Since returning after the holiday, the children in Year 4 have really hit the ground running with their learning!
Maths
This week, we finished our unit on fractions with an exploration of how to add and subtract whole numbers, unit fractions and mixed numbers. The children showed a good understanding of the strategies involved and were able to apply them to solve a variety of questions. This fractions knowledge will also come in handy when we start to develop our learning to cover decimals in the coming weeks.
English
In our English lessons, we have started to explore persuasive writing – particularly in the form of advertisenments. We began by exploring existing examples and unpicking exactly what makes them persuasive in order to create a ‘toolkit’ of sorts. This was thwen used to try and “sell” random items from around the classroom. We also dove into the differences between fact and opinion and the children showed that they were very good at spotting examples of each. Next week, we will be specifically looking into radio adverts and eventually even creating our own!
Science
In Science, our new topic is all about the ways in which we can classify living things. We used the acronym MRS GREN to help us remember the seven life process that all living things must do to be classed as ‘living’ and also explored the differences between ‘living’, ‘non-living’ and ‘never lived’. We had some really interesting conversations about this, especially when it came to identifying examples of things that were once alive, but no longer were and things that had never been living at all. It was really lovely to see and hear so many children engaging with our topic in this way.
History
After doing so much work on the Vikings last half-term, it was finally time to answer the question posed at the very beginning of the unit: Did the Vikings deserve their vicious reputation? We began by analysing a range of different sources to see what else they could tell us about what life was like for the Vikings.
Once this was done, the children had to pull together everything that they had learned to make their final decision. The end results were very interesting. Though almost everyone agreed that the Vikings were, at least initially, quite violent and vicious towards the monks, many children also recognised that the Vikings had many other sides and talents, including roles as traders, farmers and craftsmen. They were also able to justify their answers using everything that they had learnt over the course of the half-term.
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