Summer 2 

This summer term we have had lots of fun in year 4!

In English, we read ‘The Last Bear’, and really enjoyed it! We wrote a narrative from the perspective of Bear the polar bear, detailing how he came to live on Bear Island. Also, we wrote diary entries as April explaining how she was going to help Bear. Our final piece of writing was a letter to Miss Thomas, explaining all the ways we as a school can help to save the planet. We thoroughly enjoyed reading the book, and always wanted to continue reading more.

In maths, we have been working hard on plotting and writing coordinates. We have also spent time revising concepts such as fractions, short multiplication and long division to ensure we are ready for year 5!

In science, we have been looking at sound. We looked at the ways sound travels, and how we are able to hear sound. We made string phones, using different length string to test what happened to the volume of sound when the length of string is decreased. We enjoyed trying out the string phones with our friends.

   

We have really enjoyed our history topic this term, Roman Britain. We have been learning about the different ways the Romans changed Britain, including the houses and roads they built. Additionally, we also went on a fantastic trip to Verulamium! We saw original Roman mosaics and walls, and were lucky enough to have a workshop all about Roman artefacts. We enjoyed walking around the museum, learning lots of new things about Roman life. Lunch time and playing in the park were also very exciting!

 

     

In DT, we have been thinking all about healthy snacks! We designed our own healthy snacks which fit the brief we were given, such as athlete. We had to think carefully about the ingredients we were choosing, and why they were suitable for the specific group we were given. We then designed thepackaging for our snack, thinking about making it eye catching and vibrant!

This term we were lucky enough to have St Albans School come in and teach us Joseph the musical! We loved being able to perform it to our parents, and the rest of the school. We were also able to link it to our RE learning, thinking about the story of Joseph and the messages behind it.

  

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We have had a great start to the summer term in Year 4!

In English, we have been reading 'Escape from Pompeii'. We have been focusing on using figurative language to write about Pompeii and the explosion of Mount Vesuvius. We worked hard writing eye-witness accounts of the eruption, and have really enjoyed learning about the history of Pompeii! We are currently writing holiday brochures, encouraging people to visit Italy.

In maths, we have been learning a variety of different mathematical concepts. We enjoyed learning about Roman numerals, and this linked with our history topic too! We learnt about negative numbers, and how to solve worded problems involving them. We worked hard to answer time duration questions, and wrote our own.

In art, we have been creating our own puppet theatres. We used shoe boxes as the structure, and put our own designs onto them. For the theatres we used a range of different materials, paints and pens! We really enjoyed seeing our designs come to life!

   

We have been learning all about Florida in geography. We learnt about the Magic Kingdom and why it is so popular. In pairs, we planned our own route around Disneyland, making sure we had visited attractions, shops, restaurants and the toilets! Additionally, we learnt why Florida is a peninsula and looked at different countries around the world which are peninsulas also.

This half term in science we have been focusing on electricity. We have been looking at how to create simple circuits, and understanding what each component of the circuit does. One of our lessons involved looking at the difference between batteries and mains and understanding how everyday electrical items we use are powered. Also, we carried out an experiment testing different materials and items to see which are conductors and which are insulators. We enjoyed finding different items in the classroom to test, some of us even tested our coats and bags!

We have enjoyed trying out different challenges during the daily mile. We have tried balancing bean bags on our heads and walking around keeping up a ping pong ball with a bat!

 

We have been very lucky to have the Music Department and Sixth Form students from St Albans School work with us on a musical theatre production! We are excited to continue this next half term too.

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We have had a fantastic Spring Term in Year 4!

In English, we read a new book called The Lost Thing. We used the story to create different pieces of writing which allowed us to write our own story based on the book. We really enjoyed creating our story maps based around the story, and using our own ideas in our stories.

It was World Book Day this half term, and we loved coming in dressed as a book character!

   

We have been focusing on fractions this term in maths. We have been working on adding and subtracting fractions and finding fractions of amounts!

Our focus this half term in science has been time, linked to British Science Week, specifically linking to our topic about solids, liquids and gases. We conducted an experiment with ice and salt to see whether normal water or salt water would melt ice quicker. We timed how long it took for the ice to melt in each bowl, and concluded the ice melted quicker in salt water. We wrote up our experiment and even came up with our own de-icer product based on our findings! Also, we loved dressing up for British Science Week!

In DT, we created Roman moving eye pictures, which we linked to our history topic. We drew the portraits ourselves and painted them. We then moved onto the mechanical aspect of the pictures through adding the moving eye element. They came out really well and we are really proud of them.

Our history topic for this term has been the Romans. We have learnt about how Rome was founded, how Rome was ruled, what Britain was like before the Romans and the Roman army! We spent time looking at Roman shields, and designed our own! We are excited to continue to learn more about the Romans in the summer term.

   

In RE, we have been learning about the Easter Story. We went through each different parts of the story and created our own Easter story spinners for each event.

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We have had a busy half term in year 4! In English, we have been looking at a science fiction story, Jazz Harper Space Explorer. We spent time creating newspaper articles based around Jazz’s trip to Mars.

We also designed our own aliens, labelled their features and imagined they’d be visiting Beech Hyde! We used these aliens to help us write explanation texts based around a guide to a first day at school. In our explanation text, we focused on using time conjunctions in our writing.

In science, we have been looking at states of matter. We learnt about solids, liquids and gases; we even went onto the playground to see how they would move around! During our lessons we conducted different experiments to learn more about changing states.

  

During our maths lessons, we have been working hard learning about decimals. We first learnt how to partition decimals into tens, ones, tenths and hundredths. We have recently moved onto column addition and subtraction using decimals. We are also working really hard on our times tables in Year 4! We are really enjoying using Times Table Rockstars and Hit the Button in class. We spent number day playing games practising our times table knowledge.

