Happy New Year and Welcome Back

Welcome back to school to you all. Hope you had a positive Christmas and New Year. We are really looking forward to the term ahead and the children returned last week demonstrating their excellent attitudes to learning.

Geography project is ‘Our Future Planet’

We will be starting with a general introduction to Planet Earth. Considering: What is Earth? What do we know about it? Why do you think we call it ‘little blue planet’? Exploring maps, photographs, images and videos of Earth – its oceans and its land. We will consider plants and trees - Why and how are trees and other green plants special and significant? We will explore and learn about the importance of oceans and why they matter to the future of our planet. We will consider about why we need to care for our earth and how we can improve and sustain our environment including understanding food miles.

I am at present working to arrange a visit to the Eden Project linked to our project – this is likely to be in the first week of next term due to Eden Project having limited availability during this term. I will be in touch with further information via dojo in the near future.

English

Our class book is ‘The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe’ by C.S. Lewis which we began on the first few days and are already enjoying! Our English work will be based around the story we will look at poetic language, writing our own narratives, we will write eyewitness reports and use drama strategies to explore characters. We will develop our understanding of proper nouns and pronouns as well as use relative clauses to add information to our writing. Daily spelling sessions continue in addition to daily reading sessions where we explore vocabulary, inferences, retrieval of information and enjoy the text together.

Maths

This term in Maths, we are going to begin with a short unit on perimeter and area before moving onto multiplicationand division. Following on from that we will begin our first of two Multiplication and Division units. Children explore multiplication and division, looking first at multiplying and dividing by 3, 6, 9, 7, 11 and 12, and then at multiplying and dividing by 0 and 1, the understanding of which is key to children’s mastery of this unit. This unit encourages children to use visual representations to tackle multiplication and division questions We will continue to focus on 9 times tables before revising our 6,7 and 9s and moving onto our 11 times tables. Our aim is for them to gain fluency in all the times tables by the end of Year 4. The best way to do this is through repeated, deliberate practice. Please could you encourage your child to play https://ttrockstars.com/ or alternatively they can practise using Hit the Button (https://www.topmarks.co.uk/maths-games/hit-the-button) or as a pair try times tables ping pong (https://ictgames.com/tablesTennis/oldcdn.html ).

Reading

Please ensure children are reading at home regularly - children are given time to quiz and quietly read daily. We celebrate children who are reading at home weekly. Please ensure they have their reading book and reading record in school every day.

General Reminders

PE remains on Monday and Friday. Outdoor learning is on a Monday - please ensure children have appropriate outdoor clothing including hats and gloves which are labelled with their name. Wellies and outdoor shoes are essential if children wish to play on the field during their break times as well as for outdoor learning.

Children are allowed to bring in small pencil cases and use them sensibly in lessons – some of them are rather cumbersome and taking up a lot of the desks so ideally keep them of a reasonable size.

If you every have any questions or worries please contact me on ClassDojo or via shunter@stoke[1]climsland.cornwall.sch.uk.

All the Best,

 

Mrs Hunter (Year 4 Class Teacher)