Religious Education

The Come and See topics for RE in the second half of the autumn term are Confirmation and Life in the Christian community.

English
In Year 4, children will enjoy reading a wide variety of texts and will learn to write in a wide range of genres. We aim to instil in our pupils a love for reading and writing, confidence, stamina and creative, independent thinking.

Key texts we will be reading this term include ‘The Village that Vanished’ by Ann Grifalconi and ‘The Spiderwick Chronicles’ by Tony DiTerlizzi and Holly Black..

Reading skills are taught explicitly in daily lessons so the children have the necessary skills for reading and comprehending texts. Pupils also learn about each of the learning behaviours required for reading and will discuss texts with their partners and small groups. Children will also continue to answer “Big Picture” questions as a written comprehension skill that they need to master in preparation for Years 5 and 6.

Key skills: prediction, questioning, clarifying, summarising, inferring, evaluating and making connections.

Grammar

Grammar is taught alongside the teaching of writing.

Key skills include using: conjunctions, adverbs, prepositions, fronted adverbials, punctuating direct speech and possessive and contractive apostrophes.

Spelling

Spellings are taught via a weekly list of words which are introduced to pupils in class, then set as activities on the Spelling Shed website.

Mathematics
In year 4, we will continue to use the White Rose scheme of learning which aims to provide pupils with key mathematical skills and knowledge using the mastery approach.

We will learn effective strategies to add and subtract 4-digit numbers; measure the area of shapes and we will continue to work on multiplication and division, so the children have fast recall of times tables and can use this knowledge to solve division problems.

Science

We will be learning about Animal Including Humans. They will learn:

• That we can group animals by what they eat;
• Why humans are born without teeth;
• Why the stomach doesn’t eat itself;
• How big the small intestine is;
• Consider how bacteria can be good and bad for humans.

The children will develop an understanding of the nature, processes and methods of science through different types of science enquiries that will help them to answer scientific questions about the world around them. They will be equipped with the scientific knowledge required to understand the uses and implications of science, today and for the future. We will achieve this through practical investigations – working scientifically – as well as knowledge-based lessons.

Computing

The children will learn to programme using Scratch. They will learn to use Scratch so that they can make a simple animation, use it to tell a story and to programme a game.

History

In year 4 we will be studying “The Roman Empire” through a scheme of learning developed by the Haringey Education Partnership. Discrete history lessons will allow pupils to regularly address and sometimes devise historically valid questions about change, cause, similarity and difference, and significance. They will learn to construct informed responses that involve thoughtful selection and organisation of relevant historical information. They will begin to understand how our knowledge of the past is constructed from a range of sources.

Geography

We will be learning about Population and as part of this unit we will learn about migration, multi-ethnic parts of the United Kingdom, focusing on London and Cardiff. Then, we will learn about the Welsh language and culture and about Welsh and British identity.

Music

The children enjoy weekly whole class singing and a music lesson with a specialist music teacher.

P.E.

Year 4 take part in an LFA coach-led PE lesson every Friday as well as a teacher-led PE session on Tuesday. Sports coaches will focus on games and team sports such as: football, tennis, cricket and athletics. Year 4 teachers will take sessions of gymnastics and dance.

Art and Design

We will focus on Roman Art, including mosaics, using a variety of media including chalk, pastels and water-colours.

Homework

English and Maths homework is given out on Friday and should be returned by the following Thursday. Spelling homework is given out each Friday and there is a test on those spellings the following Friday. Children are expected to read regularly and record what they have read in their reading journals. Parents are strongly encouraged to listen to their children read at least once per week and record this in the reading journal.