We have had a brilliant start to Term 5 in Year 4. The children have been raring to go and eager to start learning – well done Cyan and Turquoise!

English

In English this week we have started reading our new book called ‘Tales of Wisdom and Wonder’. This is a lovely book of short tales from different cultures. We began with the short story called ‘The Curing Fox’ and have also read the story ‘Fish in the Forest’ this week. For the first two weeks of term, we are learning how to write play scripts. We have studied lots of different play scripts and identified the features of play scripts. This week, we have learnt to use the structure and lay out of a play script, to write narration in the past tense and to write stage directions in brackets in present tense.

Next week, we will be learning to design stage scenery, using a laptop to use presentational effects of a play script such as italics and bold lettering, and then planning and writing our own play scripts for a traditional tale.

Maths

In maths this week we have been learning about Roman Numerals for the first time. We discussed where we might see them in the world such as on clocks and on Royal names like King Henry VIII.

The children learnt the symbols for 1,5,10, 50, 100, 500 and 1000, and use these to write Hindu-Arabic numbers (our normal numbers) in Roman Numerals.

1 = I     5 = V    10 = X    50 = L     100 = C     500 = D    1000 = M

We learnt the three golden Roman Nume-rules:

Nume-rule 1: You can’t have more than 3 of the same numeral next to each other. (e.g. You can’t have IIII  for, you must use IV)

Nume-rule 2: If you can you a bigger numeral you must! (e.g. VV doesn’t equal 10 because you can use X)

Nume-rule 3: When turning numbers into Roman Numerals, you must start by writing the largest place value. (E.g. When writing 342, start with the hundreds column (CCC) then write the tens column (CCCXL) then the ones column (CCCXLII))

We finished off the week looking at the place value of decimal numbers, recapping the learning covered in Term 1. The children learnt that after the decimal point is the tenths column, followed by the hundredths and thousandths columns (see picture below).

Thematic

Our thematic topic this term is Water World! We will be learning all about the water cycle and how rivers work. This week we began by looking at important rivers in the United Kingdom such as the Thames and Severn and we discussed that people settled near rivers because they provide a source of fresh water and are great for trade. We then located the important rivers of the world and learnt the capital cities of many countries.

Check out our work below:

Spellings

This week we are focussing on words beginning with auto- and inter- the spelling words for next week’s test are:

autograph, automatic, automatically, automobile, autodial, autobiography, autobiographies, autofocus, autocue, autopilot

Due to PE now being on a Tuesday, spelling tests have been moved to Thursdays.

Home learning

This week is a playwriting task. Can you make up a scene involving your favourite characters from a book, TV show or video game? They can be doing whatever you like but please write it as if it was a play script.

Remember a title, scene subtitle, stage directions (in present tense) and narration (in past tense) and definitely remember NO INVERTED COMMAS.

Reading

Please remember to be reading 4 times a week at minimum. It doesn’t necessarily have to be 4 days but it must be 4 separate episodes of reading. For instance, if you read a chapter in the morning and a chapter before bed that is two times. Make sure an adult signs the reading record so we can see what wonderful readers you all are!

Dates to remember:

• 21st May - Year 3 and 4 Viking Games at Upton Junior School

• 23rd May - Year 4 trip to Marlowe Theatre

• 24th May - Dress to Express day and Be here, be you, belong parade at 2.15 on school field

• 24th May - Last day of term

Many thanks

The Year 4 Team