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Horizon Academy Trust is an exempt charity regulated by the Secretary of State for Education.

company number 08411590

registered office is C/O Biggin Hill Primary School, Biggin Avenue, Bransholme, Hull, United Kingdom HU7 4RL.

Enter Trust

Cavendish Primary School

welcome to Year 4

In the Year 4 team, Mr Dinsdale (Assistant Head, Phase Leader and Safeguarding Lead), Mrs Marley (Reading and Science Lead), Mrs Warhurst, Mrs Headley, Mrs Shields, Mrs Miller and Miss Marsden are committed to providing the best experience of school life possible for the children in their care.

As the children grow and mature, expectations are heightened and independence is key. Your child will be encouraged to start to think about their own learning. They need to make decisions on how to present work, how and when to complete homework, and how to learn best.

Children often ask questions and their teacher will encourage them think for themselves too. Could they answer the question themselves? Can they make that choice? If they can, then they are learning skills which are vital for future years in school and adult life.

Our priorities are to ensure that children are happy, settled, engaged and enthused about their learning. This is why we aim to make it so challenging, yet fun!

Year 4 Newsletters, Knowledge Organisers & KIRFs Documents

Autumn Term:

Y3 & 4 Autumn Term Curriculum Overview

Y4 Autumn Term KIRFS

Y4 Autumn Term Knowledge Organiser - Addition & Subtraction

Y4 Autumn Term Knowledge Organiser - Place Value

Spring Term:

Y3/4 Spring Term Curriculum Overview

Y4 Spring Term Knowledge Organiser Multiplication and Division

Y4 Spring Term KIRFs

Summer Term:

 

 

 

reading

Enjoying a novel from beginning to end is such a satisfying experience and we want to support the children in doing this throughout Year 4. Taking them through the journey of a novel means we can teach them about the characters, new vocabulary, settings and general plot twists and turns, guiding them through the process of becoming strong readers who don’t just read a text but immerse themselves in it, understand it and become hooked.

When we complete our guided reading sessions, we focus on key skills such as decoding, retrieving and inferring, amongst others.

The single most important thing that you can do at home is to hear your child read. Good readers make good writers because they are exposed to a greater variety of vocabulary, syntax, grammar and style. When you listen to your child read, there are a number of things to remember:

  • Make it fun! Use silly voices and read to each other as well as just listening.
  • Ask questions about the text, the characters, the plot, the setting, the style of writing, and the words. Anything to get them to think about what they are reading and to consider the deeper messages hidden in the subtext.
  • Read a wide range of writing – from comics to newspapers, novels to Pokémon cards, and even your child’s own writing!
  • Look up individual words in a dictionary or thesaurus together to find out what they mean.
  • Be a good role model for reading. This is the perfect excuse to curl up on the sofa, forget the chores, and read a good book yourself!

Of course, children in Year 4 are perfectly capable of reading to themselves as well, and independent reading must also be encouraged. However, it is important that those comprehension skills are regularly checked and reading aloud is perfect for that.

Y4 Long Term Plan Reading Spine Spring 2023

 

WRITING

Your child will continue to develop across the different strands of writing: imagination and ideas, audience and purpose, handwriting or typing, spelling, grammar, and punctuation. They will be expected to:

Plan their writing by:

  • Discussing writing similar to that which they are planning to write in order to understand and learn from its structure, vocabulary and grammar.

Draft and write by:

  • Composing and rehearsing sentences orally (including dialogue), progressively building a varied and rich vocabulary and an increasing range of sentence structures
  • Organising paragraphs around a theme
  • In narratives, creating settings, characters and plot
  • In non-narrative material, using simple organisational devices (for example, headings and sub-headings).

Evaluate and edit by:

  • Assessing the effectiveness of their own and others’ writing and suggesting improvements
  • Proposing changes to grammar and vocabulary to improve consistency, including the accurate use of pronouns in sentences
  • Proof-read for spelling and punctuation errors.

The writing process considers all of the necessary elements needed for a successful piece within a specific genre. The children will know and learn all of the building blocks prior to writing their final piece.

Poetry plays a big part across Year 4, with the children learning some poems and using these to influence their own creativity.

 

SPELLING

We continue to build upon the phonics and spelling knowledge and rules learnt previously. We encourage the children to independently use this knowledge in their writing. To enable a deeper understanding of the words they’re learning, we plan a weekly dictation. Spellings will be sent home each week and the children tested on these. We recommend learning spellings in sentences and using the spelling activities on Spelling Shed.

 

MATHS

In Year 4, the children will continue on their Maths journey as they develop fluency, reasoning and problem-solving skills in Mathematics, building on their previous knowledge using the Mastery Maths approach which has been used throughout their time at Cavendish Primary School. Children are given the opportunity to progress in each domain of learning in small steps, making it possible for children to gain confidence and develop deep understanding in maths. This approach allows children to believe that they can succeed at maths in real-life situations, feel confident and resilient whilst giving children the means to represent their mathematical reasoning verbally and pictorially.

Throughout the year, we will have a significant focus on each child’s times table knowledge with our goal for all children to be able to recall all of their times tables to 12 x12 in any random order. This is to prepare them for the year 4 multiplication check which will take place at the end of the academic year when each child will be asked 25 questions and have 6 seconds to type each answer. Any of the following tips will help your child to become a master of their times tables.

  • Practise regularly, making sure to go back and repeat tables you have practised before.
  • Sing tables in the car; at mealtimes; before bed; walking the dog; at any spare moment!
  • Put a poster at the end of their bed or give your child tapes to listen to in the car.
  • Download an app such as Times Table Rockstars to practise on a laptop or tablet.

