Food Technology – egg pots
Today we have been busy making our egg pots. We learned lots of new skills including how to use a bridge cut to cut the tomatoes and how to open a tin of beans safely.
Back in class, we evaluated our product with some children reflecting that they would refine the recipe by including carrots or cooking and serving the ingredients separately.
Thank you for the donations made towards the ingredients, we are already looking forward to our next project in the new year.
Help at home: Try one of these recipes and let us know if any are particularly popular with your family.
https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/health/family-health/top-10-healthy-meals-for-kids
Art – collages inspired by the work of Zaha Hadid and Sir Christopher Wren
We have thoroughly enjoyed our learning this half-term about the work of architects Zaha Hadid and Sir Christopher Wren.
As well as learning about the work of these architects, we have also developed our art skills to use techniques such as tracing, using carbon paper and freehand drawing.
Having honed these skills, we created multiple pieces which we then combined to form a collage. The children have thought carefully about the use of technique, colour, space and the composition of their final pieces.
Each piece was truly unique and it was wonderful to see the happiness experienced during the creation of the collages!
Gymnastics – applying our learning to big apparatus
There was much excitement in Year 4’s PE lesson this week!
The children applied what they have learned about jumping and travelling to the big apparatus. They showed courage and resilience pushing themselves to achieve new personal goals in gymnastics.
They followed the rules to ensure that they kept themselves and each other safe. There was a great sense of pride in the room as we reflected on what we had achieved by believing in ourselves. A great opportunity to see our school vision being lived.
National Santa Dash
On Friday, all children took part in the National Santa Dash. This event was all about having some fun whilst being active.
We’ve decided to extend this event: we’ll be holding an Easter and Summer Dash, too! Our goal is to allow pupils to set some targets and improve on their personal bests through the year.
Here are some photos – enjoy!
Living and Learning – I know there are a range of emotions
This week we have been thinking about different emotions that we experience and about how it is normal to experience a wide range of emotions. We used the characters from the Inside Out films to help us identify different emotions and consider how they can vary in strength.
We will continue our learning about emotions to reflect on how each emotion makes us feel and what we can do to manage those feelings if they become too much.
Help at home
It is always great to talk about emotions but if you would like something more structured to support your conversations you might enjoy using this workbook from MindMate:
Topic Review – Art Open Classroom
We loved welcoming parents to our topic review where we looked at the work we have done so far this half-term in art. Having reviewed the art we have already created using white pencil on black paper and by using different pens on tracing paper, we trialled a new process using carbon paper.
We will soon be combining all the different processes to make a collage.
Living and learning – online safety
As a class, we reflected on what we could do if we were presented with a search result that was not appropriate, we received a pop-up advert/message or received an unkind/inappropriate message when we were playing on an online game. The children had lots of ideas which they were keen to share with each other.
The 3 most popular tips were:
- tell a trusted adult
- close it
- block them
Help at home: If you are keen to learn more about how to keep children safe online, take a look at the advice provided by the NSPCC: NSPCC safe online
Science – Does the temperature of water affect the time it takes for ice to melt in it?
In our chemistry unit of learning, we are learning about states of matter.
We have created gestures to help us remember our key vocabulary of solid, liquid and gas. Now that we can confidently identify and describe these states of matter, we are considering how materials can change states.
Today we planned an experiment to answer the question:
Does the temperature of the water affect the time it takes for ice to melt in it?
We had to consider the variables in the experiment including which ones would change and which ones we would keep the same to answer our enquiry. We also had to practise some key skills including measuring accurately, reading a thermometer and measuring time using a stopwatch.
We recorded our results and came to the conclusion that “The colder the water the more time it takes for ice to melt.”
Maths – column addition
In maths we have been practising adding two 4 digit numbers when an exchange is required. We started by understanding the structure of the maths by using base 10 and then place value counters to represent the maths but we are now all working in the abstract using just digits.
Across school, we all set our column addition out in the same way with the exchange underneath the sum. We also cross out the exchange when we have added it (see example below).
We use stem sentences to help us think about the procedure we are undertaking.
The instructions we have written (and follow) as a class are below. We have them on our working wall to refer to if we get stuck.
Help at home: Challenge your child to teach you how we add two 4 digit numbers using the instructions above.
Art – Architecture
This half-term we are focusing on architecture in our Art learning.
Although we will be looking at a variety of structures, the two architects we will use as inspiration for our work are Sir Christopher Wren (who designed St Paul’s Cathedral) and Zaha Hadid (who designed the Heydar Aliyev Centre). We will create a collage using a variety of techniques. Watch this space to see our creations!