Hello everyone,

We have been using our class book ‘Thieves of Ostia’ in our writing sessions to look at historical stories. After looking at commas for clauses, and going over our work on adjectives and adverbs, we had a go and writing our own.

In Maths, we have been using factor pairs, multiplying by 10 and 100 and dividing by 10. Remember to practise those times tables at home.

We have been continuing to look the digestion system in Science. The children enjoyed looking at the process of digestion and tried to explain it themselves.

We’ve noticed quite a lot of children are not bringing in reading records, books and water bottles. Please can these be brought in daily. Thank you.

Swimming will be on Friday (8th), so please can you make sure your child brings in their swimming kit and coat.

We hope you have a great weekend.

Mrs Fairclough, Mrs Brunyard and Mrs Bayliss

Yesterday, the children tried different foods in Design and Technology, in preparation for us to plan and make our healthy meal at the end of this half term. The children had mixed responses to the food tasted, and tried to think about the aroma, flavour, taste and texture.

In English, we have been looking at features of a historical story ready to write our own next week. We have also been looking at how and why adjectives and adverbs are used, and how we can use more adventurous vocabulary in our writing.

In Maths, we have multiplying and dividing a number by 1 and itself, multiplying three number together and looking at factor pairs.

Our Golden Certificate winner this week is Ben. He is eager to learn, always listening and sets a great example. This week, Ben has used his logic skills as well as his mathematical skills to solve problems in maths. Well done.

At the end of Year 4, children should be able to recall their times tables up to 12.

Here are some links the children can use to help them practise their times tables at home:

Times tables games – Learn them all here!

Hit the Button – Quick fire maths practise for 6-11 year olds (topmarks.co.uk)

Next Friday (1st December), Year 4 will start their swimming block, so please send your child with swimming kits and make sure they have a coat with them. Thank you.

Have a great weekend.

Mrs Fairclough, Mrs Brunyard and Mrs Bayliss

The children really enjoyed observing what happened to the eggs in different types of drinks for our science investigation this week. We were trying to investigate to see if sugary drinks caused tooth decay. Yesterday, we took the eggs out and observed closely and noticed the eggs in water and milk had stayed the same, but the egg in cola had turned black and the egg in orange juice had white specks on. We then looked at how we can look after our teeth, and the different types of teeth humans have and their functions.

In English, we have been looking at setting descriptions. We have been looking at using adjectives and figurative language: similes, metaphors, personification and hyperbole. After analysing a text and writing a setting description as a class, we tried to write one on our own.

Our Golden Certificate winner this week is Holly. She has really impressed us this week in English, where she has given thought out answers in our reading sessions and used some great descriptive language in her writing. Well done!

In Maths, we’ve been looking at multiplying and dividing by 3, 6, 7, 9, 11 and 12. We have talked about how we can use the times tables we know, to help us with those we are not yet confident with.

Next week we will be doing some food tasting in our Design and Technology lessons. Please make sure we are aware of all food allergies by Wednesday. Thank you.

Have a lovely weekend.

Mrs Fairclough, Mrs Brunyard and Mrs Bayliss

Welcome back! We hope you all had a fab half term.

Our Golden Certificate winner is Ella who this week has been brilliant in engaging in whole class discussions. She’s really grown in confidence and has given thoughtful and considered answers. Well done.

In English, we’ve almost reached the end of of guided read book ‘Into the volcano’. After looking at features of character description we used the book to find adjectives and looked at writing expanded noun phrases. We created a class character description of grandma as a class then wrote our own on

In Maths, we’ve started our unit on multiplication and division. We have been looking at multiples of 3 and multiplying and dividing by 6 and 9

This half term we are looking at animals including humans in science. After going over what animals need to survive and food groups, we started to discuss the importance of looking after our teeth. We then planned and set up our investigation to see if sugary drinks cause tooth decay.

Just a reminder that PE is on Monday and Wednesday this half term.

Today we’ve been talking about remembrance and held a two minute silence at 11am.

Have a great weekend.

Mrs Fairclough, Mrs Brunyard and Mrs Bayliss

Another week has flown by!

This week the children have been planning and starting to write this biographies on Bear Grylls. We’ve been working on reading our work back and looking at how we can edit and improve it.

Our Golden Certificate winner this week is Nyla. She tried hard and persevered with her writing. Well done!

In Science, we have been talking about environmental dangers and have started to look at endangered species. The children have been asked to see if they can find out any more about endangered species ready for our lesson next Thursday.

In Maths, we have been looking at area. We have been counting squares and making and comparing shapes.

We’ve been doing some work on feelings the last couple of days. We have been talking about how we can express those feelings, telling others how we feel and things we do that can help us and others.

Spellings for next week have been given out and we will do our test on Thursday next week (PD day on Friday).

Parents evening appointments have all been given out and we look forward to seeing you on Monday and Tuesday.

We hope you have a great weekend.

Mrs Fairclough, Mrs Brunyard and Mrs Bayliss

We’re getting closer to the end of the first half term. Parents evening letters have been given out and it’ll be great to see you all and talk about how your child has settled in and is getting on in Year 4.

Our Golden certificate winner is Jack. He is always showing active listening and tries hard with all his work.

This week we’ve continued to look at features of biographies in English. We’ve been looking at adverbials, causal and time conjunctions and third person. The children have also been researching about Bear Grylls ready to plan and write their biography next week.

In Maths, we’ve finished off our addition and subtraction unit by looking at subtraction with one or more exchanges, estimating and checking strategies. Next week we will move onto area.

In Science, we’re looking at living things and their habitat. Yesterday, we talked about positive and negative changes to a woodland habitat.

If you need to contact us for non-emergencies you can do so on: sycamore@crowmoorschool.co.uk

All urgent communication needs to go through the school office.

We hope you all have a great weekend.

Mrs Fairclough, Mrs Brunyard and Mrs Bayliss

This week in English, we’ve started to look at Biographies. We’ve been looking at what a biography is, features of a biography and analysing an example text. We then looked more closely at past tense and chronological order. We will continue to look at features of a biography next week.

In Maths, we’ve started our unit on addition and subtraction. We have looked at adding two 4-digit numbers with no, one and multiple exchanges. Today, we started to look at subtraction with no exchange. Next week, we’ll be moving onto subtraction with one or more exchanges.

Our Golden Certificate winner this week is Hakeem. Hakeem always listens well, is a great helper and his handwriting and the presentation of his work is always excellent. Well done!

Just a gentle reminder that all jewellery must be removed before anyone takes part in PE, as per our School PE Policy. This is due to health and safety and guidance we have received from the Association for PE Teaching. Earrings must be removed – they cannot be taped over. We advise that earrings are removed before school so that they are less likely to get misplaced. Thank you.

Please keep up the daily reading at home, it makes such a difference.

We hope you have a great weekend.

Mrs Fairclough, Mrs Brunyard and Mrs Bayliss

We have had another great week in Sycamore. The children have really enjoyed hunting for invertebrates in Science. They continued to look at a classification key and played a game to guess the invertebrate.

In English, we have been looking at causal conjunctions, commas for clauses and expanded noun phrases. The children have also been researching and collecting notes about volcanoes ready to write their explanation texts next week. Today, we continued our research and looked at paragraphs.

In Maths, we have been comparing and ordering numbers and looking at roman numerals. Today, the children enjoyed creating our own number line to round to the nearest 10.

Our Golden Certificate winner this week is Bobby. He has only started in Sycamore Class this week and has settled in so well – you would think he has also been here! Well done!

We hope you have a great weekend.

Mrs Fairclough, Mrs Brunyard and Mrs Bayliss