Spring newsletter

     

Spring 1 

Welcome to 2019 … we hope you all had a good break over Christmas and are ready for this Spring term, as it will be full of hard work and fun! 

Our main topic this term is based around history and geography links to the Romans - so an exciting theme and we obviously have our visit to the Roman Baths.   

This term in English, we are going to begin by exploring all the new vocabulary we will need to understand and use, connected to our topic and ever expanding skill set. This will help us develop faster and more efficiently, across all subjects of learning. Over the next few weeks, we will be covering a range of texts covering the genres of letters, newspaper articles, narratives and informative fact files. The children will continue to develop a range of sentence types and to ensure that their writing contains detail, adventurous vocabulary and maintain good effort in presentation. Our main focus for reading will remain on comprehension skills, especially reading for inference and deduction. In addition, we shall be adding to a growing vocabulary bank which will further increase personal independence and understanding.  

Spellings will be given out as usual on Mondays, then tested the following Monday.  

In Maths, we will continue developing understanding of mental calculations and the formal written methods for addition, multiplication, subtraction and division. The concepts of fractions and area will also be covered before half term, allowing further opportunity for problem solving in real life situations.  

Home Learning  

Please ensure you encourage (and remind) your child to fill in their daily journal, summarising the text they are reading. An example of this is available on the school website home page. Our children are now expected to write a few sentences about what they have read each day at home in order to consolidate their comprehension skills. This is monitored weekly and is rewarded through their INSPIRE page.  

Our homework tasks remain as: 

• Weekly tasks to consolidate learning or to prepare for the following week’s learning 
• Projects (taking several weeks to complete)  
• Times table practice through Times Table Rockstars 
• Weekly spellings 

School Uniform 

Reminder: can you please ensure that your child is wearing the correct uniform, including black school shoes. Long hair should be tied back neatly, for health and safety reasons - especially during PE - Games. For further details of our uniform policy, please see the school website.  

PE 

PE/Games in Year 4 will continue to take place on Thursdays (Games) and Fridays (PE). PE kits should generally be kept in school. Your child will need a named:- 

• red t-shirt 
• black shorts  
• a pair of trainers 

• tracksuit bottoms and a sweatshirt for colder months 
• PE kits must be in school for these days (reminder letters will be sent home if kit is missing) 

Snacks 

As we are a healthy school, please ensure your child has a healthy snack at break time. This could be fruit, vegetables or a healthy snack bar. 

If you have any queries, please feel free to come and speak to us as usual. 

               Year 4 Team