WELCOME TO YEAR 4 KITES

Kites are powerful, yet graceful creatures and journey through life with a strong sense of togetherness. As the oldest of the lower key stage two, our class feel passionately about working together as a team and helping those around us. 

This Term's Theme

How has the reign of George VI impact on us today? 

In our learning we will be looking at how life has changed in Britain since the reign of King George VI. In doing so, we will be discussing key concepts and organisations/events that came out of his reign and exploring what they mean to us in today's society. These will include: The role of the monarchy, stereotypes, the coronation, the commonwealth, the NHS, WWII and the welfare state.  These transferable skills will be linked to all of our curriculum areas and offer up key points for discussion. 

P.E & Dance days

P.E. Days are Monday and Tuesday 

Please ensure that your child has the correct kit in school all week. We will ensure that they are sent home at the end of every half term

Home Learning days

Home Learning will be handed out on a Friday and collected in on a Wednesday. This will give you the opportunity to explore aspects of your child's learning if you wish.

Upcoming Events

Thursday 9th May - Reach Outdoors 

Thursday 16th May - Reach Outdoors  

Thursday 23rd May - Reach Outdoors

Meet The Team

If there are any issues or concerns, please feel free to come in and see your teacher (Miss Drohan) or alternatively please contact a team leader (Miss Durnford or Mrs Foster).

sdurnford@white-rock-primary.torbay.sch.uk

lfoster@white-rock-primary.torbay.sch.uk

Academic Year 2018-2019

YEAR 4 RESIDENTIAL 11.06.19

We have arrived and it's not raining!

20.05.19 - Learning this week

This week we have written our own discursive text based on 'The True Story of the Three Little Pigs'. In Maths we have been learning about Roman numerals and comparing them to the Arabic number system. In PSHE, we have been learning about the 1989 United Nations Children's Rights Convention- we have made some fantastic posters that are on display in our classroom. We have also had our final reach outdoors session and it was possibly the best one yet! Everyone had a go at stand up paddle boarding as well as going on a supersized 8-man paddle board.

I am very proud of Kites for their fantastic learning this term and I hope they all have a well earned rest over the half term- ready to start their exciting and final term as Year 4's!

16.05.19

We had a great time scaling the climbing walls with Reach Outdoors. Check out the photographs below to see our amazing climbing skills. 

Reach Outdoors - (09.05.19)

On Thursday morning, we went to Goodrington beach as part of our Reach Outdoors programme. Firstly, we had to complete the obstacle course to retrieve the ropes needed to make our rafts. Secondly, we were put into four groups and learnt how to tie a reef knot to secure the ropes tightly to the raft structure. Finally, we worked incredibly well in our teams and we all successfully launched our rafts into the sea. We all had a fantastic morning and showed great water confidence, we are all very excited for next week's Reach Outdoors session. 

Geometry- 01.05.19

In Maths, Kites have been learning about geometry including: lines of symmetry, angles, triangles and quadrilaterals. To consolidate Kites knowledge and understanding of the properties of 2-D shapes, they each made a set of Top Trumps. They had great fun playing their 'Geometric Top Trumps' with each other. 

Science investigation- 29.04.19

In science, we have been learning about how sound travels. We made string telephones and investigated what would happen if the string was bent around a corner. We discovered that the vibrations travelled best along a straight and taut piece of string.

Wednesday 3rd April 2019. Schools Festival Performance

We were very proud of you all for performing so well at the Riviera Centre this evening. You really performed your very best and you did so well. We had many positive comments from the organisers about your singing and dancing and how incredible you all were to learn songs in a different language. From Mrs Sage 

Science Learning 2.4.19

We have been asking questions about how sounds are made? Is there such a thing as silence? As part of our investigations we went on a sound walk today to various areas in the school. We did not make a sound ourselves but notated down all of the different sounds we heard and then took those back to the classroom to discuss the soundscapes and delve deeper into whether silence exists. 

Wednesday 27th March 2019: Year 4 learning celebration. 

We were excited to invite our parents/carers to our learning celebration today in our classrooms. On display were our learning journey and art books, a geography task to participate in, Maths challenges, our Science models, French role play station and our very own cake stall.

