Mrs Gibbons

Time is racing by…

… which was the theme of Friday afternoon, to mark Science Week. Year 4 was investigating whether people with the longest legs run the fastest. This involved measuring leg length, timing each other running sprints and then recording the data. We had to wait till the rain and stopped and dried up before we could go outside, so the final recording and analysis will wait till next week.

We’ve also been considering evaporating water as we measured the amounts of water in containers in different locations. We were surprised at how much effect on evaporation heat actually has!

In RHE, we have been learning about how we are all created in God’s image. In particular, we’ve considered how what we see on social media frequently isn’t real and doesn’t represent reality. However, reality is what matters and we should all respect and love each other in our “real forms”, like God does.

Here three children are reading the story which formed the basis of the RHE lesson. The children really enjoy reading the scenarios and role-plays for the sessions. They are great public speakers and actors!

The home learning has posted at the right time this week, so the children can share the learning they’ve been doing about perimeter and length, which included shape which they have enjoyed. It’s nice to have a change from straight number work. Let’s hope there is some sun this weekend and I hope that you all have a relaxing time together.

Year 4 Books Wishlist

As Mrs Porter mentioned in the bulletin, the birthday traditions at St Adrians include buying a book for the school library, from the year group’s wishlist on Amazon. Here is year 4’s: https://amzn.eu/cP4l70U

Buying a book for the school library is a wonderful way to contribute to the joy of learning and pleasure of reading for current and future pupils. When a child goes to the library, s/he may see his/her book on the shelves and s/he can recommend it to friends. It will have a bookplate on the front cover so readers can see which kind person shared a favourite read with them.

World Book Day Fun

The children looked amazing in their costumes – there was a huge range of book characters learning in year 4, which was great to see. I am sorry not to post a photo, but the Apple mini-i-pad has “frozen”and I can’t get into it. When I can I will post the photo then.

As always, year 4 worked really well as a team and sang their Mother’s Day enthusiastically. It was lovely to see so many Mums, Grandmas and aunts today.

We have started a new topic in Maths – length and perimeter so there are plenty of opportunities to talk about distances and to estimates lengths and height of furniture, for example.

We are continuing to learn about Lent and Easter in RE and I am looking forward to seeing lots of individual entries for the Easter Art competition.

Have a lovely weekend.

Our new book isn’t odd at all…

Two chapters in and everyone in class 4 is desperate to know who the creatures are and what adventure is going to happen next in “Odd and The Frost Giants”. We have travelled to a different time and place to meet some very interesting characters… More will be revealed next week…

The book is by Neil Gaiman, an author I’ve been mentioning at consultations. He writes fantastic books – novels and picture books – for children which appeal to many ages and girls and boys. If your child enjoys this book, or even if s/he wouldn’t choose reading as the first thing to do, this author could be for them. Your child doesn’t have to read every word – you could read a page each, or you could chip in when it gets tricky. Any way into reading is really worth it, for so many reasons, not the least being as inspiration for writing. There are Neil Gaiman books in the school library for anyone to borrow. This website is American and shows some of the titles, for all ages he has written- https://www.mousecircus.com/books

Have a great weekend and I look forward to seeing the parents I haven’t seen yet on Monday morning.

Logic and nonsense in year 4 for the week before half-term

Both were studied this week – logic in the form of data which the children saved using data loggers, when they worked well in small groups. They were also inspired by Lewis Carroll in “The Jabberwocky” and wrote their own fantastic versions of the nonsense poem which will be made into an anthology. They also made good progress with multiplication, moving onto formal multiplication. It’s been a packed five weeks and I hope everyone has a really good break and rest. I look forward to seeing everyone after the half-term break.

Feeling good on and off line

.. has been the theme of this week. Some of what we have done is in the bulletin. On Thursday, the children also thought of an achievement they are proud of and shared this with their table. Also key to good mental health is a healthy outdoor environment and the Eco Councillors and other children planted some saplings on the field which will hopefully grow to provide shade and a home for birds and other animals.

The children are really enjoying “The Firework Maker’s Daughter” which is a beautifully written story of bravery and adventure, laced with plenty of humour.

Reading rich, varied and creative literature is a key aspect of good learning and the children are also loving exploring nonsense poetry, specifically “The Jabberwocky” by Lewis Carroll.

They have been learning about data – what it is, the pitfalls of collecting what seems to be straightforward data, and how well-suited computers are to gathering and processing it. They used data loggers, which are borrowed from a local computer hub.

Here is the display of the children’s writing about the (imitation) Roman artefacts we have here and their excellent accompanying sketches the children took great care in drawing.

