Class 4 Blog
Class 4
Friday 15th November
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
Can I just say, what an absolutely fabulous group of children we have in class 4 this year! Miss Monday, Miss Slade, Miss Francis and myself are already delighted at the progress the children have made since September. They all listen beautifully, work incredibly hard and really are a pleasure to teach.
The children have worked incredibly hard in all areas of the curriculum this week. Today, they have thoroughly enjoyed their outdoor orienteering with Miss Monday this morning; linking their activity with the geometry we have been focusing on all week. This afternoon, they have had fun using 'Audacity' on the laptops to record, play and delete audio of themselves. They have, as you'd imagine, enjoyed every minute.
They have also been busy in science; identifying, labelling and describing the roles of each of their teeth. The children have also been learning how best to take care of their teeth; they have created very informative 'Dental Hygiene' posters too!
In literacy, the children have worked particularly hard on poetry this week and last. Not only have they been enjoying reading a wide range of poems, they have been writing their own too. Below, I have added just a few photographs of some of the poems they have written. I have been so impressed with every single one of the poems the children have written; they've loved it! I wish I could add them all the the Blog! Do enjoy reading them at Family Sharing!
Have a fabulous weekend everyone!
See you on Monday,
Mrs Matthews and the year 4 team x
Friday 8th November
admin on: Class 4
Good evening everyone!
We've had a wonderful first week here in class 4; the children have come back to school with super enthusiasm (as always) and have worked so incredibly hard. Today they really enjoyed working on the flower beds at the front of the school with Miss Monday and Miss Slade to dig, weed and plant the remainder of the wonderful bulbs you all sent into school. Thank you so very much! We can't wait to enjoy looking out of the window in Spring to admire those gorgeous flowers (whilst working hard in class of course)!!!
Enjoy the photos below!
Mrs Matthews
Friday 25th October
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
We've had a great week this week! We've been as busy as always and have had two extra special events this week too. I thought I would post a few photos to give you a little insight into the fun we've had!
Today, the children have been planting bulbs at the far side of our playground; a wonderful event organised by Dr Bamfield, whose husband also very kindly joined us all and worked incredibly hard preparing the ground for the whole school to plant a bulb each. We are so very grateful to him and also our school government for all their hard work designing their posters to advertise the event to everyone in school. Thank you so very much for your incredible kindness in donating so many wonderful bulbs. Year 4 had so many; thank you so very much for your kind donations. We have quite a number left and so planting will continue further around school. We can't wait for Spring to see the colourful array of flowers that will be springing into life!
Earlier in the week we were also treated to a fabulous and very inspirational presentation by Sarah Morrell, Esme's mum. She led a wonderful interactive session for the whole of Key Stage 2, sharing her love of writing and giving the children a wealth of ideas to inspire their creative story writing. Thank you so much Sarah for taking the time to prepare and present an amazing session. We all loved every minute; staff and children alike!!
Here are a few photos!
Have a wonderful half term break everyone. See you in Autumn 2!!
Mrs Matthews and the year 4 team
Friday 11th October
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
We've had another great week here in class 4!
The children are thoroughly enjoying focusing on 'The Lorax' in English at the moment. They have particularly enjoyed role playing conversations between the Lorax and the Once-ler! They have then been working really well together in groups to plan a persuasive letter to the Once-ler to insist he stops destroying the environment. Next week, the children will be writing their own versions of a persuasive letter to him.
In science, the children are becoming very skilled at using those classification keys. Today, they were using one to help them identify different animals they may not have otherwise recognised. The children have loved our animals topic. Next week, we will be using the same technique to identify different plants and trees too.
P.E. has once again been very busy! On Wednesday, the children enjoyed yoga and mindfulness! I was very impressed with their balance and stamina! Gymnastics this week involved working in pairs to create sequences; the children used synchronised rolls/cartwheels or developed other interesting ways of performing movement and then included one of their paired balances before finishing with another synchronised movement. The class then performed beautifully for each other. I was so impressed; the progress the children are making is so lovely to see.
Computing was very exciting for the children this week! We focused on websites this week; particularly how content is found on different websites and why different media may be used. The children then worked together to create images and sounds that could be added to a website. They absolutely loved it! Below are photos I took in class as they worked enthusiastically creating exciting musical content.
Hope you all have a wonderful weekend. Keep your fingers crossed for lovely Autumn sunshine!
