YEAR 4
SPRING TERM 2017
Information Booklet
Year 4 Team:
Mrs S Judge
Teacher Cover
Mrs C Hallam
Teaching Assistant
Mrs R Pinney
Class Teacher
(email: [email protected])
This pamphlet informs you about the curriculum which your child will be covering this term.
We hope this information will enable you to be further involved with your child’s education.
How to help
Needed in school every day: Reading book, Reading Record, Home-School Liaison Book,
water bottle, wellies, PE kits (indoor and outdoor). Year 4 PE is timetabled for Monday
afternoon.
Other information:
 School Uniform is now purchased on-line. Book bags, however, are available to
purchase from the school office. (£4.60)
Please ensure that all items are clearly labelled with your child’s name.
 Lunches:
 School Dinner: All children in Reception, Year 1 and Year 2 are entitled to a cooked
school meal, free of charge. For Year 3 and Year 4 children, the cost is £2.15 per
day, (£10.75 per week).
 Packed Lunch: It is helpful for children bringing a packed lunch, to place their own
lunch box on the trolley before school, so that they can find it easily at lunchtime.
Please ensure that your child knows whether they are having packed lunch or
school dinner, each day. (This is important because school dinners have to be
ordered from the kitchen which supplies our school, by 9:20am)
 Reading: Please try to read with your child each day and discuss the content of what
has been read. Please record what has been read, together with any comment(s) you
would like to add and your initials or signature, in the reading record book. It is
sometimes appropriate for books to be re-read to develop understanding and fluency
and expression in reading aloud. Library books may be changed weekly on the day
timetabled for the class and are based around interest rather than reading level. For
Year 4, this is Friday.
 Homework: This term, homework for Year 4 will consist of weekly tests of spellings and
multiplication tables or number facts; tests will be on a Monday. In addition, there will be
a regular task, which will involve a piece of research or development work around our
whole school topic, e.g. researching some of our key questions or a task which
develops and builds on what we have studied in school.
 Curriculum: Each of the subject headings covers a wide variety of activities. Some
subjects are taught separately, but within the termly topic shared by the whole school,
links between knowledge and skills are promoted across all areas and pupils are
encouraged to develop independent learning. We hope this overview provides you with
the opportunity to share activities with your child and may encourage you to share
activities linked to the topic, outside of school.
English:
Reading: In Year 4, pupils should be
able to read books accurately and at
a speed that is sufficient for them to
focus on understanding what they
read rather than on decoding
individual words. Teaching is directed
more towards developing the breadth
and depth of their reading, making
sure that they become independent,
fluent and enthusiastic readers, with
a clear understanding of the text.
Writing: Pupils should be able to write
down their ideas with an increasing
degree of accuracy and with good
sentence punctuation. We build on
writing skills, vocabulary, sentence
structure and knowledge of linguistic
terminology through our weekly ‘Big
Write’. Pupils will understand how
writing can be different from speech
and joined handwriting should be the
norm. Pupils should be able to use it
quickly enough to keep pace with
what they want to say and write, from
memory, simple sentences dictated
by the teacher.
Spelling: The spelling of common
words should be correct, including
exception words and other words that
they have learnt. Children should
spell words as accurately as possible
using their phonic knowledge and
other knowledge of spelling. Spelling,
punctuation and grammar will
continue to be a focus each day.
Pupils will use the first two or three
letters of a word to check its spelling
in a dictionary. Independent and
fluent decoding will continue to be
encouraged, as otherwise pupils will
find it increasingly difficult to
understand what they read and to
write down what they want to say.
RHYTHMS OF THE WORLD
Science: Pupils will broaden their scientific view of
the world through exploring, talking about, testing and
developing ideas about everyday phenomena and the
relationship between living things and familiar
environments. They will ask questions about what
they observe, carry out simple comparative and fair
tests. Year 4 topics this term are Sound and Living
Things and their Habitats. This work will be linked
with our topic wherever possible.
Values: From this term we are changing our Values
to half termly, rather than monthly. Our two Values
are Courage, e.g. stepping out of your comfort zone
or trusting God’s promises and Forgiveness, e.g.
wiping the slate clean or forgiving others as God has
forgiven you.
Social & Emotional Aspects of Learning: (SEAL)
Our SEAL topics this term are ‘’Going for Goals’ and
‘Good to be Me’.
Art & Design: Pupils should be taught to develop
their techniques, including their control and their use
of materials, with creativity, experimentation and an
increasing awareness of different kinds of art, craft
and design. We will look at African landscapes.
Music: Our focus will be the build up to the “In This
Together” Big Spring Sing Concert. Pupils will be
taught to sing with increasing confidence and control,
recalling sounds with increasing aural memory.
French: We continue to focus on speaking. Pupils will
practise introducing family members, counting, asking
and answering simple questions, and name colours
and animals, including pets.
Design & Technology: Through a variety of creative
and practical topic based activities, pupils will be
taught to design and make, evaluate, modify and
improve products that solve real and relevant
problems.
