Term 4: Shine a Light

Welcome to Term 4!

This term, our new topic is ‘Shine a Light’. This is a science-based topic with a focus on light. We will explore how to keep safe in the sun, conduct experiments on the best SPF to use and test which materials are reflective. We will also explore how shadows are made, and how we can change the size of them.

In reading this term, our class text is ‘The Iron Man’ by Ted Hughes. This tale of courage and friendship tells the story of the mysterious iron giant, who is initially feared by locals before befriending a little boy and saving the world! In reading lessons, year 3 and 4 will be delving deeper into how the author uses imagery and suspense to hook the reader. We will also develop our inference skills by considering what character’s might be thinking and feeling and find evidence to support this.

In Maths, year 3 will be continuing their topic of column subtraction, before moving onto written methods of multiplication. Year 4 will also be looking at written methods of multiplication and division.

Newspaper reports will be our focus in English, where we will be learning the structure and features included. Then, writing our own.

In PE on a Tuesday, Year 3 and 4 will be completing gymnastics in the hall. On a Friday, we will be outside learning throwing and catching skills through basketball.

We have an exciting term ahead!

Term 3: Temples, Tombs and Treasures

Welcome back! We wish you all a Happy New Year and hope that you have had the chance to spend time with family and friends during the Christmas break.

This term our topic will focus on Ancient Egypt. We will begin by identifying where Egypt is in the world and taking on the role of archaeologists to study primary sources of information. Additionally, we will discover how important the River Nile was to the Ancient Egyptians and how significant it was in the development of Egypt. We will discover how the pyramids were built and and what their purpose was. The study of the structure of Egyptian society will help us understand how influential the Pharaoh was and impact that he had. Finally, we will look at the excitement of the discovery of the tomb of Tutankhamen and the treasures that were found inside it.

In English, we will be learning about the features of a time-slip story with our model text 'Adventures of Sandy Cove'. We will be focussing on descriptive techniques. In Teaching of Reading, we are discovering more about life at the time of Howard Carter's discoveries in Ancient Egypt with the book Secrets of a Sun King. We are really excited to learn more about our topic through this book. In Maths, we are continuing with addition and subtraction. Firstly, focussing on mental strategies and then moving on to using formal column addition. 

Swimming will continue on a Tuesday for Year 3's, with Year 4's completing a dance session at this time. On Fridays, we are focussing on gymnastics with a focus on working as part as a group to create our own routines - and then performing them!

Term 2: How Humans Work

We are excited to welcome you back to Term 2. We hope that you had a lovely half term break and are ready for a new term of learning.

This term has a Science focus where we will be exploring how the human body functions. We will learn about how our eyes see, and what our different types of teeth are for. We will then focus on the digestive system, answering the big question 'How does food travel through our body?'. We will be building on our investigative skills as we plan and carry out a range of experiments, making predictions and drawing conclusions. 

In English, we are learning a 'defeat the monster' story. With a focus on character and dialogue. We will be reading the Christmasaurus in Teaching of Reading, where we will continue to draw inferences about characters, make predictions about the plot and sequence events. 

In Maths, Year 3 are starting the term by building the 3,4 and 8 times tables. Then we will focus on addition and subtraction using mental methods. Year 4 are beginning by looking at geometry and shape, and will then too be adding and subtracting using mental methods. 

In PE on a Friday we will be practising our passing and catching skills in Netball. This will be an outside lesson so please remember a school PE or dark coloured hoodie. On a Tuesday, Year 3 will continue to go swimming, with Year 4 doing an inside dance lesson.

We are really looking forward to this term,

Year 3/4 Team

Term 1: Living Together

How lovely it is to welcome you all back to school. We hope that you enjoyed the Summer holiday and are ready to settle back into a new and exciting year at St Bart’s. We have got lots of interesting lessons planned for you.

Our first topic is called ‘Living Together’ in which we explore what it is to be part of a community. This topic has a history and a geography focus and will involve us finding out about the importance of local historical figures and learning he important skill of map reading.The question we will be asking is ‘How have the geographical features of Royal Wooton Bassett contributed to our community?’

In English, we are looking at a rags to riches story, focusing upon the skills of description so that we can create a picture in the reader’s mind. We will be using similes, the power of 3 and powerful verbs. Our other genre of writing this term will be writing a non-chronological report.

Our Teaching of Reading text is ‘The Firework Maker’s Daughter’. We will be making predictions about the text and learning about the setting in more detail.

