Year 4

Welcome to the Chocolate Factory

with Mrs Gibbison, Mrs Savage

and Miss Tarr

Welcome to Year 4 and to the start of another wonderful year at Church Vale! We have many exciting things planned for this year and can't wait to get started on our exciting topics our first one being 'Feeling Hot Hot Hot' where we will be looking at Volcanoes and their impact on our Earth and linking this to Solids, Liquids and Gases and Living Things in Science.

Here are a few general bits of information to help along the way.

If you have any questions or would like to speak to us, please use the contact form at the bottom of the page or call into school. 

Thank you :)

Reading 

We love to read in Year 4! Already, your wonderful children have shown just how much they enjoy books and how knowledgeable they are about authors and genres they like. 

Even though they are now Year 4s, reading aloud and being read to are still so important so please encourage your child to read at home; once children can decode most words the real challenge comes in showing their understanding, so please encourage them to talk about what they have read. 

All children are required to read at least 3 times a week and record these in their reading diaries. This can be books but it can also be magazines, instructions, shopping lists... anything! Please sign their reading diaries each week and feel free to add any comments. We will read through these each Friday and the children can receive rewards and prizes when they meet milestones... there are even more prizes this year! 

Children can change their book when they would like to. They just need to ask! We don't make them persevere with a book they aren't enjoying as we really do want them to develop a love of reading. 

Homework

Spellings will be given out on a Friday to be learnt for an informal test the following Friday. Some weeks they may also be given a piece of Maths homework too. If the children have not completed their homework, they will complete it at playtime on a Friday.

There will also be an additional homework menu with more creative tasks on which children can choose to do and will be rewarded with Marvellous Me badges for. 

Homework menu coming soon... watch this space!

PE

We believe that having a healthy and active body will ensure we have a healthy and active mind. Research shows that children who are more active do better academically!

So it really is important that children always have their PE kit in school.

PE days will change each half term as we’re fortunate enough to have some excellent sports coaches coming in to run a variety of sessions with the children. During the first half term, Year 4 will be learning Striking and Fielding games on Mondays with Mr Richards and Outdoor and Adventurous games such as Orienteering on a Wednesday. These days can sometimes change because of the weather or the hall being unavailable. Therefore, can you please make sure that PE kits come into school on a Monday and remain in school until the end of the week. 

Children are not able to take part in PE if they are wearing earrings – if you are considering having your child’s ears pierced, please do this at the start of the summer holidays as it has a huge effect on their learning in PE.

We will be going swimming in the second half of the school year. 

Year 4 Multiplication Test

This year, the Government will be launching the Year 4 Multiplication Test in the Summer. This will be an online test and will test children's knowledge and fluency of the ALL times tables (up to 12s). They will have 6 seconds to recall each fact so they really have to be confident with them! 

This is something we would like the children to take in their stride and feel empowered to do their best on so we will be doing daily Times Table practices in school. You can help your child by practising with them at home and playing Times Table Rock Stars (link below). 

https://play.ttrockstars.com/auth/school