Welcome to Year 3/4S

Teacher: Miss Sullivan

Key days

PE: Thursday

Year 4 swimming: Wednesday

Summer Term 2024

Welcome to Year 3/4S. It has been wonderful getting to know the children since January and  I am very excited for our final term of this academic year. We have lots of interesting topics to cover and we are going to learn about mountains, our local area, plants, time, money, writing to entertain and persuade, how pop-up cards are made and lots more before we finish for the summer. 

On our class page, you will be able to find information about this half term's learning.

At the top of this page I have attached this year's topic overview and this half-term's spelling sheet (Term 3a).

English

We started the half-term by editing and publishing our amazing non-chronological reports on Dragons.

Next, we will be exploring The Iron Man written by Ted Hughes. We will be using descriptive language, including similes to write a character description. After that, we will compare the Iron Man with the Iron Woman. Inspired by our reading, we will then write a persuasive letter to the Prime Minister asking the government to take action on climate change.

For our Guided Reading sessions, we will continue to focus on our VIPERS (Vocabulary, Inference, Prediction, Explanation, Retrieval and Summarising) skills. We will continue to apply our growing knowledge of root words, prefixes and suffixes, both to read aloud and to understand the meaning of new words that we discover. We will also be reading further exception words, noting the unusual correspondences between their spellings and sounds, and where these occur in the word. 

Maths

This half-term, we will be finishing off our Fractions unit, before moving onto Decimals, Money and Time. We will look at real-life problems that require reasoning and problem-solving skills.

As ever, knowing your multiplication and division table facts will help you to be an efficient mathematician who can notice connections and patterns.

Throughout the year, we ask that children try to play on TTRockstars each week. Even 5 minutes, 3 times a week can make a huge difference to your times table recall.

All children have been provided with logins for TTRockstars and My Maths but if you have lost your logins, please see your class teacher.

Topic - History and Geography

First of all, we will complete our learning about Mountains, begun in the Spring term. We will compare different mountainous regions and learn about how mountains are formed. Then, we will plan a route to climb the Three Peaks and learn about the climate of mountainous regions.

In the summer term, we will be completing our Local Area study.

In Geography, we will find out about the human and physical features of our local area. We will develop our map-reading and navigation skills by drawing our own maps of routes we have experienced. We will discuss how our local area has changed over time and how Withington has grown from a rural village to an urban village, an extension of the city of Manchester.

In History, we will study Withington now and then. We will learn about how the Industrial Revolution caused Withington to become an urban area. We will learn about the lives of child apprentices and consider whether their rights were respected.

We will go on a field trip to Quarry Bank Mill to complete Geography fieldwork on the River Bollin and to learn about the lives of child apprentices who worked at the mill.

Science 

This term we will be exploring plants.

We will:

• identify and describe the functions of different parts of flowering plants: roots, stem/trunk, leaves and flowers
• explore the requirements of plants for life and growth (air, light, water, nutrients from soil, and room to grow) and how they vary from plant to plant
• investigate the way in which water is transported within plants
• explore the part that flowers play in the life cycle of flowering plants, including pollination, seed formation and seed dispersal.

Religion

This half-term, our Pentecost-themed topic is Energy. We will learn about how Pentecost transformed the lives of the apostles and how they were empowered by the Holy Spirit. Following that, our final two topics will be Choices and Special Places. We will also celebrate Other Faiths Week in June, where we will learn about Hinduism.

Home Learning

All Y3/4 children bring home their red homework book on a Friday. Homework should be returned by the following Thursday.

- 1 spelling sheet to practice this week's words

- 2 times tables activity sheets

As well as this, all children are expected to read and complete online activities as described below. 

Every other half-term, we also send a Learning Log project with a range of creative tasks for children to complete at home.

PE

This half term you will need to come into school wearing your PE kit each Thursday.

Swimming

All Year 4 children will be swimming every Wednesday - children should come to school dressed in their school uniform on this day.

Clothing requirements for School Swimming are as follows:

Girls:

• One-piece swimming costume – no bikinis*
• A swimming hat is required to be worn if the hair covers the eyes or airways
• A towel

* Please note that in order for your child to benefit from the swimming lessons appropriate aquatic clothing must be worn. Should your children wish to wear items of clothing that cover up parts of the body, there are specific aquatic clothing designed for this purpose. Cotton leggings are detrimental to teaching and are a risk to health and safety.

Boys:

• A pair of traditional swimming trunks
• A swimming hat is required to be worn if the hair covers the eyes or airways
• A towel 

No Bermuda or long shorts are allowed - for reasons of safety the swimwear should be sufficiently tight fitting to allow the freedom of body and limb movement without causing unsafe water resistance.  

Jewellery of any description should not be worn in the school swimming lessons.  It is important that earrings in particular are removed.

Goggles are only permitted for medical reasons.  Parents must produce a letter from either a Doctor or an Optician to state that your child has a medical condition and is required to wear goggles in the school swimming lessons.

Thank you for your continued support.

If you have any queries, please do not hesitate to contact the school office.