In PE, we have been focusing on bridging, using the equipment. In our outdoor PE lessons, we have been learning how to play tag rugby and are really enjoying it.

       

In art, we have been looking at landscapes. We spent time learning about Leonid Afremov and created our own colour wash sunset pictures.

During PSHE, we have been looking at dreams and goals. At the beginning of the term we created our own dream catchers. On the back of them we wrote what our individual dreams and goals were and coloured in the front!

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In English, we have been reading How to Train Your Dragon. We created our own dragons and wrote setting descriptions including them. We created ‘How to Train Your Dragon’ brochures, writing our own dragon training instructions. As a class, we looked at the features of non-chronological reports, and wrote our own. We also wrote poems entitled ‘Beware of the Dragon’.

   

In maths, we have been working hard on learning how to multiply and divide by 10 and 100 and use this to help us convert between different units. We have been using our place value sliders to help us, and are now able to complete the questions independently!

In DT, we made our own money purses! We first looked at different money purses and their features and used this to help us design our own. We then drew out our designs and templates which we attached to material to cut out. Then, we worked hard sewing our purses together using different stiches we had learnt. Finally, we evaluated them. We are all really proud of our purses!

      

During our French lessons, we have learning the French version of Goldilocks and the Three Bears! We have learnt key words and phrases which make up the story, and created our own flashcards with pictures and the English translation. We finally created our own story board to help us remember the story.

For anti-bullying week we each made a kindness flower. As a class and individually we thought about what kindness means and how we can all show kindness. We drew on each petal of the flower to represent all the different ways we can be kind to each other. 

                      

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In Year 4 we have had a great start to the Autumn term!

In English, we have been reading Robin Hood. We have done lots of work around the setting and characters to help us write our own story!

We also wrote our own acrostic poems and setting descriptions about Harvest. We presented these in our harvest assembly to the school.

In maths, we have been working hard on learning our times tables. We have made our own flashcards to help us and have used them to test our partners. Also, we have been listening to different times tables songs to help us remember them.

Our science topic for this half of the term has been ‘Living Things and their Habitats’. We have spent time learning about different animals and where they live. We have learnt the difference between an invertebrate and a vertebrate, and went on a mini beast hunt to find them! Also, we learnt about endangered animals and made fact files about them!

                

In art we have been weaving! We started practising our paper weaving before moving onto material. We have also learnt to make our own loom.

In RE we have been learning about Hinduism. In one of our lessons we created our own rangoli patterns. We used tissue paper, chalk, oil pastels and colouring pencils to create a range of different designs. We even drew some on the ground outside of the classroom!

              

In Year 4 we have had a fun filled summer term, culminating in our open evening where we show cased our moving eye art work.

We have been exploring acrostic and list poems in English. Here are our goldfinch acrostic poems. We were inspired by Robert Macfarlane and Jackie Morris’ amazing book - The Lost Words.

When we had finished our own list poems about St Helen’s Church we took a line from each and made class poems that were put up outside the church for village day.

     

In maths, we have been learning about coordinates and used them to create treasure maps.

In science we were remembering how to make electrical circuits.

We also had a great time at the Natural History Museum in Tring learning about how animals adapt to the environment in which they live.

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One of our focus books in English has been the mysterious Tuesday where in the village residents see frogs flying on lily pads.

During our English treasure hunt we learnt about synonyms.

    

In science this half-term, we have been investigating sound.  We investigated string phones and how vibrations and sound travels.

    

We've also been investigating vibrations - here we could see, hear and feel the vibrations!

      

 

In art, we have been looking at landscapes.  We focused on creating a sunset picture inspired by the artist, Leonid Afremov.  First we applied water colour to create the sunset background and then we added silhouette detail.

In geography, we are exploring Florida, USA.

As part of Mental Health Awareness Week, we made worry monsters to take our worries away.

    

    

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We have been reading 'Cloud Tea Monkeys' by Mal Pete and Elspeth Graham.  The children have started to create their own tea packaging and enticing descriptions for the outside.

    

  

    

In geography, we have been studying the weather.  We have been taking daily recordings and monitoring changes.

     

In RE, we have been creating artistic representations of the Easter story and the cross.

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In maths, we have been learning about time and different ways of recording data.

 

We’ve also been learning a new game; the ancient game of kalaha.

In English, we have been learning the features of an explanation text and have written some of our own!

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In English, we wrote our own versions of chapter 2 from 'How To Train Your Dragon' by Cressida Cowell. Following this, we looked at non-chronological reports about dragons and read sections of Dragonology. This week we completed a feature hunt from a piece of text, asked questions about the appearance, habitat and feeding habits of dragons then we designed and labelled our own dragon. Next week we will write non-chronological reports about our very own dragons!

 

For homework, Mrs Berry challenged us to create our own Christmas decorations using materials found at home. We were very imaginative and used a wide range of materials. These are now in our classroom by the class Christmas tree!

In RE, we learned about the significance of Advent around the world. We created our own Advent wreath last week. This week we discovered Pinatas have a significance during Advent in Mexico. We watched a video clip about how they are made then created our own 2D Pinata with wishes for the world on the back. We will add these to the school Christmas tree.

A few weeks ago, we looked at Remembrance during Guided Reading. Our comprehension task was to carefully follow a set of instructions to make a tissue paper poppy. These are now on display in the classroom.

    

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In Year 4 we have been looking at classifying different species of animals. The children have carried out some research using books from our library and iPads to create fact files.

   

Year 4 presented our harvest festival with Year 3. We collated facts about harvest and sang the song, Cauliflowers Fluffy!