See you Monday,
Mrs Matthews and the class 4 team x
Friday 4th October 2024
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
It has been another wonderful week here if class 4! The children are all working so incredibly hard and it really is an absolute pleasure teaching and getting to know every one of them!
The children were very excited this morning to find our new text in literacy is 'The Lorax'! They thoroughly enjoyed sharing the first half of the cartoon version of the story today. The story links beautifully with our learning in many other areas of the curriculum; in PSHCE, geography and science to name just a few. The children have really understood the concept of taking real care of our environment and the text links perfectly with this. I am sure the fabulous descriptive writing the children have been working on in these last few weeks will really help as they write a persuasive letter to the Once-ler later next week. The children are really looking forwards to the role play we will be sharing on Monday as preparation for planning their letters!
In science, we have been using classification keys to identify a wide selection of animals. The children have really enjoyed this and are developing a great understanding of how animals can be grouped.
The children enjoyed developing their skills as they used atlases to locate a number of 'settlements' and then carefully plot them on their own blank maps of the UK. It was great to see the children working really well with their partners to solve problems together and find the solutions. I have to say, I think we have a really thoughtful class of children who can work incredibly well together.
P.E. was great too! The children thoroughly enjoyed further partner work as they created fantastic paired balances and developed short routines, incorporating polished starting and finishing positions, as well as two of their best balances. These took a little practice, but wow, what a result! The children were amazing! Please have a look at just some of the balances they created, before then performing as a class in two halves. They were all brilliant!
Please enjoy the photos below; some of our gymnastics and some taken whilst developing extended noun phrases out in the woodland area.
Have a lovely weekend everyone. See you on Monday!
Mrs Matthews and the class 4 team!
xx
Monday 23rd September
admin on: Class 4
Good evening everyone!
A very warm welcome to class 4! I can't believe we have already been back in school 3 weeks! It really has flown and feels very much like our Summer holidays are a distant memory now the Autumn weather has kicked in!!
Your fabulous children have all made a really wonderful start to class 4. As you know, we have been delighted to welcome 4 new class members to our team and class 4 have made each of them feel very welcome. The children have all settled beautifully and are already working incredibly hard. I'm so proud of every single one of the children.
Our team of adults in the classroom has also grown this year. Miss Francis and Miss Slade are both new to our school and have joined us here in class 4. Their fabulous support has already proved to be invaluable! Miss Robb joins us at times during the week too.
The children have been working on developing their descriptive writing in our English sessions and thoroughly enjoyed our visit down to the woodland area earlier last week to help them develop their ideas. Using their senses, the children worked in small groups to create extended noun phrases, before then writing lovely descriptive paragraphs. Today we have begun to develop further noun phrases whilst sharing the text 'Window'. Next week, we will be moving onto share 'The Lorax', as we link our learning to our science and geography topics.
In science, we have been focusing upon animals and their habitats and later this week will be beginning to classify animals according to different characteristics. We will be looking at a number of vertebrates and invertebrates.
In geography, we have been looking at settlements and which needs are the most important to consider when choosing a settlement site. Today, we have been comparing different sites in terms of basic needs.
P.E. has been busy over the last couple of weeks! The children are really enjoying developing their ball skills as they work towards becoming more confident in netball skills. They have also been working hard in gymnastics; focusing on paired balances, movement and sequence development. This week, we will be moving onto using the benches and floor beams as the children further develop their routines.
The children are thoroughly enjoying a daily shared story-time just after break each morning. They look forwards to sitting together on the carpet and listening to a story each day. It allows the children a little settling down and relaxation time before active times tables practice in maths!!
We are delighted to have begun our 'My Happy Mind' sessions each Thursday afternoon this half term. The children are not only learning all about how their brains function, but will be learning how to maintain a 'happy' and healthy mind. We will be looking at different relaxation techniques as we continue with the sessions each week. Our music lessons are equally relaxing this half term too; we have been learning to sing 'This Little Light of Mine' and have been developing different ways of moving as we sing too! I'm very impressed with the super singing and dancing this year in class 4!
Hope you all had a lovely weekend and are keen to have another fun-filled week in class 4!
See you tomorrow,
Mrs Matthews, Miss Slade, Miss Francis and also Miss Robb (the A team!!)
