Year 4 Weekly News 10.11.23
English
In English this week we have continued to learn how to write a 5 part story. This week we have been learning how to describe settings using personification, ambitious verbs and adverbs, similes and metaphors. The children thought of some excellent personification ideas; this is where the writer gives an object or animal human like features e.g. the snow ate Ivan’s feet as he trudged through the snow, the frozen icicles pointed at Ivan, the snowflakes danced in the sky. We then moved on to describing characters. The children are very skilled already at using descriptive language such as adjectives, verbs and verbs to describe what characters LOOK like, so this term we are learning how to show what characters are like using what they SAY. We have been recapping speech punctuation in our punctuation and grammar lessons and this has helped us to write dialogue in our English sessions. Next week, we will be learning about how to create suspense in the ‘build up’ section of our 5 part fantasy stories.
Maths
This week we have continued to learn about equivalent fractions. The children were solidly able to work out equivalent fractions using fraction walls or by shading shapes so we moved on to learn how to use multiples to find equivalent fractions. The golden rule for this is: whatever is done to the numerator, must be done to the denominator. We multiplied or divided both the numerator and denominator by the same number to find equivalent fractions. See below.
We then learnt about factors, common factors and highest common factors. The factors of 24 are 1, 24, 2, 12, 3, 8, 6 and 4.
Next week we will be simplifying fractions and learning about 3D shapes and classifying triangles.
Thematic curriculum
In our Ancient Egyptian themed learning, we have been studying some more history. We have learnt about the different pyramids that were built in the past and placed them in chronological order on a timeline. We learnt about BCE (before the common era) and CE (common era) and used these with the dates on our timelines. In our hieroglyphics lesson, we learnt about reliable and unreliable sources of evidence from the past. Finally, we learnt about mummification and mummified some tomatoes. Here are some pictures of this…
Next week we will be taking a pause from our Ancient Egyptian learning as it is 'Healthy Relationships' week. The theme of this week is 'If you can be anything, be kind'. We will be learning about the impact bullying can have on others and about how to be kind to others and kind to ourselves.
Love to Learn
Your Love to Learn challenge this week is to draw or make an Ancient Egyptian mask. You could paint it, colour it in with pens, or actually make a 3D version. We have sent home a white mask if you would like to use this to make it but you can also draw in your Love to Learn book if you’d rather. You have 2 weeks for this task so please could you send in your home learning by Wednesday 23rd November.
