Welcome to the Year 4 page!
In Year 4, there is a big focus on reading. By Year 4 we would expect the majority of children to be reading Grey or Black book bands and to be able to read with fluency. Throughout the year we will be teaching children how to accurately answer comprehension questions and will focus on identifying the different types of questions they could be asked (retrieval, inference and choice). Children will be able to frequently change their book banded book or bring home catch-up reading books.
We also use the Oxford Reading Buddy where children can access further texts:
Learning times tables will also be a key focus. By Year 4, all children should have rapid recall of all of their times tables and they will sit a government test in the summer term. To ensure all children feel confident and ready to take the test we work hard to help prepare them and also highly value the benefits of having a rapid recall of these facts as this helps children to reduce their cognitive load when tackling more complex multiplication word problems. TT Rockstars is an exciting way to engage all our children and is something we would strongly encourage all children to have go at when they are at home. In school, we regularly check children’s progress and how often they are logging onto the app and it is also regularly celebrated within assemblies with ‘rock battles’ and ‘battle of the bands’ competitions between classes.
Times Tables Rock Stars (ttrockstars.com)
Year 3 and 4 spelling words:
The national curriculum in England – English Appendix 1: Spelling (publishing.service.gov.uk)
Log in details for the above links can be found in your child’s diary.
Wider curriculum learning
In geography, the children will describe the key stages of rivers and the water cycle, with a focus on The River Stour. They will use maps, atlases and digital mapping to locate countries and rivers as well as other topographical features. The links below may help your child with their understanding:
The Stour Valley Way: Walks along the River Stour in Dorset
As scientists, the children will learn how some materials change state when heated or cooled and they will group materials based on whether they are solids, liquids or gasses. There will be different experiments based on evaporation and condensation to complement our work on the water cycle.
What is evaporation and condensation? – BBC Bitesize
If you would like more detail about your child’s learning please come and talk to your child’s class teacher.
Home learning
Children should read a minimum of 3 times a week and record this in their home school book by colouring the reading book picture each time they read. Children have a home learning book which they take home on a Friday and is due back in on the following Wednesday. Home learning will be a maths task which focus on increasing your child’s fluency and arithmetic skills. We also encourage all children to log on to TT Rockstars and Spelling Shed as much as possible.
