Class 4 Summer Newsletter

Welcome back, we hope you have all had a lovely Easter. The children have already settled back into school brilliantly and I hope they are ready for another busy term!

Mrs Tokeley will be teaching Class 4 Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays and Mrs Gates will be teaching on a Thursday and Friday. We have also welcomed Mrs Abrahams to our class who will be with us Monday-Thursday mornings with Mrs Bond joining us on a Friday morning.

Please see below an outline of areas we will cover this term.

English:

We start the term by exploring performance poetry exploring a variety of different poems and the ways to create an engaging and entertaining performance. We will then be looking at chronological reports using George’s Marvellous Medicine as inspiration for our writing.

We will also look at a film study in which we will explore setting and character description, plot summaries, diary entries and inner monologues. Areas of grammar will be taught through activities based on these texts include use of apostrophes in possessives, use and punctuate direct speech, understand that writing can be 3^rd or 1^st person, use of powerful verbs and adjectives, use of the present perfect rather than simple past tense and use prepositions to express time or place.

Listening to your child read continues to be very important, as does discussing their understanding of the texts they are reading. There will be daily classroom time for reading, handwriting, grammar and spelling activities.

Maths:

In maths we will be continuing our work on fractions and moving onto decimals, recognising and tenths and hundredths as decimals and on a place value grid, dividing 1- and 2-digit numbers by 10 and 100. We will also look at writing comparing and ordering decimal numbers, rounding and halves and quarters as decimals. After this we will be learning about money, consolidating our addition and subtraction skills in the process. We will look at estimating and giving change and converting between pounds and pence. We will learn about time looking at analogue and digital, converting between them and 24-hour time. Our statistics topic will involve interpreting charts and line graphs, after which we will learn about properties of shape, identifying and comparing angles and exploring lines of symmetry.

Science:

We be learning about living things and their habitats where we will learn about sorting and classifying living things. This will be followed by our topic on sound where we will learn how sounds are made, vibrations and the ear.

Topic- History/Geography WWII

This term half we will be learning about World War II. We will learn about the events leading up to the war, countries involved, life on the home front, evacuation, and rationing.

After the half term break, we will be learning about rainforests. This will include where they can be found in the world, the types of life found in the rainforest and the problems caused by deforestation.

French:

We will be learning about transportation and different ways we travel to school which will be followed by where we go on our holidays and what we do there.

Art and DT:

In DT this term we will be looking at savoury pastry, designing and making our own savoury tarts. In art we will be looking at nature in art, creating observational sketches and natural/outdoor sculptures, leading on to clay sculptures.

PSHE:

We will be learning about maintaining a balanced lifestyle; oral hygiene and dental care, followed by a topic on growing and changing in which we learn about the physical and emotional changes in puberty and keeping safe: medicines and household products; drugs common to everyday life.

Music:

We will be developing the skills of listening and appraising taking part in activities linked to this.

RE:

We shall learn about the origin of the Ten Commandments, the importance of the Jewish Shabbat and the origins of Sunday as well as the meaning and importance of Kosher food, the Shema, Mezuzah and Tefillin.

PE:

For the first half term we will be focusing on bat and ball skills in rounders and a variety of activities in athletics. After half term we will be focusing on cricket and tennis.

PE will be on Tuesdays and Fridays-please ensure that your child’s PE kit is in school for the whole week.

Computing:

We will be exploring how art and computing can be combined. This will focus on using the Inkscape program to create tessellating art.

Homework:

It is greatly beneficial to your child’s learning for you to hear them read whenever possible, the children will be set spellings to learn each week ready for a test on Fridays. The spellings will be recorded in their home spelling book for them to practice these at home.

Maths, English, Science or Topic homework will be set on Fridays for return the following Wednesday tasks are set to support and consolidate the learning taking place in class.  Please support your child to ensure that they understand what has been asked of them and to make sure that their work is clearly and neatly completed. If there is ever any confusion, or your child is having trouble with the homework, please let me know (preferably before the Wednesday) so we can help them.

We regularly practice/test times tables in class-please encourage your child to practice their times tables daily either on times table Rockstar or using a method they prefer.

Water/Snacks:

Children are actively encouraged to bring in water and a snack for break time each day. It is often a long time between breakfast and lunch and a snack is important to keep us all going. We ask that these are healthy, in line with our Healthy Schools ethos (fruit or vegetables).

Best wishes

Mrs Tokeley and Mrs Gates