact of tourism and the challenges that water can bring.
Call for help to bring our curriculum to life: If you have visited York or Venice as a tourist and would be happy to host a short question and answer session with the class, I would love to hear from you!
PE
There will no swimming in the first week of term but we can’t wait to get back to the pool on Tuesday 28th April! Please send children in their PE kit on Tuesday 21st April as we will do an extra PE lesson in school.
Our in school PE lessons this half term are through the sport of Basketball. Over the half-term we will be learning to pass and catch accurately (using ‘throw and point’ and ‘ready position’ that we have used in other sports), to dribble, shoot and intercept the ball.
Living and Learning
This half term we will think about how we keep ourselves physically healthy and fit and how we keep ourselves safe. See the school calendar and weekly homework for further details.
Feelings First
The feelings we will think about this half term are:
- relieved
- horrified
- concerned
- overloaded
- furious
We will also be thinking about how our capacity to function well (represented by the green part of the battery) can be impacted by lots of things such as feeling tired or hungry or by other things that are happening in our lives. This can explain why something might not have an impact on how we feel one day, but could have a significant impact on another day.
As always, please do catch me on the door at pick up, send me an email or give me a call if you have any questions or I can be of help at all.
Living and Learning: I know the importance of a healthy diet
This week, Year 4 have been learning about having a healthy, balanced diet.
We recapped the five main food groups that we learnt about in Science last year.
- carbohydrates
- fruit and vegetables
- protein
- dairy
- fats
We need a balanced diet of these food groups to keep us healthy and strong. For example, carbohydrates give us energy and dairy is full of calcium that is great for our teeth and bones. We also need some fats as they give us energy and help us to absorb the vitamins and minerals that we eat through fruit and vegetables.
We had a go at creating our own balanced meal. Here is one great example:
Help at home by planning a meal with your child and checking that you have a balanced amount of each food group.
Science – Electricity
This half term we’ve been learning about electricity. We started the unit thinking about how different appliances were powered and sorting appliances in different ways.
We then made a circuit with a cell, wires and a bulb and had great fun problem solving when some of the bulbs didn’t light.
As all super scientists do, we have lots of questions we wanted answers to! What happens if you use more cells?
What happens if you use more bulbs?
To help us to work scientifically to answer these questions, we created model circuits using this online tool: Circuits To say the children were excited would be an understatement!
We also experimented by adding switches and considering how the switch worked by ‘breaking’ the complete loop that the bulb needed for electricity to flow all the way round.
Help at home: explore the online tool Circuits and use it to answer some questions your child still has about the changes that happen when you change parts of the circuit.
Living & Learning – I know the importance of personal hygiene, including handwashing
This week in living and learning, we’ve been thinking about how we can keep ourselves healthy by paying attention to our personal hygiene.
We’ve had some very honest conversations about handwashing, reflecting on when we should wash our hands and the times we’ve not washed our hands. Did you know that there are parts of our hands that we are more likely to not wash well? We made a diagram to show this:
Help at home: Together, look at the guidance from the NHS about how to wash your hands. Get your child to coach you or a sibling to see how much of the guidance they can remember and apply. NHS handwashing guidance
World Book Day
We had such a fun and busy World Book Day in Year 4! Many of the children loved coming to school dressed as their favourite book characters and it was wonderful to see so many creative costumes and to hear about the books that inspired them. Throughout the day, we took part in lots of exciting World Book Day activities to celebrate our love of reading.
One of the highlights was helping to write a whole school book together. We can’t wait to hear the finished story in Collective Worship tomorrow. Everyone shared ideas and worked hard to contribute their part. The children also created some fantastic artwork and an acrostic poem inspired by the story How to Be a Lion by Ed Vere, which will be displayed in the school library.
We were also lucky to enjoy hot chocolate and stories in the library before spending time with the Year 1 class sharing stories together. It was lovely to see the children recommending their favourite books to each other and talking about the characters they love and why.
It was a brilliant day full of stories, creativity and lots of enthusiasm for reading. What a great way to celebrate the Year of Reading!
Help at home: read the next chapter of our class novel that will be sent home with your child tomorrow.
Reading – Class Novel
To say we are enjoying our new class novel, The Wolf Wilder by Katherine Rundell, is an understatement!