Times Table Rock Stars is the app which we use in school to promote the learning of times tables. The challenge is for all children to become Rock Heroes by answering questions quickly. Your child’s rock status will improve the quicker that children are able to answer their times table questions. Will your child be able to get their names in the Cavendish Primary School Rock Star Hall of Fame?

 

COMPUTING

In Year 4, children will build on the basic skills of computing which they have learnt so far at Cavendish Primary School. They will learn how to work collaboratively in a responsible and considerate way. They will learn how the internet works and how networks in school enable us to work together. They will look at how databases can be useful and find out just what is inside a computer. Children develop their research, word processing skills as they learn how web pages and web sites are created. They showcase their skills as they edit the HTML and CSS of a web page to change the layout of a website. They also explore spreadsheets as they research and store data by designing a weather station that gathers and records data.

 

SCIENCE

 

We want to create children who are inquisitive and independent and science enables us to do that. Children will work scientifically in almost all lessons:
  • Asking questions.
  • Setting up practical enquiries, ensuring fair tests.
  • Making observations and drawing conclusions.
  • Recording and presenting data. 

We will cover knowledge acquisition in such areas as:

  • Rocks and Soils
  • Forces
  • Animals including humans
  • Light
  • Plants

We build on prior learning and knowledge and link their learning to the real world through STEM days and other activities.

With out hands-on lessons, children are excited and immersed in this fascinating subject.

 

WIDER CURRICULUM

 

At Cavendish Primary School, our curriculum ensures that children learn about facts and acquire skills linked to specific subject areas. Each new block of lessons starts with a revision session, picking up on the key facts and skills that children should have from prior learning.

 This year we will be covering the following topics in History and Geography:

  • Earthquakes and Volcanoes
  • Cities and counties of the UK
  • European countries and cities
  • Stone Age to the Iron Age
  • Romans
  • Anglo Saxons

Educational visits and workshops are a key part of our curriculum and an activity is planned during every term. This might involve a visitor coming into school or a class trip linked to the theme.

 

We have carefully planned PE sessions, building on core National Curriculum skills and introducing children to games through the skills they have learnt.

 

We will also continue to build on knowledge learnt in Music, Spanish, Art and D&T, as well as exploring feeling through our coverage of the Jigsaw curriculum.

 

 

PARENTS AS PARTNERS

We recognise the importance of and value parental involvement in the life of the school. In Year 4, we are therefore committed to establishing and maintaining an effective and purposeful working relationship between the school and home. Parents/Carers are the most important influence in a child’s life. Any educational initiative can only be fully effective if there is partnership between parents, children and providers. We rely on you as parents and carers to ensure the pupils complete all the homework they are set, to listen to your child read at least four times a week and to engage with the different parental meetings that we offer throughout the year.

By working together, we can make a positive and meaningful difference to the pupils’ education.

 

end of year expectations

The National Curriculum outlines these expectations as being the minimum requirements your child must meet in order to ensure continued progress.

All the objectives will be worked on throughout the year and will be the focus of direct teaching and investigation. Any extra support you can provide in helping your children to achieve these is greatly valued.

Mathematics

  • Count backwards through zero to include negative numbers.
  • Compare and order numbers to and beyond 1,000.
  • Compare and order numbers with up to 2 decimal places - 4.25, 4.5 and 4.75
  • Read Roman numerals to 100.
  • Find 1,000 more/less than a given number.
  • Count in multiples of 6, 7, 9, 25 and 1000.
  • Recall and use multiplication and division facts all tables to 12x12 quickly from memory.
  • Recognise place value of any 4-digit number Th H T O
  • Round any number to the nearest 10, 100 or 1,000.
  • Round decimals with 1dp to nearest whole number.
  • Add and subtract numbers with up to 4-digits using written column method.
  • Multiply:

                - 2-digit by 1-digit/3-digit by 1-digit

  • Count up/down in hundredths.
  • Recognise and write equivalent fractions 2/6=1/3
  • Add and subtract fractions with same denominator 2/4 +3/4 = 1 whole and 1/4.
  • Read, write and convert time between analogue and digital 12 and 24 hour clocks.

Writing

  • Vary sentence structure, using different openers (When, Despite, However, Furthermore etc.)
  • Use adjectival phrases (e.g. biting cold wind).
  • Use appropriate choice of noun or pronoun.
  • Use fronted adverbials (words or phrases at the beginning of a sentence, used to describe the action that follows – Before the sun came up)
  • Use apostrophe for plural possession (Crocodile’s sharp tooth)
  • Use a comma after fronted adverbial (e.g. Later that day, I heard bad news)
  • Use commas to mark clauses (Tom, wearing his red hat, waved in the distance.)
  • Use inverted commas and other punctuation to punctuate direct speech “Why?”
  • Use paragraphs to organised ideas around a theme.
  • Use connecting adverbs to link paragraphs.
  • Write with increasing legibility, consistency and fluency in a cursive joined style.

Reading

  • Give a personal point of view on a text.
  • Re-explain a text with confidence.
  • Justify inferences with evidence, predicting what might happen from details stated or implied.
  • Use appropriate voices for characters within a story when reading aloud following punctuation accurately.
  • Recognise apostrophe of possession –plural. (The kitten’s toys rolled under the fridge)
  • Identify how sentence type can be changed by altering word order, tenses, adding/deleting words or amending punctuation.
  • Explain why a writer has used different sentence types or a particular word order and the effect it has created on the reader.
  • Skim & scan to locate information and/or answer a question.
  • Text mark to identify key information within a text when answering questions in oral and written form.