Every day is a fresh opportunity!
This week we finally finished reading our class text Secrets of a Sun king. We have all loved the text so much, we actually felt quite emotional when we finished it and many of us think there needs to be a Secrets of the Sun King 2! We got so so so much from the story and completed some amazing pieces of work – our next class text has a lot to live up to!!! Well done class 4 – your love of reading has been visible for all to see!
I can’t believe it is already Summer Term, the time is just flying by!!
This term our theme is all about Intriguing Inventions – we will be looking at Inventions that changed the world, The United Kingdom, Sculptures and Structures, the artist Michelle Reader and the history of the Railways.
Check out of curriculum map to find out more…
Class 4 have had another very busy week, in English we have been exploring poetry by Pie Corbett, in Maths the year 5s have been exploring decimals and percentages and the year 4s have been looking at fractions, we have continued to learn about sound in Science with everyone making their own pan flute to explore pitch and we have also learnt more about Egypt in our Geography work.
Homework
Next week we are going to complete our Design and Technology topic. This term, we are going to research, design, make and evaluate our own Egyptian Jewellery, for example, necklaces, bracelets and cuffs.
For homework can you complete some research into the type of jewellery they had, remember we saw some on our trip at the Art Gallery?
You may want to have a search around at home for any resources that you could bring into school for your jewellery. I will bring some pasta that I thought we could thread, we have some paper plates and we will also have the art straws that we can use. I look forward to seeing our finished designs!
Class 4 had great fun during Science Week, we enjoyed a visit from Mr Carey to find out about pH levels, we looked at STEM careers, we made a walking rainbow, we used the microscopes and we explored wind power – making straw rockets, windmills and wind turbines. It was great to see so much teamwork, conversation and scientific language in the classroom.
We had an amazing time at Feren’s Art Gallery at the opening day of the new Discover Ancient Egypt Exhibition. It was fantastic to see so many hands up when the children were asked questions and they clearly enjoyed the visit. It was the perfect end to our history topic.
Gosh Class 4, we have had such a busy two weeks, so busy I ran out of time to actually write a blog post last week!!!
What with World Book Day, Jar making, swimming, the excitement of the Secrets of the Sun king, researching Tutankhamun, making Egyptian death masks, sound experiments in science and planning a school trip – it really has been none stop!!
So, next week looks just as busy…it’s Science Week!
Mrs Platten has spent lots of time planning a fun week for us and we can’t wait to get started…in fact we were lucky enough to get an early start to the fun on Friday afternoon. The year 5s joined in an interactive science session and the year 4’s researched STEM careers – we were surprised to see so many jobs linked to Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths.
Homework
One of the activities we are going to carry out next week is making a wind turbine. Please bring in any materials that you think will be useful, due to our busy week (swimming and school trip) we will need to be ready with our ideas on Tuesday and finish them on Friday!! Can you make any ideas or prototypes at home?
School Trip – I hope everyone is excited for our trip on Thursday, we are very lucky to be getting a sneak preview of the display – it hasn’t even opened to the public yet! I hope we will find out lots more about Ancient Egypt – it has clearly been a topic that we have all loved! Please remember school uniform and a small rucksack to carry your packed lunch in. I am looking forward to a great day!
Final message – Please bring your balloon powered car, if you have made one, into school on Friday and we will test them to find a winner!
Check out the STEM blog via the school website for more information.
We have had another busy week in Class 4 this week, from biographies in English, to Egyptian Gods in History, from exploring sound in Science, to looking at how to stay healthy in Jigsaw. The week has really had it all – some of us even fitted in a bit of swimming as well!
Here some of us are working out how many times we would need to walk around the track to walk 1km!
I was really impressed with all the board games that people made over the holidays as well, I can’t wait to play them all soon.
Cardboard
Please send any unwanted pieces of cardboard or larger boxes into school for Friday. The card doesn’t need to be too thick because i would like the children to cut it themselves and the pieces need to be bigger than their head!!??!! I wonder what we are going to get busy with this time!?!
Homework
I am not going to set any homework this week, because you will all be busy with your World Book Day ‘Book in a Jar’ Competition Entries. I can’t wait to see what you think of, I had bought a big jar to do mine in, but Maisie has pinched it because her school are doing the same idea!!
Below is some inspiration
Have fun creating your designs!
On Wednesday afternoon, Class 4 became an animation studio!! It was amazing to see the team work, resilience, perseverance, creativity and complete and utter FUN! I was so impressed with the ideas and designs the children came to school with, it certainly made the animation process easier. Thank you for all the support with this.
Over half term, I hope to work on making our finished animations into a video to share with everyone – watch this space for our film premier!!
If you enjoyed our animation work, you may wish to enter Purple Mash’s 2animate competition. Details of the competition can be found on the menu bar on the left hand side of your Purple Mash homepage. I will enter some of our finished animations on your behalf as well. Good Luck.
Homework – Egyptian Board Game Challenge
Like we had in Autumn Term, I am setting an optional half term homework challenge. Details will be coming home with your child – hopefully you can have some fun making your board game – perhaps you can link it to our whole class text, the Secret of the Sun King!?!
Have a great half term holiday
Thanks for your continued support
Mrs A
Class 4 have had yet another busy week, from instruction writing to reflective materials, from division to life in Ancient Egypt and from animation to Egyptian dance. The week has had it all!
The Secrets of a Sun King
I must give a special mention our guided reading text. The children are absolutely loving our class text ‘The Secrets of a Sun King’. When the whole class groaned when I said we needed to stop reading on both Wednesday and Thursday, I knew I had made the correct text choice. I really hope you continue to love the story and all its twists, turns and mysteries!
Division
This week both Year 4 and Year 5 have been working using bus stop method to calculate division problems. This method really relies on the children knowing and using their times table facts. Watch the following video to see the method.
Homework
For homework please spend some time practicing your times tables and the related division facts. The following websites contain some fun games and everyone also has a list of QR codes in their reading logs.
https://www.topmarks.co.uk/maths-games/7-11-years/multiplication-and-division
https://www.topmarks.co.uk/Search.aspx?q=short+division
I have also set a boys vs girls battle on times tables rockstars – it will run until 9am on the Monday after the half term holidays – I wonder if the girls will win again!!
We have news – WE DID IT!!! 100% reading 3 times or more!!!! Well done class 4 – now you need to keep it up and rise to the extra challenge of telling me about the part of the book you read each day or about how much you are enjoying the book and why. Also make sure you get that adult signature once a week. Remember, extra Dojo points are on offer for those who rise to the challenge!
Homework – English
This week we have finished our Tadeo Jones stories – I have been very impressed with them! For homework I have a treat for you – you get to watch the rest of the film!! Watch it once and enjoy it, then watch it again and write down detailed sentences to explain the clues we were given that it wasn’t a real Egyptian tomb, set in Egyptian times. Finally, did you expect this ending?
Can you include some fronted adverbials in your sentences? Can you use expanded noun phrases to write about the clues you notice?
I wonder what our new English unit will be next week?