Year 4

Autumn 2015

Dates for the

Diary

17th September:

Welcome Mass

22nd September:

New Walk Museum

and Art Gallery

20th and 21st

October: Parents

Consultations

22nd October:

Whole school

Harvest Mass 2pm

11th November:

Class Assembly

3rd December: BRW

Advent Celebration

7pm

17th December:

Advent Mass

Mysteries, Mummies and

Myths - Can we be as creative

as the Egyptians? A warm welcome to all the new pupils and parents of Year 4! We hope you had a wonderful and restful summer and are ready for the exciting Autumn term ahead! As the children move to Year 4, it is an exciting time and it is our aim to ensure that the children will be working hard and challenging themselves to become excellent, enthusiastic and independent learners. It is crammed with opportunities for the children to create and explore!

BRW will be embarking on ‘The Year to Create’ for 2015-2016.We will be exploring the creative Ancient Egyptians where we hope to be as creative as them and more so! At the centre of our learning are our Come and See topics:

‘People’ in Christianity, and how the people in our families shape our ideas, beliefs and actions.

‘Called’ in which we will consider how being ‘chosen’ can change our lives and the lives of those around us.

‘Gift’, where we look towards Jesus’ birth and prepare for this special gift from God.

In English, we will be reading ‘Egyptian Cinderella" by Shirley Climo. The story will help with discussing the culture of Egypt (today and 3000 years ago!) We will discuss what culture is and compare that of Egypt to our own in the UK. We will also compare the Egyptian version of Cinderella with the well-known Western version. Along side this we will study Instructions by creating our own mummified teddy! A range of text types will be studied, such as reports, narrative descriptions, information and explanation texts as well as recounts.

In Mathematics, we will build on our learning from previous years, by re-visiting and refining mental and written methods; revising place value and number facts regularly; converting between a range of measures and analysing and representing data in a range of charts.

Our topic work will be centred around the Ancient Egyptians where in history we will explore one of the

most ancient and fascinating civilisations along with culture and social structure. To compliment this,

Geography will focus upon modern Egypt, recognising and describing the key physical and human

features of the country and the River Nile, comparing the climate of the UK, together with identifying the

importance of the tourism industry in Egypt. Our Science activities will explore a range of experiments

linked to Egypt, including mummification, decay and fossilisation.

With Art and Design we will explore and create Egyptian portraits, cat mummies and even make our own

mummy tombs. Computing will allow the children to reinforce and perfect their skills in word processing

and coding. In French, year 4 will continue to explore and revise numbers, colours and greetings through a

series of games, texts and written activities. Year 4 are also lucky enough to be working with the Becket

School Music team, with whom we will create a band and learn to play instruments such as recorder,

trumpet and ukulele.

To support our learning, alongside Year 3, we have organised an educational visit to Leicester’s New Walk

Museum and Art Gallery, where the secret world of the ancient Egyptians will be revealed! More details to

follow.

Finally, we look forward to an amazing and creative term; we appreciate the commitment and dedication

from home and look forward to the pupils growing in confidence, independence and maturity throughout

Year 4. Please, if you have any queries please feel free to pop in and ask.

How you can help:

Correct school PE kits will be needed every day. Kits should be appropriate for the season i.e. both out-door and indoor kits are needed for the winter months. PE will take place on Thursday and Friday.

· Children receive weekly homework on a Friday which is collected on a Thursday.

It is so important that the children know their number facts. Multiplication, division, addition and subtraction facts are the basis of everything else that is learnt in Maths. Children may have number

facts to learn and will be quizzed on.

Spellings— unless learning lines and lyrics, children will have a set of spellings to learn each week, to be tested every Tuesday. Please keep checking them on these as often as possible. Writing them down is

effective.

Read with your child every day, and ask them questions about the text. Please record in their diaries the pages they have read and initial this to enable good communication with home and school. This

recording is seen as evidence that they have read everyday and is treated as homework.

Exciting news: Each week in Year 4 we will be having Hot Seat Talks. This is where the child is asked to present a five minute talk on a randomly chosen topic. In the past the children have included quizzes,

PowerPoint presentations, music, resources, or have just used a fact sheet they have created. The aim of these talks is to develop the children’s speaking and listening skills as well as boosting confidence and

self-esteem. It promises to be an enjoyable activity for the children. If you have any queries or your child needs support with this, please see me so I can help.

· Take a look at Year 4s class page and blog for more information! brwacademy.com

I look forward to meeting you and getting to know your children for an exciting year ahead.

Miss Fisher