Dragons and Directors

It is hard to believe but yes, we have already reached the end of our first half term. It has given me great pleasure and pride to teach the children this half term and I can't wait for the next!

This week the children have been writing their own myths based around their knowledge of the Vikings. Once they had written their myth they cut it down into 100 word mini sagas and then 50 words. This gave the children a great opportunity to think about the structure of a story and how to read and edit their writing.

On Monday the children completed their addition and subtraction warm task in which every child made progress from the cold task. This was a very proud moment for us all. We then focused on time for a few lessons, an area which we will return to later in the year. The children had to complete a puzzle, as a group, to match the 24hr and 12hr times...
 

During theme, the children have been learning about the Viking raid on Lindisfarne. After taking down some notes about the event, the children got into groups and planned their own news reports. This involved the children taking on various roles such as reporter, interviewer, weather man, Viking, Saxon or monk...

Lastly, I am very impressed with the quality of creative homework from class four this half term. We had a fantastic homework share today in which each child had the chance to display and talk about their homework. Their effort has not gone unnoticed and I would like to say thank you to everyone who helped the children at home. Here is what they all produced...

 

 

Have a fantastic half term everyone!

Myths and Materials

As the last week before half term approaches, the children have shown no signs of dropping their superb work ethic. We have started our work on myths by looking at the different types of character involved with a myth and how to storyboard their own. During one particular lesson we focused on the story of Thor's stolen hammer and then 'hot seated' the characters.

During maths we have been continuing addition and subtraction ready for a warm task next week. We have looked closely at word problems and re-capped mental and written methods. Our final mini unit will be rounding and estimating to add large numbers.

Science was very practical and investigative for year four this week as we looked at which materials are conductive of electricity. We did this by placing different materials in a circuit and seeing if the light bulb worked.

Theme lessons are still focused on the Vikings and we have been researching the Viking raid on Lindisfarne with a view to creating a news report using drama.

I apologise for the lack of pictures this week, there seem to be some technical issues which will be resolved by next week.

School Council and Sketching

This week has been full of variety and the children have done very well to lend themselves to a great many challenges. Maths has still been focused on addition and subtraction but we have drawn our attention to missing number and word problems which will continue into next week. These questions have challenged the children's knowledge of inverse and reading a question carefully to understand what it is asking.

In English we have been recapping the structure and devices of a persuasive letter. This led up to us completing a warm write today which I am looking forward to reading. Next week we will turn our attention to myths and mini sagas to fit with our Viking theme.

During theme we have continued our work on the Vikings to find out who they were and where they came from. Today we started to sketch and design our own Viking prows....

Throughout the week the children have written and practiced speeches to put their names forward to be a school council representative. They all did brilliantly to stand in front of the class and deliver a speech. I was very proud....

After a very fair and well thought out voting process by the children, the result came in that our representatives will be Lucy and Daniel.

Notices:

- Creative homework has been handed to the children, this is to create their own breed of dragon and include a short piece of writing. If they have lost the sheet please don't hesitate to send them for a new one.

- Active Learn: I have allocated all children with new bug club books, maths activities and grammar/spelling activities. If these appear too easy/difficult please let me know.