The children used data loggers for the first time today. They recorded the levels of light and noise and the temperature in different parts of the classroom. Some children went to great lengths to ensure different readings!

Wishing you a relaxing, happy weekend.

What the Romans did for us….

Year IV know just what the Romans did for us and they told us all about it on Thursday. They did it with style, confidence and worked brilliantly as a team. The children learnt their lines off by heart so they could concentrate on delivering them clearly and loudly. Thank you for coming to support the children. We hope you enjoyed their ukelele playing. Thanks go to their teacher, Mrs Newman, who prepared all the music and tuned the ukeles the day before the performance.

We used the visit to Verulamium and the resources we have at school to complete some topical writing and Art which are now proudly displayed on the classroom wall. The children have very much enjoyed reading “Escape From Pompeii” and will start a new book very soon.

Everyone looked amazing on Number Day on Friday. Thank you for your donations to the NSPCC. The children played some games from the nrich website to use their multiplication and division fact recall in strategic problem-solving contexts. Maybe you could play the games with your children at home? The links are :

https://nrich.maths.org/6863 – Times Tables shifts,

https://nrich.maths.org/10094 – Four in a Row (or similar name)

Year 4 travel back to Verulamium

… was one of the headlines year 4 chose to start their reports on their trip to Verulamium Museum. They also wrote about what they had learnt and their ideas show insight.

It was a beautiful day to walk across Verulamium Park and the interest in the dogs we passed along the way was almost as great as that shown in the Roman artefacts we handled during the workshop session. It was a fantastic opportunity to actually touch the same objects that Romans made nearly 2000 years ago. The children then had the opportunity to learn more about the Roman history of their city by exploring the museum exhibits.

We are very grateful to the two Mums who came with us, midweek; and without whose support we couldn’t do these very valuable enrichment activities. Thank you.

The Roman topic, studied in History and through reading “Escape From Pompeii”, has provided the children with opportunities to learn about vocabulary, practise art and understand the impact of a hugely significant civilisation.

w/c 15th January in year 4

With the freezing weather and roadworks getting to school has been tricky this week, but once in year 4 it’s really warm and cosy as the new heating does its job well. The sun has been streaming through the window to make the days bright.

The children are engrossed in our current book “Escape From Pompeii”

The children are engrossed in our current book “Escape From Pompeii” which contains a wealth of powerful verbs and interesting language. The children love the fascinating subject of volcanoes and this story shows the impact of a pyroclastic flow. They have been creating some excellent paragraphs with expanded noun phrases. On Google Classroom I’ve posted another two pages in the grammar book to help support this learning. I sent home a couple of sheets relating to this book, because I came across them in researching resources and they were so useful for vocabulary building and comprehension skills. Its purely optional to use these resources or not.

Linked with this, we are learning about the Romans, leading on from the children’s learning about the Iron Age last year. This another fascinating topic – “What did the Romans ever do for us?” is a question it’s always intriguing to answer. Our trip to Verulamium Museum on Wednesday will help deepen this understanding. If you are able to accompany us, please could you contact the office as we still need an adult (though I appreciate that Wednesday morning is not convenient for work schedules). Thank you.

We’re coming to the end of learning about times tables facts and soon will apply that knowledge in formal multiplication and division, involving instant recall of those facts.

States of Matter is our topic in Science. Can your child explain to you why solid objects retain their shape after being squashed and squeezed but a gas can occupy any size shape into which it is released?

The children’s ukelele playing is really progressing and the collective sound is very jolly and uplifting.

There were a few complaints about the number of spelling words last week – I did ask the class! – so apologies if the quantity and variety was a bit much for your child or you. However, there were good improvements and I’m very proud of the seriousness and commitment they children show to improving their spelling and writing.

I hope you all have a relaxing weekend, whether the weather stays bitterly cold or warms up.

Welcome back to a new year!

The two weeks off have done everyone a lot of good and everyone is raring to go with learning. We started lots of new topics this week, including out book for writing “Escape From Pompeii”. The children role-played being citizens in Pompeii, before the volcano erupted.

The children explored replica Roman artefacts to better understand life in Ancient Rome. We shall see real versions of these when we visit Verulamium Museum on Wednesday 24th January.

In Maths, we have been learning about other ways to work out the answer to multiplication calculations and today the children used Dienes to show that multiplying a number by 12 is the same as mutliplying it by 12 and by 2, which are straightforward calculations to do; and then adding together these two answers.

I found out today that the cake sale raised £199.10 which is really fantastic! Thank you for your generosity in organising, making cakes as well as buying and selling them. I will discuss with the class what we would like to buy with the money.

I hope that you all have a lovely weekend and let’s all hope that it’s not going to be bitterly cold.