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 TERMS THEME

'Technology Time Travel'

For more information about this scroll down to our Curriculum map.

P.E AND DANCE DAYS

P.E. is on Tuesdays.

Dance is on Wednesdays.

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

Week beginning 24th February- Swimming lessons.

18th March- Learning Celebration.

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 and Mrs Foster).

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

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

ACADEMIC YEAR 2019/2020

Friday 6th March 2020 - Art learning and World Book Day.

Today we celebrated World Book Day with a book trail around our school, a book quiz and a reading session with Year one where we shared stories written by Julia Donaldson. We also celebrated our favourite book characters by coming to school dressed up as them! 

In our Art learning, we have researched a famous sculptor artist- Alexander Calder. We have analysed some of his most famous wire sculptures and imitated these in our sketch books. 

Friday 28th February 2020

This week, we have started our new learning journey looking at poetry. In teams of four, we have identified some descriptive devices used in poetry such as metaphors, personification, alliteration and onomatopoeia. Check out our learning below.

Friday 7th February 2020- Class Trip to Exeter

What a fantastic day! We had so much fun learning about the History of emojis and how to create our own using an iPad Pro. We loved exploring The Royal Albert Memorial Museum, especially the Ancient Egypt room. Check out our photographs below.

Friday 31st January 2020- Music and Drama

This week, Kites have started to learn to play the Ukulele! Firstly, we looked at the musical symbols. We learnt that a semibreve is worth 4 beats, a minim is worth 2 beats, a crotchet is worth 1 beat and a quaver is worth 1/2 a beat. Then, we clapped the rhythm of a piece of music using our knowledge of the musical symbols. Next, we got to the very exciting bit and explored the ukuleles! Finally, we put all our learning together and performed a piece of music. Kites were so incredible, Mrs May couldn't resist but to come in and listen to our performance!

Kites have continued to develop their drama skills with the guidance from the incredible Paddleboat Theatre Company. Miss Drohan was blown away by each and every one of Kites as they worked in their teams to deliver their group performances. Kites have shown great awareness in how they can use their bodies and voices to portray a character and create atmosphere. 

Friday 24th January- Maths and Science

In Science, Kites have built on their prior knowledge of electricity to build an electrical circuit. Firstly, we identified that electrical energy can be converted into other types of energy such as movement, light and sound. Kites then investigated the electrical components and in their teams built a circuit. After, we drew and labelled a scientific diagram to show the components need to complete a simple circuit. 

In Maths, we have been learning how to multiple 3 numbers such as 5 x 2 x 3. Kites used numicon to represent their number sentence - 4 x 2 x 2. Miss Drohan set Kites a challenge to explore how many different ways the number sentence could be represented using numicon.

Friday 17th January- Paddle Boat Theatre

This week, we had the fantastic Paddle Boat Theatre Company at White Rock Primary School. Kites, Kingfishers and Kestrels have been extremely excited about their term long project with Paddle Boat. We started this week's session with an ice-breaker game followed by an exploration of how we can use our bodies and faces to resemble a type of character. 

Friday 10th January 2020

What an exciting first week back to White Rock Primary school! Kites have been extremely enthusiastic with this term's learning about communication technology. We have used our research skills to create a technology time line starting at present day going right back to the Ancient Eygptians when hieroglyphics were invented as an early form of written communication.  In Maths, we have been learning about multiplication, ensuring we have mastered multiplying by 10 and 100 by using resources to represent number sentences and images. As well as, using mathematical language to explain our reasoning. Finally, we have had an additional member to Kites this week- our school guinea pig, Thunder! Kites have shown great team work and responsibility by taking it in turns to look after Thunder- replenishing his water, food and bedding, daily. And of course, giving Thunder lots of cuddles! 

AUTUMN TERM

Autumn term curriculum map

REACH OUTDOORS

Please see below for more information about our Reach Outdoors Residential coming up:

Thursday 31st October 2019- Grandpa Chatterji 

This week, we have been immersed in our new class text- Grandpa Chatterji. Firstly, we wrote a character description and read them to our Kingfisher or Kestrel partner. Our partner drew what we described and we reflected on what we could improve for the next time we write a character description. We then used our reflections to plan a character description for Grandpa Chatterji and Grandpa Leicester. We made sure we included expanded noun phrases to add extra description as well as prepositional phrases. Check out our learning below!

Wednesday 16th October 2019- Column method of addition 

This week, we have been using the place value grid to help us understand what happens when adding a 4-digit and 4-digit number together with multiple exchanges. Once we understood the exchange we could then confidently and accurately use the written column method of addition. After half term, we will be using this learning to help us with the column method of subtraction.

Wednesday 9th October - African Dance Workshop

As it is Black History Month, Year 4 had the opportunity to take part in an African Dance Workshop this week. All the children had big smiles on their faces throughout and really enjoyed learning some traditional African moves to live drumming. 

Tuesday 8th October 2019- Teeth 

Today, Kites learned about the different teeth and their function in the human mouth. We all had a go at eating a pear with just our incisors and it was quite tricky (and a little messy)! We then had a go at eating some crusty bread, we discovered that our canines were useful at tearing the bread into smaller chunks. Take a look at our pictures below.

Wednesday 2nd October 2019- French 

This week, we have been extending our language skills, by learning how to have a simple conversation in French. We can now ask and respond in French to - What is your name? How old are you? Where do you live? Check out our pictures below from our French languages afternoon .

Monday 23rd September 2019- Maths- Negative numbers

On Monday, Kites took their learning outside! We formed a human number line from -15 to 15.

Friday 20th September 2019- Learning Journey

This week, Kites had great fun during drama. We acted out key parts of our class text- Bill's New Frock to create a story board. We used our story boards to help plan our diary entries. Kites used their expressions to convey what the main character, Bill, may have felt during each scenario.

Tuesday 17th September- Science

This week, Kites have been exploring how dangers to the environment such as pollution, can pose a serious threat to all life on Earth. We created a food web which highlighted the effect dangers to the environment can have on living creatures. Check out our food web below.

Thursday 12th September 2019

This week in Kites, we have continued our learning of the place value system and have developed our mathematical language when comparing numbers. We have extended our understanding of 4-digit numbers and can now use less than and greater than symbols accurately when comparing 4-digit numbers.

Thursday 5th September- Maths- Place Value

In Kites we have been looking at place value focusing on ones, tens, hundreds and thousands. We have used a variety of resources such as diennes, bead strings and place value counters to facilitate our learning. Check out our pictures below.