All our visitors thoroughly enjoyed learning about our recent work in class and also our delicious WWII cakes! In the background, we had our two festival songs playing so we could show off our talents for Modern Foreign Languages! We look forward to the next learning celebration to showcase our talents! 

Tuesday 26th March 2019: Baking

In Design and Technology, we have been practising our cooking skills and baking some delicious WWII recipes for our learning celebration tomorrow. We used skills of grating, chopping, weighing, mixing and peeling. Our end result was: Danish apple cake, carrot cake and honey cake - all made with rationed ingredients.  We look forward to sharing these with our families tomorrow! 

Science Week 11th March 2019

We had a very exciting time using our design and technology skills in Science this week. Our task was to design a container to carry artillery and a canoe in WWII. We also had to make a pulley system to pull the container over mounds and across difficult terrains. Our designs were well-thought out and we had to use our problem solving skills when some things did not work. 

500 Words competition

We really enjoyed being creative and writing our own narratives for the 500 word competition. After writing a couple of paragraphs, we peer assessed with our learning partners and helped edit punctuation and spelling errors. After this, we gave our learning partners next steps to embed in their next section of the narrative. It was a challenge ensuring that we did not go over our word count and then using laptops to type them up afterwards. 

Spellings

As part of our learning in class, we have been using dictation as a way to learn our spellings off our Year 3/4 spelling list. After Mrs Sage dictated a paragraph to us, we had to swap our writing with our learning partner and check their work for any errors in capital letters, punctuation and spelling errors. As a result, we are all really progressing in our spelling work in class. 

Factors Investigation

In Maths, we investigated factors using cubes. We discovered that some numbers only have two factors and therefore we can only make one rectangle with the cubes. These numbers were called prime numbers. Prime numbers e.g. 2,3, 5, 7 etc. are distinguished by the fact that they have two factors one and themselves. 

Thursday 7th March 2019. World Book Day

What a fantastic effort we all made with our costumes. We had a special assembly, did book shares with Bramblings class, did a book trail (hunting for clues) and a book quiz! A great World Book Day 2019!

Gymnastics Spring 1 Half Term

In Year 4 this half term, we have been practising our Gymnastics skills, including egg rolls, log rolls, rock'n'rolls, teddy bear rolls and learning to do a forward roll accurately. We have also helped each other with rock'n'roll to stand, as you can see in the photographs.

Thursday 13th December 2018: Making Pizza!

Using our cooking skills, picked up from our trip to Occombe Farm, we all made  pizza in preparation for the learning celebration.  We worked as a team to make our dough and then top it with delicious, organic vegetables and cheese. We look forward to serving these to our parents and carers at the celebration tomorrow. 

December 2018: Reach Outdoors Orienteering Workshops

We had wonderful three sessions orienteering with the Reach Outdoors team. This included visits to Clennon Valley, Primley Woods and Cockington Geopark. After learning crucial navigational skills and understanding the points of the compass we set off around the grounds following tracks, patterns, mazes and solving clues. We had to use our team working skills and always know our positions on the map to enhance our chances of success. 

Thursday 22nd November 2018. PSHE

In PSHE, we have been learning about what constitutes a positive relationship. We have used resources from the NSPCC that illustrate the important messages in order to keep ourselves and others safe. Part of this learning, was to ensure we know that certain secrets should not be kept, to tell a trusted adult if anything is worrying you, 'No' means no and your body belongs to you. We also talked about risk taking and how to ensure the risks we take are thought through carefully so that we stay happy and healthy. We acted out scenarios about what we would do if a stranger approached us and offered to take us to the local shop to get some sweets. We decided that we should not go with anyone (even if we know them) unless our parent/carer has told us that it is alright to do so. Part of these workshops was also learning assertive commands and confident body language to assist us in moments where we may feel insecure. 

Friday 16th November. Anti-Bullying Week

The main message for the anti-bullying week was 'choose respect'. We had a workshop which delivered very important messages in relation to the theme and learnt how to keep ourselves and others safe. We all know what to do if we or others experience bullying. At the end of the week we designed posters to consolidate the week's learning. After this, we had a gallery and gave positive feedback about the posters that stood out and why they gave a very clear message. 

