We have had another great week in Year 4. Here is what we have been up to…

Maths

In maths this week we have been learning about Roman Numerals. We have learnt these basic symbols:

I = 1     V = 5    X = 10    L = 50     C = 100   M = 1000

With these symbols we have learnt how to write our Hindu-Arabic numbers as Roman numerals. E.g. IV = 4      VIII = 8     IX = 9     XVI = 16      XXX = 30      MC = 1100         XL = 40

We also recapped our understanding of the place value of decimal numbers this week. We learnt that the place value columns after the decimal point are tenths then hundredths and that 1/10 = 0.1 and 1/100 = 0.01.

Next week we will be learning to add and subtract decimals, and to solve 2 step addition and subtraction problems using bar models.

English

In English this week, we have finished our unit on play scripts. The children wrote wonderful play scripts for the story of Jack and the Beanstalk and really looked like budding scriptwriters; they really impressed us with their great stage directions and narration!

We then started our new writing unit on setting and character descriptions. We have been thinking about the settings and characters in the story in Tales of Wisdom and Wonder called ‘The Blind Man and the Hunter’. We drew some wonderful pictures of the rainforest setting with the hunter and the blind man in the forest and used these to help us plan some expanded noun phrases. We then used these expanded noun phrases in our writing the next day to describe the characters and the rainforest as we rewrite a scene from the story.

Next week, we will be continuing to describe the African village where the hunter and blind man live, using all of our senses to gather ideas for our writing. We will be using compound and complex sentences in our descriptive writing.

Thematic

This week, in our themed unit called ‘Water World’, we have been learning some science! We found out about the 3 states of matter: solids, liquids and gases. We learnt about the way the particles behave in each state of matter and how each state of matter differs e.g. liquids can flow, solids have a fixed shape, and gases are often invisible and can change shape. The children learnt about changes of state, including evaporation and condensation, and that some changes of state are reversible and some are irreversible. We then conducted an experiment to find out the temperature that butter melts at. We used thermometers and made careful observations. Here we are carrying out our experiment…

Next week we will be learning about the Water Cycle.

Spellings

Mr Oxley’s group:

burn, turn, curly, surf, hurt, fur, burnt, father

Challenge words: nurse, curve

Mrs Cousins' and Miss Stephens’ groups:

educate, imagination,, prepare, exploration, imagine, circulation, explore, education, circulate, preparation, does, purpose, quarter

Challenge words: multiplication, identification, qualification

Spelling test for these words is on Thursday 15th May

Love to Learn

This week’s home learning task is English. This week we have learnt to use expanded noun phrases. We would like you to choose one of the settings below and write a description of the setting and character using as many expanded noun phrases as you can. Write your description in a paragraph or paragraph(s). Look carefully at the picture to find as many details to describe as you can. Remember, you can do things you would hear as well as see.

4  Please could this challenge be handed in by Wednesday 14^th May.

Dates to remember

Term 5 Dates for your Diary

21st May – Year 4 class assembly 2.50-3.05

23rd May – Be here, Be you, Belong celebration. Children can come to school wearing anything they feel represents them as part of our ‘Dress to Express’ day. We will have a parade at 2pm on the field to celebrate this, to which our families are all invited.

23^rd May – End of Term 5

Many thanks

We hope you have a lovely weekend

Mrs Cousins and Mr Oxley