PE will continue to be on a Tuesday and a Friday. On Tuesday, we will be working on our general fitness levels by taking part in a circuit of activities and on Friday we will be teaching ball skills through the game of football. Swimming will start later this term on a Tuesday afternoon, more details will follow in a letter.

Every Thursday, we will be visiting the school library as a class. Although it is handy to keep reading books in bags, please ensure they are bought in on this day so that they can be changed or logged out/in, even if they aren't finished. 

As always if you have any questions or concerns please speak to your child's class teacher or speak to the office to make an appointment. If you would like to help and support your child at home, please listen to them read regularly and record it via the GoRead App and encourage to use TT Rockstars, Mathletics and Readiwriter. 

Meet the teacher session: Wednesday 20th September at 2:40

We are always here to help.

Best wishes,

The Year 3 and 4 team

Term 6: Scavengers and Settlers

Welcome back Year 3 & 4, it is so lovely to have you all back after half term as we enter our final term of this year! 

Our new topic is a fantastic one to be finishing on, it is called Scavengers and Settlers and is focused upon first settlers. 

During the topic lessons, we will be learning all about the first settlers and how their lives differ to our lives today and looking at how humans have changed over millions of years. We will also be focusing on cave paintings and linking this with our Art lessons. 

In English, we will be focusing upon using all of the skills we have learnt this year to write a narrative. We will be using conjunctions to link ideas in a sentence together, using direct speech and adverbs of time manner and frequency. In maths we will be looking at money, decimals and statistics.

Our Teaching of Reading text is Stig of the Dump, which links closely with our topic, it is a classic book in which the main character Barney makes friends with Stig who is from another time era. We will be looking at the choice of language the writer uses and also how we can compare the lives of Stig and Barney. 

For PE this term we are continuing to practise our throwing and catching skills through rounders on a Tuesday afternoon. On a Friday, we will be doing athletics in preparation for sports day. Both of these sessions will be outside so please dress appropriately for weather.

Homework will continued to be set on a Monday on Showbie and will be due in the following Monday. As always if you have any queries or concerns please speak to your child's class teacher or speak to the office to make an appointment. 

We are so looking forward to our final topic and last few weeks of the academic year, we can not wait to see what amazing things we get up to!

Term 5: Feel the Force

We hope you had a good break during the Easter Holidays and are excited about our new topic. 

It is called 'Feel the Force' and we will be learning about a range of forces including magnetism, gravity and friction. There will be lots of hands on learning about science in this topic, which we hope you will enjoy. 

In English, we will begin our topic by learning about poetry, this will lead us in to writing our own poems inspired by ‘The Cave of Curiosity’. In Teaching of Reading this term, we will be immersing ourselves in poetry to begin with. After this, we will be exploring different text types and developing our skills in comprehension and reading aloud.

We will be having two PE sessions this term. On Tuesdays we will be developing our rounders skills and on Friday we will continue with Tag Rugby. These will both be outside sessions, so please dress appropriately. You may choose to wear a dark coloured jumper, or our school PE hoodie to keep warm.

Term 4: Different Places Similar Lives

Welcome back Year 3 & 4, we are really looking forward to our learning this term. 

This term our topic, 'Different Places, Similar Lives' is Geography based, where we compare what it is like to live in different countries around the world. We are hoping to speak to people living in Chile and also connect with a school in Finland. We will be learning about how people adapt their lives to different climates and what it is like for children across the world. The children will be using different primary and secondary sources of information to find out more about different countries, 

In English, we will start by looking at creating a Wishing Tale. We will be focusing on using a range of homophones through our writing and our spellings. We will also be using fronted adverbials in our stories as well as using expanded noun phrases to describe settings and characters. 

For Teaching of Reading, our book this term is Charlotte’s Web by E.B White, we will be looking at creating a dairy entry and also linking non-fiction texts to the narrative.  As always, we will be continuing with our Rainbow Reading Challenge and we look forward to awarding more certificates during our Golden Book Assembly. Remember you need to add all of your reads onto BoomReader, this can be reading independently, to an adult and in class. 

We will be having two PE sessions this term, on a Friday it will be tag rugby, please make sure the children have warm clothing and appropriate footwear. On a Tuesday it will be gymnastics, which will be inside.

Term 3: They Made A Difference

Welcome back Year 3 & 4, we hope you had a lovely Christmas and New Year. We are really looking forward to our learning this term. 

