Sports Day

On Wednesday, we took part in our Sports Day at Leeds Beckett Headingley Campus. Despite the warm weather, we still had a fantastic day. Staff were so proud of the children’s sportsmanship, teamwork and resilience throughout the different activities.

Countryside Days

On Wednesday, we had a fantastic trip to Harrogate Showground to take part in Countryside Days. The children took part in a plethora of activities from ferret training to sheep shearing. We all had a great day learning about lots of different aspects of agriculture.

Pointilism

On Friday afternoon, we looked at creating pointillism drawings using our creature designs from last week. We looked at simplifying our initial designs and adding spots in the style of the pointillist movement. 

Tom Vaughan Author visit

On Thursday, we were joined by amazing author called Tom Vaughan. He spoke to us about his book series all about Greek myths but specifically Hercules. He explained that the series was a modern take on these myths with the 12 labours of Hercules receiving a modern twist. Some of us got to get dress up as Greek gods and take part in a quiz. Tom was so impressed with Year 4’s knowledge about this topic considering we haven’t studied it yet!

In the deep, dark ocean …

A fantastic final week in 4A!

This week, we started our new writing topic which is a piece of non-fiction all about an underwater creature. We have been learning lots of interesting vocabulary like bioluminescent and protruding. We used this to start building different sentence types. We learnt our model text and then created our own story maps of flipchart paper. Next half term, we will be imagining our own underwater creature and creating a fact file all about it.

In Maths, we have been working extremely hard on our fractions topic. We learnt this week how to subtract and add fractions from whole and mixed numbers. I have been impressed with the children’s fractions knowledge and how they have persevered when things have got more complex.

During our R.E. learning, we finished off our Easter topic by creating some fantastic pieces of art to do with the Easter story. We talked about the use of specific colours for different parts of the story. We discussed that bright colours would be more suitable for Palm Sunday as it was an uplifting part of the story were as darker colours would be better for representing Good Friday.

Night Lights

This week, we undertook our termly assessments. The children took on all aspects with great resilience and perseverance. I have been really impressed with the progress the children have been making.

In Reading, we looked at a variety of non-fiction texts and answered a series of retrieval questions that allowed us to skim the text to find the answers. Once, we had finished our reading lessons we magpied any great vocabulary that we can then use in our own writing.

During our Geography learning, we started by looking at different biomes. We focussed more closely on the ocean biome. We looked at the different layers the ocean is split into. We watched short Blue Planet clips and tried to guess which section the action was taking place.

On Thursday, we made their night lights using the glass jars the children brought in. We had great fun bringing our designs to life and pushing our creativity. We were all really impressed with our night lights and we all can’t wait to test them out at home.

Dichotomous Keys

Another great week in 4A!

In Writing, we planned and wrote our hot writes all about a character who gets transported to the depths of the ocean. The children have once again proven themselves to be amazingly imaginative writers.

In Science, we have been looking at dichotomous keys – which help scientists group animals. We started by creating them using liquorice all sorts. We had to think of questions that would help us separate them. We used this knowledge to create keys about different animals.

Our class novel this half term has been ‘The Boy who met the Whale,’ by Nizrana Farook. We loved hearing all about the adventures of Riza, Shifa and Zheng as they attempt to find the treasure whilst avoiding the villainous Marco.

Live Bands, Libraries and Colour Runs …

What an action packed week it has been in 4A!

In Writing, we began our shared writing focusing on portal stories. The children have transported their character from an everyday setting such as a library to the depths of the ocean. Their characters have encountered several different underwater creatures from giant squids to fierce sharks. We have been blown away by the imagination and creativity on show.

In Maths, we have been working hard on our new fractions unit. We learnt about the different parts of a fractions and what they mean. We also started to look at mixed numbers and counting beyond one in fractions.

On Thursday, we were treated to a live rock concert from first row music. The children all loved experiencing live music some for the very first time. We also took part in the school-wide Holi Colour Run. The children loved taking part and having paint thrown on them whilst raising money for charity.

On Friday, we visited Moor Allerton Library. We learnt all about how the library works and were able to take out a couple of books to add to our classroom library. Moor Allerton library has an excellent children’s section that the children are able to borrow several books at a time.

Thank you so much for all the jars and bottle tops that have been coming into school. We are nearly there with our jar collections but please keep sending in bottle tops for our art topic.

World Book Day

World Book Day was a resounding success! We loved seeing everyone’s creative outfits. We took part in lots of activities across the day. We started by writing fractured fairytales – which meant we wrote traditional tales from the perspective of a different character. The teachers loved reading about the giants annoyance at Jack trespassing on his property and the bear’s indignation at someone eating their porridge and destroying their furniture. We also took part in a CBBC lesson streamed live from Bradford and took part in loads of fun quizzes.