Y4 HALF TERM 6

Keep sending us those photos...

We love seeing how your potatoes and sunflowers are growing. Don't forget to keep us updated.

Lovely Library Trip

Wow! we can't believe it is the final half term of the year! Where did that time go? We hit the ground running with a super trip to our very own Rayleigh Library. Karen, our librarian, told us all about how the library works and which books we can take out. She showed us information books all about our new Europe topic and then we were allowed to browse by ourselves. We had a wonderful time! All we have to do now if to remember to renew or take our books back in 3 weeks time!

Final Food and Farming Update.

Well, we have really enjoyed our Food and Farming topic this year, learning about how our meals get from farm to fork and growing our own vegetables. As you can see from our photos, our Carrots and Lettuce have grown fabulously and we have even had some peas in our pea pods!! We have designed our own gardens and won the Food and Farming Competition! With the vouchers that we won, Mrs King invested in some new gardening gloves that the whole school can benefit from. Well done Year 4!

Amazing Artwork

Our Theme and Science this half term is based around Habitats. In art, we have been looking at the artist Rousseau and how to draw on a grid. To practice our grid skills, we used a simple picture of an elephant to draw as a class and then we independently used our skills to sketch a squirrel. Over the next few weeks, we will be perfecting our sketching skills to reproduce an animal onto watercolour paper. As you can see, we have started to think about mixing primary colours to make secondary colours and we have looked at how to create different shades and tones by mixing in a little white and a little black paint. Once we have sketched our animals, we will be using watercolours to add colour and shading to our final piece. Watch this space for our finished products.....

The Rounders Showdown

Last half term, we learned how to play rounders. We practiced our throwing, catching and hitting skills and gradually built up to a big game. Today, 4SW took on 4R in the Great Year 4 Showdown! Fortunately the result was a 9-9 draw and everyone played to the best of their ability. well done!

Orienteering Fun

Today ( 10th June), we took part in 3 orienteering activities organised by Mr Hatton. We had to use our memory skills to match parts of a map, follow directions on a map grid to add up the values on cones and then run around the school field, finding markers to stamp our tickets. What a great morning!

Pizza Express 4SW

It was 4SW's turn to visit Pizza Express yesterday. We learned some more about the foods are used for pizza toppings and enjoyed touching and smelling bowels of basil, oregano, mushrooms, onion, olives and tomatoes. We all brought home our own margherita pizza to enjoy at home. Thank you Pizza Express.

Awesome Art Day

On Monday 13th June, we had a whole school Art Day. each year group studied art from a different part of the world. In Year 4, we looked at the artwork of New Zealand, Maori Art . Their pictures are inspired by nature. We looked at the artist Raewyn Harris. The Koru is the Maori name given to an unfurling fern that symbolises new life and growth. We used oil pastels to create our Koru Art. Aren't they beautiful?

Fantastic First Aid

Throughout this half term,. Year 4 will be doing all about First Aid. We have a weekly lesson about how to help someone in an emergency. So far we have looked at what kinds of things to carry in a first aid kit and what to do if you are the first to arrive at an accident. This week, we had a go at putting each other into the recovery position. Didn't we do well?

Creating a Crumble in Cookery!

Our Food and Nutrition skills have been perfected this week as we have been making the perfect apple and pear crumbles! We have learned how to peel and chop fruit safely using a peeler and a sharp knife. We have stirred the fruit and sugar carefully on the hot hob. Using our weighing and measuring skills, we read the scale on the weighing scales to combine flour, butter and sugar to make the perfect crumble topping and then we assembled the dish. We took our creations home to bake in our own ovens. Mmmmmm delicious! Let us know what you thought...

Peeling and chopping....

Heating on the Hob....

Weighing, making crumble and assembling.....

Science Workshop Follow-up

Following our fabulous 'Diverse Planet' workshop yesterday with 'Hands-on Science', we decided to make our own Woodland Food Webs to show how all species are important and they exist in a delicate balance. Here are our 3 dimensional Woodland webs. ..

Tennis Taster Sessions

Today we had a visit from Ryan at Rayleigh Tennis Club who came to give us a taster session in Tennis. We had a great time, playing short games up to 4 points in a little tournament. The winning girl and boy from each class were invited to take part in an inter schools tournament at Rayleigh Tennis Club. Well done to our winners and thank you to Ryan and his team.

We're Going on a Bug Hunt.... We're going to catch a Big One!

Today in science, we went on a bug hunt. We caught them carefully in our bug viewers so that we could observe and secord them and them we carefully returned them to nature!

Amazing Assault Course

We had so much fun this week, taking part in an assault course on our school field. There were so many brilliant obstacles such as : monkey bars, a seesaw, crawling nets and high bars that we were able to climb over, crawly under and swing from. Some of them were quite high and scary but we all overcame our fears and made ourselves proud! You can see from our photos how much we enjoyed it! Go Year 4!!

The Town Around Us - Walk to Grove Woods

As part of our Science and Geography curriculum, we walked from our school to Grove Woods. We followed a road map, collecting items along the way and marking on our map, the places where we found them. Once in the woods, we had a little rest and a snack and then went on a minibeast hunt with our adults. When we got back to school, we made a poster of our adventure. We stuck on the items we had found, described our route using compass references and included pictures along the way. We used our minibeast habitats knowledge to create a guide to woodland habitats. It was a beautiful day and we spent time chatting about the places we had been and the things that we had seen so that we now have an appreciation of how humans and other creatures co-exist on our planet and the impact we have on each other. A HUGE thank you to our adult helpers! We really appreciate you giving up your time for us.