Last week/this week

Oaks and Acorns is a community of the (slightly) older generation who visit school once a month to meet and work alongside the children and are rewarded with the children serving a delicious school dinner to them.  All Year 4s met with their new friends and as we have been looking at timelines chatted about the lives of our visitors.  This was a wonderful experience for all with both ages enjoying the experience.  Timelines have been made and will be displayed in Class 3 for those who wish to see the results.  Why not pop in during the Open Afternoon to have a look?

We also had an exciting science lesson with the Year 3s learning about chemical reactions during their challenge to make their own volcanoes - much noise and excitement ensued with Mr Henderson having to come and see what was happening!!

We have had some great maths games with the children learning to play 'tennis' with number bonds, alongside working with the 2, 3, 4 and 6 times tables and multiplying by 10 and 100, doubling and halving and having to think things through.  Can I urge parents to play as many times tables games with their children as they can - Mr Wainwright has introduced a 'Times Table Challenge' and well done Matilda for being the first member of Class 3 to have a go!  Lets see Class 3 rise to the challenge - perhaps all could complete the challenge by the end of the Academic year!

In Literacy we looked at performing a poem and have learnt "Our Teacher is a Caveman" to perform at our end of term Museum day.

This week starts with Mr Wainwright joining us on Monday.  He will be team teaching alongside myself and has come up with an interesting challenge for our science - I don't want to spoil the surprise so keep up with this page to see the pictures!!

Maths this week will focus on written addition and subtraction.

In Literacy we shall begin to look at Myths over the next couple of week which will culminate in writing our own Mythical narrative.  

Also we have been asked to provide some paintings by the children of yellow fruit or vegetables for Harvest Festival.  If you wish to contribute please can I have your work produced on an A4 sheet of paper.  This can be given out at School for those who wish to help. Thank you.

Finally, I would like to thank all those parents who are 'bearing with me' whilst we come up with a suitable procedure for dismissing the children at the end of day, particularly on a Wednesday/Thursday when many children attend after-school clubs.  We have decided that those children attending a club will be escorted by the TA through the other exit from the classroom.  Those able to walk into the playground will then be asked to leave through the front door of the classroom and finally I shall bring the remainder of the children to the same door.  Can I ask that you remind siblings of these children to remain outside with you, whilst I make sure every child is returned safely to their respective parents.  It is a busy thoroughfare and we need to ensure that the dismissal at the end of the day is as calm as possible - for both the children and adults!

Mrs Smith

Year 4 Science

Year 4 came together this afternoon and learnt about reversible and irreversible changes.  They looked at butter, cheese, chocolate, candle wax, egg and a stone in cups floating in hot water.  The children made observations afterwards in cold water to see which materials were reversible.

Predictions were made and the overall conclusion was that: stone didn't change and all the others were reversible except for the egg.  Discussions about cheese were had related to cooking.  Great scientists at work!!

An exciting time !

Well, the whole school received some visitors on Monday.  Ms Rayner called us quickly to the hall and we rushed to find out what all the fuss was about - two visitors from the Stone Age had made their way to our School!  They were dressed funny and couldn't speak (only for grunts).  At first they couldn't get out of the School hall, but once out they foraged for food in the hedges (and didn't use a knife or fork!) and warmed themselves up by a fire.  Finally they were doing really funny things with rocks - Class 3 thought they might be making tools to kill animals with.

After such an eventful start to the week Class 3 begun learning all about Non-Chronological reports, began to look at suffixes, learnt all about number bonds and had some hard thinking in their final math's lesson to work out how to add different given numbers to  40, 100 and 120.

In science we began our Rocks investigation by taking a walk around our School to find different rocks, compare them and discussed what other materials which might be made out of rock.

This week Class 3 will continue their work on Non-Chronological Reports specifically looking at the Neolithic settlement found in Skara Brae.  Maths will be learning all about place value, greater/less than and comparing and ordering numbers.  Science will be a comparison of different rocks at a closer inspection.

Foundation subjects will include footwork skills in netball, map and atlas work in Geography, Hinduism in RE and friendship in PSHE.

Homework set last week included the first use of Maths activities via activelearn.  Inside the front cover I stuck details of how the children can log on and once logged will see their allocated work (each task covers 3 different levels).  I will be showing the children how to log on during the week but if any parent has trouble please come and see me.  Thank you to all the children who managed to 'personalise' their homework books.  They were great!

Scary visitors !

Considering the different types of rock

Look what we found!

Comparing different types of rock

What rock is this?

Feeling the different properties of rock

It's a new dawn, it's a new day, it's a new Class 3!!

How great to be back!  Our new Class 3 had a brilliant first day.  We managed to get ourselves in a tangle which meant working as a team to untangle ourselves.  This was a good ice-breaker and team building exercise, I hope the photos show the enjoyment on the faces of our team as they worked together.

Our afternoon activity was to paint portraits of the staff in Class 3 also being charged with painting Bev in the Office and Becky in the kitchen. Again a fun afternoon which was enjoyed by all.

Children:  please remember that although you have no homework as such, you are asked to cover your new homework book in pictures or posters, wallpaper, drawing, anything you like that is personal to you. Your homework book does not need to be in School until Thursday. Also please can you remember to write neatly your name on your new reading journal and bring it in ready for Monday.

Can I add a 'gentle reminder' that names must be clearly marked on water bottles please.

Have a great weekend and I look forward to seeing you all again on Monday,

Mrs Smith