Friday 14th June
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
We have had a super week this week and last week too! We have been busy designing and working on completing the 'buzzer games' in D.T. and science- a joint project. The children have really looked forwards to today as they have loved putting their designs into practice. They have been working in small groups on their games and each of the children will be inviting their buddies to come and play on their game when it's completed.
We have really enjoyed practising for sports day this week; the children have loved working in relay teams to complete sprints, hurdles and obstacle courses. It's looking like it will be a super event for you to enjoy!
The children really enjoyed their additional yoga session this week; incorporating yoga positions, games and relaxation too! Below are just a few photos taken on the whole school yoga day! Thanks so much to our Sports Partnership for the great sessions.
I have also added a photo of just some of the completed Egyptian canopic jars- the children absolutely loved decorating them. We will send them home next week.
As we have now started our new 'Romans' topic, we have been sharing a lovely Roman myth, 'Romulus and Remus' this week. In groups, the children have been busy re-enacting different sections of the myth this week. I was so impressed how well they worked together; they have some seriously good acting skills too!
We have been busy problem solving in maths today; applying the multiplication and division practice we have worked on this week. Again, I have been really impressed with the understanding the children have developed.
You will be delighted to know all the children have now completed their 'Multiplication Check' test; the results will be known soon and will be sent home along with the reports.
Have a wonderful weekend everyone!
Mrs Matthews
Friday 24th May
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon all!
Class 4 have had a lovely week this week! We began on Monday by creating Ancient Egyptian artefacts with clay. The children absolutely loved it! They have sculpted the most wonderful canopic jars and vases. When the children have carefully painted them, I will add a photo to the blog for you to see. They'll be brilliant!
After completing their research using non-fiction texts and the com0puters, the children have now finally completed their wonderful Ancient Egyptian fact files. They are absolutely fabulous! I am so proud of the children for all their super hard work. You couldn't hear a pin drop in the classroom this morning whilst the children were adding their finishing touches!
Yesterday, the children enjoyed their last badminton session. After practising serving and returning the shuttlecocks and then having rallies with partners, the children enjoyed lots of mini tournaments. Each of the children had the opportunity of playing many matches and also umpiring for their peers too. They really didn't need me at all!! The children have thoroughly enjoyed using our fabulous new badminton nets!
Today, we have enjoyed a full afternoon of science. The children were very excited as they have been creating their own electrical circuits, using bulbs, switches, motors and buzzers. They have then carried out a fair test to sort materials according to whether they were 'conductors' or 'insulators' of electricity.
We very much hope you all have a wonderful bank holiday weekend and a lovely week next week. Let's keep our fingers crossed for more weather like last weekend!
See you all a week on Tuesday!
Mrs Matthews and Mrs Pearce xx
Friday 17th May
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
It's been another fun and busy week here in class 4. The children have been working incredibly hard on their Ancient Egyptian adventure stories and have now finally completed their final drafts. I can't wait to read them all this weekend.
The children are loving the Ancient Egyptian topic. They have worked exceptionally well in small groups today as they researched Ancient Egyptian topics. They loved the large collection of non-fiction texts we shared and particularly enjoyed using the computers to further develop their research. Next week, we will be beginning to create exciting Ancient Egyptian fact files; I can't wait! The children are keen to continue researching and then also add exciting photographs and images to illustrate their facts.
Badminton continues to go from strength to strength! The children played mixed doubles in a very exciting mini tournament earlier this week. I am absolutely amazed how quickly they have all developed some superb badminton skills.
Maths has been quite tricky at times, but the children have continued to persevere and have now developed some super confidence in converting units of length, capacity and mass. Today proved a little harder as the children were then applying their knowledge to solve estimating problems. Keep practising on Mirodo everyone and this will get easier and easier!
We have continued working hard on our reading every day; the children all continue to work in a small group with me every week, thus providing them with the opportunity of reading 1 to 1 with me and in some cases with Mrs Pearce too. They also work on comprehensions on a daily basis; believe it or not, even these have at times focused on the Ancient Egyptians! We've read about Egyptian life and Tutankhamun too; there really isn't much we don't know about the Ancient Egyptians here in class 4!
Please enjoy some of the photos from today's research activity.
Enjoy your weekend,
Mrs Matthews and Mrs Pearce xx
Week ending 10th May
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone,
We had another wonderful week in class 4 and ended the week on a great big high with our singing performance in Holmfirth Parish Church. What a wonderful way to open the Holmfirth Folk Festival! The children were all absolutely amazing! We have been practising each of the songs for a number of weeks now and it was so worth it! The children were all brilliant. Phil Needham, the organiser and musician, even commented on how well the children sang; I was so very proud of every single one of them. Please enjoy the photos taken during the event in the church on Friday afternoon.