This term our Topic, 'They Made A Difference' is History based, where we look at significant people and events that have made a difference to the world. These might be world leaders, artists, scientists, authors and humanitarians; we will be comparing their achievements past and present. The children will be using different primary and secondary sources of information to find out more about their lives. 

In English, we will be analysing the structure of a biography and moving on to writing our own biography based on our research and using a range of language features. These include being able to write in paragraphs and using conjunctions to extend our writing. 

For Teaching of Reading, our book this term is The BFG by Roald Dahl; we will be looking at predicting what might happen next, being able to summarise a paragraph and identify themes within the text. As always, we will be continuing with our Rainbow Reading Challenge and we look forward to awarding more certificates during our Golden Book Assembly. Remember you can add all of your reads onto Boom Reader (formerly Go Read), this can be reading independently, to an adult and in class. We know that lots of children have had new books over Christmas and we look forward to hearing about what you are reading. 

We will be having two PE sessions this term; on a Tuesday Year 4s will have fitness and Year 3s will have swimming starting Tuesday 10th January. On a Friday it will be basketball, which will be outside, weather dependent. Please dress appropriately for the weather, a plain dark coloured jumper over a PE top may be needed.

Term 2: Young Entrepreneurs 

What a busy term we had in September and October! We hope you enjoyed learning all about Land, Sea and Sky. This term our topic is called 'Young Entrepreneurs'. The aim of this topic is to start a business selling eco-friendly Christmas gifts. We hope to keep the impact on the environment as low as possible by using recycled good where possible. We will be looking for donations of recycled resources that we can use to create our products that we will be designing. We will provide you more information about this as the term progresses.

Our PE sessions will be both indoor and outdoor this term, on a Tuesday (indoor, Y4’s when Y3’s are swimming) and Friday (outdoor), so please come to school in PE kit on those days. Please make sure as the weather gets colder you have suitable clothing and footwear.

To start the term, we will be using mental methods to work through addition problems in maths. In English, we will begin by writing an exciting portal story, focussing on our descriptive techniques. In Teaching of Reading, we will be reading The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis. The children are welcome to bring in their own copies if you have this at home already, please make sure they are named if this is the case.

Our homework is going to be set each Monday and will be collected on the following Monday. As part of the weekly homework please continue to read regularly and log this on GoRead. As well as practising times tables on TT Rockstars.

Please find more information about this term with the documents attached to this page: Knowledge Organiser.

We look forward to an exciting term ahead, 

Kind regards,

The Year 3/4 team

How lovely it is to welcome you all back to school. We hope that you enjoyed the Summer holiday and are ready to settle back into a new and exciting year at St Bart’s. We have got lots of interesting lessons planned for you.

Our first topic is called ‘Land, Sea and Sky'. This topic has a science focus, we will be exploring how animals have adapted to their habitats, how we classify plants and animals and how changes in our environment could effect living things. We are hoping to welcome some exciting visitors this term to help further our understanding around our topic. The question we will answer throughout this topic is 'Do living things choose their environments?'

In English, we will be looking at a story with a familiar setting, focusing upon the skills of description so that we can create a picture in the reader’s mind. We will be using similes, the power of 3 and powerful verbs. 

In Maths, we will be solidifying our understanding of place value with 3-digit numbers in Year 3 and 4-digit numbers in Year 4. This will lead us on to finding 10, 100, and 1000 more and less, as well as plotting digits on a number line and ordering numbers.

Our Teaching of Reading text is ‘Kensuke's Kingdom’ by Michael Morpurgo. Washed overboard in a fierce storm, Michael finds himself on the shore of a remote island and struggles to survive - he soon discovers he is not alone. We will be making predictions about the text, discussing the relationship between the books' characters and making connections to other texts we know. We will log any reading we do in school on GoRead and encourage you to do the same at home. We look forward to awarding lots of Rainbow Reading Challenge certificates in our Golden Book assemblies. 

PE will continue to be on a Tuesday and a Friday. On Tuesday, we will be working on our general fitness levels by taking part in a circuit of activities and on Friday we will be teaching ball skills through the game of football. Swimming will start later this term on a Tuesday afternoon, more details will follow in a letter.

Homework will continue to be set on a Monday on Showbie and will be due in the following Monday. As always, if you have any queries or concerns please speak to your child's class teacher or speak to the office to make an appointment. If you would like to help and support your child at home, please listen to them read regularly and record it via the GoRead App and encourage to use TT Rockstars, Mathletics and Readiwriter.

We are always here to help.

Best wishes,

The Year 3 and 4 team