Computing: In KS2 children are taught how to
use the technology safely and responsibly, to
design and write programmes to solve
problems, to understand how networks offer
opportunities for communication and
collaboration, how to search effectively and how
to select and use software.
History: Through our topic, pupils will continue
to develop a knowledge and understanding of
British, local and world history and ask and
answer questions about change, cause,
similarity, difference and significance. They will
see how our knowledge of the past comes from
a range of sources. We will continue to study
the Romans, moving on to Ancient Egypt; we
will make use of video clips from the Horrible
Histories series to enhance the children’s
learning experience.
RE: This term pupils will study units from the
Diocesan resource: Understanding Christianity.
One unit, Creation and Fall, asks the question
‘What do Christians learn from the Creation
story?’ We will look at how different religions try
to explain how the world was created and how
different religions think we should care about
the world. Another of the units asks ‘Why do
Christians call the day Jesus died ‘Good
Friday’?’ and we will learn how Christians show
their beliefs about Palm Sunday, Good Friday
and Easter Sunday in worship.
Year 3 and Year 4 pupils will also take the
Three Faiths tour in Queen’s Park, Bedford, and
visit a Gurdwara, a Mosque and a Church,
which are all within walking distance of each
other.
Maths: This term, we again focus on
multiplication and division, using the
multiplication tables we know. Pupils will
write and calculate mathematical
statements for multiplication and division
using mental, and progressing to formal
written methods. Pupils should continue to
practise the multiplication tables up to 12x.
They will look at area, finding the area of
rectilinear shapes by counting squares.
Pupils will find and show families of
common equivalent fractions and count up
and down in hundredths, recognising that
hundredths arise from dividing an object by
100 and dividing tenths by 10. They will
solve problems involving increasingly
harder fractions to calculate quantities, and
fractions to divide quantities, including nonunit fractions where the answer is a whole
number. Finally, pupils will add and
subtract fractions with the same
denominator.
Geography: Pupils will be taught to extend
their knowledge and understanding beyond
the local area to include the United
Kingdom and Europe, North and South
America. This will include the location and
characteristics of a range of the world’s
most significant human and physical
features. Our focus will be on Africa.
PE: This term in PE, Year 4 pupils will
again be focusing on developing the core
skills of movement – agility, balance, coordination and spatial awareness. They will
take part in activity challenges, both
individually and as part of a team. Our
focus will be on gymnastics and dance,
linking this to our topic where possible.
Through gymnastics and dance, pupils will
also develop their strength and control,
evaluating, enhancing and improving on
their performances.
Spring Term 2017
Date
4th
January
6th
9th
12th
20th
25th – 27th Jan
27th
February
10th
10th
20th
21st
24th
March
2nd
3rd
8th
10th
17th
21st
21st & 22nd
24th
29th
31st
April
4th
5th
7th
April
7th
24th
24th
Event
Term commences for children
Values Day and
Care of Environment Activities
Urban Safari Animal Experience
Caterlink Assembly/Cookery
Workshop
Family Praise Assembly
9.00 a.m. – School Hall
Scholastic Book Fair
School Hall 3.15 – 4.00 p.m.
Y3 Showing Assembly
2.30 p.m. in the School Hall
Y4 Showing Assembly
2.30 p.m. in the School Hall
Break for Half Term
Children return to school
African Drumming Workshops
Family Praise Assembly
9.00 a.m. – School Hall
PTA Mother’s Day Gift Shop
Y2 Showing Assembly
2.30 p.m. in the School Hall
KS2 Spring Sports Festival
Lincroft Middle School
10.00 a.m. – 12.00 p.m.
Super Learning Afternoon
Y1 Showing Assembly
2.30 p.m. in the School Hall
Queen’s Park Faith Tour
Bedford
Years 3 & 4 “In This Together”
Big Spring Sing Concert
The Kings House, Bedford 7.00 p.m.
Family Praise Assembly
9.00 a.m. – School Hall
YR Showing Assembly
2.30 p.m. in the School Hall
KS1 Spring Sports Festival
Sharnbrook Upper School
12.30 – 2.30 p.m.
Parent Consultation
4.00 p.m. – 6.00 p.m.
Parent Consultation
6.00 p.m. – 8.00 p.m.
Easter Church Service
2.00 p.m.
Break for Easter
Children return to school
KS2 Swimming
Block of 8 week lessons
1.30 p.m. -2.30 p.m.
Notes
Wellies required
Parents invited to attend
Y3 Parents invited to attend
Y4 Parents invited to attend
Parents invited to attend
Details to follow
Y2 Parents invited to attend
Full Outdoor PE Kit, water bottle
and packed lunch required
Details to follow
Y1 Parents invited to attend
Years 3 and 4
Details to follow
Details to follow by separate letter
Parents invited to attend
YR Parents invited to attend
Full Outdoor PE Kit, water bottle
and packed lunch required
Details to follow by separate letter
Details to follow by separate letter
Details to follow by separate letter