This half term we are trying a new way of reading our class novel. As we listen to the book being read, we are documenting (through words or pictures) what we learn about the characters and the details of the plot.
I hope you enjoy sharing the next chapter of the book together this weekend (photocopies provided with homework sheets.) Please let me know if this is something you enjoy doing and we can make it a regular thing!
Reviews for Wolf Wilder from some highly respected authors
A gorgeous flight of imagination set in a snowy Russian fantasy world, this has both the beauty and the fierce, funny and uncompromising storytelling style that sets Katherine Rundell’s books apart. The Wolf Wilder is a Fabergé egg of a novel – rich, bright and perfect ― Robin Stevens
A triumph! Exciting, moving, highly original, fierce, completely convincing ― Philip Pullman
The Wolf Wilder has everything: it’s a truly compelling read; it’s beautifully written; it’s totally original and yet has the familiar feel of an established classic ― Jacqueline Wilson
Help at home: Watch the ‘Introduction to the Wolf Wilder’ video on Authorfy https://authorfy.com/masterclasses/katherinerundell/ From our reading this week, can your child remember the names of the wolves that refuse to be re-wilded? From what they have read so far, do they agree or disagree with the reviews from Stevens, Pullman and Wilson?
Living & Learning – I know what a drug is
In Living & Learning this term, we’re learning about drugs, alcohol and tobacco.
This week we have defined a drug as:
A substance that changes the way the body or mind works.
We considered a range of medicines and household products and spoke about their benefits.
- Medicine – helps us to get better when we’re ill
- Soap – helps us to keep good hand hygiene to protect us from germs and keep us healthy
- Bleach – helps us to keep our homes clean and free from germs which helps to keep us healthy
We discussed the importance of staying safe when using these products. We identified the risks and how we can reduce these risks.
Help at home – discuss which medicines and household products you have at home and how you use them safely. Challenge your child to think about how they could check if it is safe to use these products (such as checking labels and asking an adult) and to explain what they would need to do to use them safely.
Safer Internet Day
We were proud to take part in Safer Internet Day, a global initiative that promotes safe, responsible and positive use of digital technology. During the day, children took part in engaging discussions and activities focused on how to protect their personal information online. They explored what personal data is, why it is valuable and practical steps they can take to stay safe, such as asking an adult before sharing personal information, using privacy settings and knowing who to trust online.
A key focus of the day was understanding the difference between misinformation and disinformation. Pupils learned that misinformation is false information shared by mistake, while disinformation is deliberately created and spread to mislead others. Through real-life examples children developed critical thinking skills to help them question what they see online and check reliable sources.
The day encouraged thoughtful conversations and empowered pupils to be safer, smarter and more confident digital citizens.
Trip to Yorkshire Museum
We had a great time at Yorkshire Museum this week.
Before lunch, we had plenty of time to explore the museum exhibits — the Roman gallery was a clear favourite! We loved dressing up as Romans, spotting Latin words we recognised from our lessons, writing our names using the Latin alphabet and getting up close to swords and helmets discovered by archaeologists. One highlight was examining the impressive Roman mosaic floor and imagining what life might have been like all those years ago.
We also made exciting pit stops in the Viking and Jurassic exhibitions, where there was lots to see and discover.
After lunch, the fun continued with a hands-on Roman workshop. We learned key vocabulary, examined real artefacts and even practised marching like Roman soldiers. The perfect end to the day (for some, at least!) was an action-packed showdown — charging at the defenceless Celt, Mrs Poole, armed with swords and shields!
A brilliant day full of history, discovery and plenty of smiles.
D:Side – Staying Safe Online
This week we enjoyed another visit from D:Side Dave.
It was really interesting to learn how AI can be used to create fake images and why people might choose to do this. We loved spotting the difference between fake images and real images.
We also thought about what happens when you share a photo with someone. We learned that when it has been shared you can’t get it back. This made us think carefully about what photos we might be happy to share and which we wouldn’t want to share.
Finally, we learnt about PEGI ratings and how they are designed to help keep us safe. It was quite surprising to learn about the PEGI ratings of some of our favourite games and to think about why they might have that rating.
Help at home: we will be looking at how to stay safe online next week on Safer Internet Day and next half-term in our computing topic. In the meantime, you could explore this advice for parents https://saferinternet.org.uk/guide-and-resource/parents-and-carers