The children have all been very busy working on their Egyptian adventure stories this week; we are looking forwards to reading their final drafts on Monday. The children have certainly risen to the challenge of creating their very own exciting stories.
Class 4 are very much enjoying our Ancient Egyptians topic; they have finally all completed their headdresses and will be using clay to recreate some of the Egyptian artefacts next too. Each of the children are thoroughly enjoying creating fact files as they research the lives of the Ancient Egyptians.
Badminton has certainly been a hit in P.E. Now the children have developed more confidence in their serving and returning skills, they have loved using the nets and playing doubles matches. Next week we will try a mini tournament; it should be fun as the children are becoming more and more skilled and certainly more competitive.
We are all looking forwards to practising orienteering skills on Monday afternoon. Fingers crossed, we will have some more dry weather!
Hope you are all enjoying a wonderful weekend!
See you on Monday,
Mrs Matthews and Mrs Pearce
x
Friday 3rd May
admin on: Class 4
Good evening everyone!
It's been another very busy but fun week here in class 4. The children are absolutely loving our Ancient Egyptians topic; not only are they enjoying learning lots of exciting historical facts in history, they are enjoying applying their learning to their art work and also their writing in literacy too. The children have enjoyed beginning to learn about Howard Carter's exciting discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb and are developing a bank of interesting facts about the lives of the Ancient Egyptians too.
In literacy, having heard the exciting story of 'Marcy and the Riddle of the Sphinx', the children have been planning their very own Egyptian adventure stories too. They are cleverly using the facts they are learning in history to enrich their writing; I can't wait to read the exciting adventure stories they are all creating!
P.E. continues to inspire the children; they are loving developing great badminton skills and are getting quite competitive with each other as they play different skills-building games. I have been so impressed how well the children have adapted to badminton.
Our music lessons sound just gorgeous at the moment; the children are practising their folk festival songs most days. The corridor down Key Stage 2 sounds wonderful on an afternoon; I can't wait for the children to perform in the church next Friday.
We have been very busy working on statistics this week; the children's problem solving skills when interpreting data is improving all the time.
As it was polling day yesterday, the children had their very own ballot in class too. They loved it! I have to admit, it wasn't a vote for their favourite mayor or councillor though! As they had successfully filled the treasure pot, I decided to allow the children to have a democratic vote (voting slip and ballot box included of course) on the reward they should all receive! Their choices were a tasty treat, stories outdoors, team games outside or extra playtime. After carefully counting all their ballot papers, it was the 'extra playtime' the children selected. They loved 15 minutes extra time to play on the field and trim trail just before assembly today; a very well-deserved treat I think!
Hope you all have a wonderful weekend and enjoy the Bank Holiday.
See you on Tuesday,
Mrs Matthews & Mrs Pearce
xx
Friday 3rd May
admin on: Class 4
Good evening everyone!
It's been another very busy but fun week here in class 4. The children are absolutely loving our Ancient Egyptians topic; not only are they enjoying learning lots of exciting historical facts in history, they are enjoying applying their learning to their art work and also their writing in literacy too. The children have enjoyed beginning to learn about Howard Carter's exciting discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb and are developing a bank of interesting facts about the lives of the Ancient Egyptians too.
In literacy, having heard the exciting story of 'Marcy and the Riddle of the Sphinx', the children have been planning their very own Egyptian adventure stories too. They are cleverly using the facts they are learning in history to enrich their writing; I can't wait to read the exciting adventure stories they are all creating!
P.E. continues to inspire the children; they are loving developing great badminton skills and are getting quite competitive with each other as they play different skills-building games. I have been so impressed how well the children have adapted to badminton.
Our music lessons sound just gorgeous at the moment; the children are practising their folk festival songs most days. The corridor down Key Stage 2 sounds wonderful on an afternoon; I can't wait for the children to perform in the church next Friday.
We have been very busy working on statistics this week; the children's problem solving skills when interpreting data is improving all the time.
