Welcome to Year 4 class page where you can find out about what we are learning each term as well as find relevant documents and resources.

Meet the team
Miss Doroftei is the Class Teacher and Mrs.Basu is the Learning Support Assistant (Tuesday-Wednesdays). 

 Magnificent Monarchs

This term, Year 4 are exploring the history topic of the Romans. We will be taking an enquiry-based approach and answer key questions such as: Who were the Romans?  Why did the Romans leave sunny Italy to invade this cold island? Why did they invade Britain and why were they so successful? Why did Boudica stand up to the Romans? What did the Romans do for us? What is their legacy? 

Children will develop their knowledge to consider the invasion of the Romans to Britain and why they were so successful and learn about life in the army. They will also learn about the Celts and their response to the Romans (exploring reasons for their response) with a local history link to the Boudican rebellion. They will learn about Roman settlements and culture. Children will complete a comparison of Ancient Rome and Long Crendon-Ayelsbury. They will learn about how much life changed under Roman rule and what evidence there still is of Roman rule in modern Britain. They will question historical sources of information and learn about key historians and archaeologists who are in this field.

We will be planning in a themed costumed day full of in school activities in June or July (exact date TBC) entitled ‘Life in Roman Britain Day’. The children will be engaged in history through a cross-curricular approach that will use practical activities, drama and role-play. The workshop stations will include activities such as scribes, charm makers, metal workers, lamp workers, fresco painters and many more.

English 

We will be learning about myths and legends including the story of Romulus and Remus  - the legendary founders of Rome. We will then delve in the wold of Pompeii by reading Escape from Pompeii, a tale of two children who live in the city of Pompeii. They are happily going about their usual business when Mount Vesuvius (which they thought was a mountain,) erupts! We will be using freeze-frame techniques to show parts of the story and the 'Conscience Alley' technique to help 'Livia' and 'Tranio' decide what to do...should they stay with their families or try to escape?

Reading is such an important skill; it really unlocks all areas of the curriculum. We would ask parents to hear their child read at least three times a week (but ideally daily), 5-10 minutes a night is all that is needed. As well as supporting your child read words, it is also useful to ask questions and check your child’s understanding of the text. In class, we will be practising a variety of comprehension (VIPERS) skills including: inferencing, predicting, explaining and retrieving.

Maths

Throughout this term, we will be continuing with fractions and decimals. We will also learn how to tell the time and work with money. Furthermore, we will cover a Measurement unit focusing on length, perimeter and area and build on the arithmetic strategies we covered so far.

Please continue to support your children’s learning by regularly asking questions or allowing them to play TT Rock Stars and also practice on Purple Mash to help improve their instant recall of the multiplication and division facts of all times tables (up to 12 times tables by the end of the year). Additionally, the activity ideas emailed can also support the Multiplication Tables Check that children will take part in June.

Science 

The principal focus of science teaching in Year 4 is to enable pupils to broaden their scientific view of the world around them.

Animals, including humans - in this unit of learning children will investigate animals including humans. They will be introduced to the main body parts associated with the digestive system and how they have special functions. This will include: digestive system – mouth, tongue, teeth, oesophagus, stomach and intestine and understand how the digestive system digests the food eaten and (with oxygen) gives the body energy process of digestion. Children will explore different types of teeth including milk and permanent teeth; incisors, canines and molars. Children will find out about food groups and healthy balanced diets and compare diets of herbivores, carnivores and omnivores. They will also investigate teeth and what causes decay and look closely at food chains/webs.

In the second half-term we will be learning about sound. 

Pupils will be taught to:

· Identify how sounds are made, associating some of them with something vibrating

· Recognise that vibrations from a sound travel through a medium to the ear.

· Find patterns between the pitch of a sound and features of the object that produced it

· Find patterns between the volume of a sound and the strength of the vibrations that produced it.

· Recognise that sounds get fainter as the distance from the sound source increases

R.E. Festivals and Celebration

Building on previous knowledge, when we learnt about different celebrations from Christianity and Judaism, this half-term we are going to explore why festivals are important to religious communities. 

This unit enables pupils to learn from different religious and spiritual ways of life as shown through festival and celebration. We have chosen to focus on Holi, Diwali, Eid, Ramadan and fasting.

Pupils will explore attitudes of:

▪ Self-awareness by becoming increasingly aware of the way celebration can make us happy;

▪ Respect for all by developing a willingness to learn from the celebrations and special days of others;

▪ Open mindedness by engaging with the lives of others and expanding their knowledge and understanding of the world;

▪ Appreciation and wonder by developing their capacity to respond to special events in the life of their family, and others, using some simple skills in creative development.

P.E

We will have P.E. every Thursday and Friday. . Please remember on the days children have P.E. they will come to school in their PE kit. They will need to wear shorts under jogging bottoms or bring in shorts with them as we need them to be dressed appropriately for the sport they are doing.

Home Learning

The children are asked to complete the following:

1. Read daily 10-15 minutes and document in their Reading Record at least three times a week.

2. Practise their Times Tables on Times Tables Rock Stars each day for 5 minutes.

3. Practise their weekly spellings using the Activity Menu

4. On Fridays choose and complete a task from the homework grid and hand in by Wednesday the following week.