Year 4 Autumn Term 1

English – Oliver and the Seawigs

Oliver Crisp's parents are explorers and for 10 years they have travelled the world, taking Oliver with them. Now they have decided that all the great unknowns have been seen and they are ready to return home. To their surprise they discover a dozen mysterious islands in the bay near their house. They pull out the dinghy and immediately set off to explore whilst Oliver begins to unpack. When he goes out to check on them, the islands are gone and so are his parents. That is why a boy who dreams of staying home and going to school winds up on yet another amazing adventure, in search of his missing parents.

Through the unit children will:

• explore, interpret and respond to illustrations in a book
• discuss meanings
• build an imaginative picture of a fantasy world, based on real life experience
• explore a story and its experiences through role play and through writing in role
• write stories from another character’s point of view

Maths – Place Value, Rounding, Addition and Subtraction

To start the term, the children will focus on their understanding of place value by reading, writing, representing and partitioning numbers up to 10,000.  They will round numbers to the nearest 10,100 and 1000 as well as finding 1000 more or less than a number. Children will order and compare numbers to 10,000. Later in the term, we will add and subtract numbers with up to 4 digits using the formal written methods of column addition and subtraction.  They will estimate and use inverse operations to check answers to a calculation.  Finally, they will apply our knowledge and skills to solve a range of addition and subtraction two-step problems in contexts.

Science – Changing State

This unit, involves identifying different materials, and exploring how they can be changed by freezing or melting. The children will look at the process of evaporation and the process of condensation. They will look at them in detail through the context of the water cycle. The children will undertake practical experiments to explore how these processes work and record our findings.

Geography - Blue Abyss

During our Blue Abyss topic, the children will develop our creative skills by using a variety of materials to produce a collage showing the layers of the ocean and the creatures that live in each layer. They will also be exploring the seas and oceans and marking them on a map.

Art – Animal and the seven elements of Art

During our ‘Getting to know you’ week, the children will explore form using clay to create their own horse. We will look at the folk-style form of the Bankura Horse created by craftspeople from Panchmura Village, Benegal as inspiration for our designs.

The children will spend the rest of the term improving their skills and techniques in the seven elements of art: line, shape, space, value, form, texture, and colour.

French - Numbers, calendars and birthdays

This term, the children will be learning how to say numbers, days of the week and the months of the year in French. They will then use this knowledge to say when their birthday is and to ask someone when theirs is.  They will also learn other dates and seasons.

Computing - Computing systems and networks

In Computing, the children will be looking at how to search for information online. We will look at how companies encourage people to buy from their websites. They will look at how opinions online are not always the truth and at how technology can impersonate a living thing online (a bot). They will look at how technology can be a distraction and how we might need to limit our time using it.

Children will be looking at collaborative learning and consider the tools that will help them to do this. 

P.E. 

This term the children will be learning about tag rugby. During the term, the children will develop their passing and catching skills, movement off the ball and how they communicate with others. They will also learn how tactics are used within rugby. They will demonstrate these abilities when working as part of a team.

In their second PE lesson, the children will be developing a multitude of skills that can be transferred across a variety of sports. They will focus on hand-eye coordination, agility, pace, stamina and aim. The children will complete a variety of activities each week and create their own activity to promote one of the learnt skills.

Jigsaw (P.S.H.E.) – Being Me in My World

Our first PSHE topic is ‘Being Me in My World’, which will enable the children to think about who they are and about their place in the world. This topic will include aspects such as becoming a class ‘team’, discussing responsibilities, rewards and consequences as well as creating ‘our learning charter’. They will learn about their rights and responsibilities as a member of the class. The children will explore how to value themselves and others. They will explore how to make the class a safe and fair place for everyone.

R.E. – Christianity in Action

In RE, the children will be looking at ‘Christianity in Action’. They will read the story of the Good Samaritan to learn more about Christian beliefs and values and consider how these are shown in the actions of others. The children will take a closer look at the work of the Salvation Army and consider how their beliefs influence their actions in the wider community.