As it was polling day yesterday, the children had their very own ballot in class too. They loved it! I have to admit, it wasn't a vote for their favourite mayor or councillor though! As they had successfully filled the treasure pot, I decided to allow the children to have a democratic vote (voting slip and ballot box included of course) on the reward they should all receive! Their choices were a tasty treat, stories outdoors, team games outside or extra playtime. After carefully counting all their ballot papers, it was the 'extra playtime' the children selected. They loved 15 minutes extra time to play on the field and trim trail just before assembly today; a very well-deserved treat I think!
Hope you all have a wonderful weekend and enjoy the Bank Holiday.
See you on Tuesday,
Mrs Matthews & Mrs Pearce
xx
Week ending 26th April
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
Here's a little round-up of some of the activities class 4 got up to last week! We had another great week!
The children have continued to enjoy working on activities linked to our text 'The Egyptian Cinderella'. This week the children worked in small groups to role play a section of the story each, so that we were able to complete the whole story as a class. The children were absolutely amazing! Their confidence is really lovely to see; they enjoyed performing their plays to each other and have found them really useful when completing their own compositions of the story.
This week we will be beginning to explore our new text, 'Marcy and the Riddle of the Sphinx'. We will be using this text to enthuse the children to begin their very own adventure stories. Do wish us look as I know this may prove to be a challenge!!
In view of our forthcoming singing performance in the Holmfirth Parish Church on May 10th, the children have been working exceptionally hard in their music lessons to learn and practise the songs. They will be performing alongside other schools in the Holme Valley as part of the opening act of the Holmfirth Folk Festival weekend; it should be a very exciting event and I know the children are really looking forwards to performing together.
Science has been fun this week too; we have recreated the water cycle whilst growing cress and on Monday will be investigating whether or not the rate of evaporation is affected by a raise in temperature. We are hoping for at least a little corner of sunshine on Monday morning so we can compare 2 different locations; keep your fingers tightly crossed!
The children loved P.E. this week; not only are they continuing to enjoy weekly swimming sessions, we have also now begun badminton lessons too. I was very impressed with the children's enthusiasm and progress on Thursday, very impressive indeed!
Hope you have all had a wonderful weekend. Looking forwards to seeing you all on Monday!
See you tomorrow,
Mrs Matthews and Mrs Pearce
Week ending 19th April
admin on: Class 4
Good evening everyone!
Class 4 had a great week last week! Our new topic of Ancient Egyptians is now well underway and we're all loving every minute! We began the week with our new text 'The Egyptian Cinderella' and initially focused on developing some role play based on the text. The children then compared the text with the traditional story of 'Cinderella'; they were amazed how many similarities and differences they were able to find.
Art involved practising Egyptian decorative patterns ready for creating their own Ancient Egyptian headdresses for display!
History involved learning many interesting facts surrounding early life around the River Nile. The children learnt many facts about the importance of the Nile for daily life in Ancient Egyptian times; for farming, washing and leisure for example.
In PSHE, the children have completed a 3D pyramid each (very well decorated of course) and have then written lovely positive comments for each other and have added these to the insides of their pyramids. The children really love them; it has been great to see how supportive the children are of each other.
Science was very busy this week; in order to recreate the water cycle, the children have re-sewn their cress seeds as our latest ones failed to germinate for some reason!! I have never come across this happening before!! We're hoping for lots of cress and lots of condensation this week! The children have then been using thermometers to check the temperature of boiling water and also the temperature at which butter and chocolate melt; they have loved it. The fact that they used the chocolate to create very tasty crispy buns did help a great deal!!
More busy activities next week! Hope you are all having a lovely weekend and have thoroughly enjoyed the warmer weather!
See you Monday,
Mrs Matthews & Mrs Pearce
Friday 15th March
admin on: Class 4
Good evening all!
We've had a very exciting week here in school; we all took part in National Science Week and on Monday and Wednesday the children in KS2 were all treated to a wide variety of science investigations and activities run by all the staff; a super event and very well organised by Mr Kershaw! The children loved every minute!
The children have been busily completing their wonderful recounts of their visit to Cliffe House this week; below is the 2nd collection of wonderful photos for you to enjoy!
Have a lovely weekend everyone!
See you all on Monday,
Mrs Matthews, Miss Nipe and Mrs Pearce
Friday 8th March
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
We had an absolutely fantastic time on our 3 day residential to Cliffe House this week. The children were absolutely amazing; really enthusiastic, energetic and excited throughout. They were able to take part in such a wonderful selection of exciting activities; from team building, to archery, river walking, wall climbing, fire building and campfire cooking to name just a few. They must have returned home full of the news of all their activities, but also extremely tired. They all behaved impeccably throughout our visit and we were so proud of every single one of them! What a great team they are!