Tuesday 13th November 2018. Science

Today we learnt about the different functions of the teeth. We ate bread and apple and tried to tear and chew using only certain teeth. Most of us found it very hard to try to only grind and chew our food using only our front teeth. We all now know the functions of the canines, molars, pre-molars and incisors. 

Friday 9th November. Geography.

In connection with our global junk jam, we decided to follow up our link with the Romanian geopark by researching more about the country. It was very interesting to compare and contrast their geopark to our own local geoparks. We used our researching skills to select relevant information and then shared our learning with the class. 

31st October. Visit to Occombe Farm

Today Year 4 had a lovely time visiting Occombe Farm. The aim of our trip was to learn about local, organically grown produce. We learned about the differences between organic and non-organic farming and where our meat comes from. Whilst visiting the farm, we fed the ducks, chickens, sheep and Berkshire pigs (from windfalll cider apples that we collected from the orchard).  

We also got to learn about how flour was made in ancient times and try our hands at using an old-fashioned grinding wheel to grind some wheat. After this, we made our own delicious pizzas from locally sourced, organic ingredients. This included thyme and rosemary we picked from the organic, herb garden and cherry tomatoes we picked from the plants in the polytunnel. We will use our experience in our writing over the next two weeks. 

October 2018: Global Junkjam

What an exciting day we had at Cockington Geopark. We collaborated with the Junkman from Kentucky in USA to play together with 11 other Geoparks around the world. These included Iran, New Zealand and Romania. In connection with out environmental learning, we have been making eco chants to highlight the problems of plastic pollution in the environment. This was performed live via a youtube link around the world and filmed by BBC Spotlight. This broadcast can be seen on:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=da5n1w_3g3s&feature=youtu.be

October: Religious Studies Presentations

As part of our learning, 'What it means to be human', we have been learning about different religious viewpoints on creation. In doing this, we have learned about how the Christians believe the world started and the Hindu creation story. In learning about how to recount our ideas we presented to the rest of the class a creation story. Some of us brought it alive by adding actions and speaking in unison. 

October 2018: Kora Performance 

We were thrilled to have a performance by an amazing duo, Alain and Josh. They performed on the Kora (West African stringed instrument) and on the djembe. It was fascinating to hear that the kora is hollowed out from a dried gourd. The djembe used to be used as an instrument to talk to one another across vast distances. Their music was hypnotic and they played with such dexterity. Both musicians had been playing from a number of years and gave us a performance to remember.  

October 2018: Our Global Responsibility

In Kites, we have been learning about the impact of global warming, over-fishing and pollution on the environment. We worked in pairs to research the issue and considered as a class how we could make our own contribution to lessen our carbon footprint. We presented our power points to the class. 

Tuesday 19th September 2018. Learning how to round in Maths

Today in Maths, we learnt how to round numbers to the nearest multiple of 10. In doing this, we learnt a rhyme to help us. ' 1 to 4 fall to the floor, 5-9 climb the vine'. We consolidated our learning by playing a game involving dice, rounding our total scores to the nearest multiple of 10 and trying to outwit our opponents. At the end of the lesson, we all felt confident in our rounding skills. Next, we will learn how to round to the nearest 100 and 1000! 

Friday 15th September 2018. Composing in Music

Today we learnt how to write rhythms using crotchets - 1 beat notes and quavers - 1/2 beat notes. We now know how to draw the notes correctly and use this to write a 16 beat rhythm. After we had done this, we had a go at clapping the rhythms of our friends compositions. Next week, we will learn a new note value - the minim, worth 2 beats. 

Wednesday 12th September 2018: Place Value

As part of our new learning sequence in Maths, we have been varying the ways we represent a four digit number and having to think carefully about how to explain our understanding to others. Today we were using the dienes, place value counters, part-part whole models and place value charts. 

Thursday 6th September 2018. Brixham Museum Day

We were very lucky to have some historians from Brixham Museum who came to talk to us about the history of the fishing industry. They gave a talk to the whole of Year 4 before we participated in some interactive workshops. We learnt how they used to make rope and had a go ourselves! Another session taught us how to encode messages using Morse Code. We learnt about the devastating affect on Brixham community when the Great Gale struck in 1866 and used this in our own learning by examining primary and secondary sources. Next week, we will be planning and writing our own narratives around the Great Gale of Brixham.