The staff at Cliffe House took such fabulous care of us all; the outdoor leaders were just amazing! They taught us all so many skills and endless facts during our stay. The housekeeping and catering staff were wonderful too; they provided us all with the most amazing meals and vert tasty extra snacks too!
Here are just a few of the photos taken. I will add more next week, but just thought you would like a little insight into the activities we all enjoyed during our stay. I promise there will be more to follow too! Please note, we took 3 cameras with us; these are photos from one camera- the others are to follow!!
See you all next week,
Mrs Matthews and the fabulous class 4 team xx
Friday 1st March
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
We have had a great week this week; very busy, but great fun!
The children have loved trying to replicate some of Claude Monet's art, have thoroughly enjoyed lots of fun and exciting practical science and have even used Lego during their exciting R.E. lesson.
The children absolutely loved the hour long music assembly on Tuesday morning; they were treated to a very interesting, exciting and interactive lesson led by a fabulous jazz band. To say it was brilliant is an understatement!
The children are very much looking forwards to our residential visit to Cliffe House on Monday; we are all very excited indeed! Do make sure they have lots of sleep this weekend as it will be a very busy 3 days; lots of fun and energetic activities to come!
Have a wonderful weekend!
See you all on Monday,
Mrs Matthews, Miss Nipe and Mrs Pearce
xx
Friday 23.2.24
admin on: Class 4
Good evening everyone!
We had a very exciting first week back!
We began our week with a number of scientific investigations to check whether we were correct in thinking the volume of sound decreases as the distance increases. The children worked in small groups to test our theory using different ways of making sounds; the children were so enthusiastic and loved working independently in their teams.
In literacy, the children are thoroughly enjoying our new text; 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory'. We have begun sharing the text and have watched clips of the film in order to help the children develop their understanding of the characters. We began with role play on Monday; taking on the roles of each of the characters in Charlie's family as Charlie returns home following his paper round. The children have worked hard to then write carefully punctuated and well-presented transcripts of the conversations between the characters. Next week we are focusing on writing persuasive letters to Willy Wonka.
As you know, the children had their first school swimming session this week; some of the children were a little apprehensive beforehand, but were all so excited to tell me how much they enjoyed it afterwards! This was so great to hear! The children will continue weekly lessons until the end of the Summer.
On Thursday, Abi joined us from the Sports Partnership to deliver a fabulous 'active maths' lesson in the hall. The children thoroughly enjoyed every single minute; they practised their times tables as they played a number of fun and exciting games.
Maths has been very busy this week; the children have been working really hard on converting fractions to decimals and vice versa and using place value to help with the division and multiplication of decimal numbers by 10 and 100. It was lovely to be able to invite you to join us in class to see the children working on their maths on Friday; we hope you enjoyed your visit!
Have a fabulous weekend everyone.
See you on Monday,
Mrs Matthews, Miss Nipe and Mrs Pearce.
Friday 9th February
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone,
We had a very busy Monday this week; the children prepared and cooked their vegetable soups in small groups. They absolutely loved every single minute! The corridor smelt delightful! The children promise us their soups tasted equally wonderful too!
In history, we have focused on the introduction of the London Underground in 1863; the children loved hearing all about it and were amazed how soon the underground networks grew and how enormously beneficial they were for people living and working in London. The children have really loved learning all about the changes brought about by the Industrialists.
P.E. was great fun; we combined our netball and rugby skills in our own version of an exciting attacking and defending game. The children played in mini teams and amazed me with the progress of their skills.
The children have worked incredibly hard with Miss Nipe on their wonderful descriptions of the Secret Garden; they really have developed some super sentences, using a widening collection of exciting adjectives and adverbs with every task. Their grammar and spelling is improving all the time too.
Maths has been a little tricky this week; we have been focusing on decimal numbers. The children have been practising counting in tenths and hundredths and have continued to work hard on those tricky times tables.
Have a wonderful week with your gorgeous children next week; let's hope the weather is kind to us all. Enjoy the soup-making photos below too!
See you on the 19th January!
From Mrs Matthews and Miss Nipe x
Friday 2nd February
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
We have had another very busy week here in class 4! We began with some wonderful xylophone playing at the beginning of the week; the children are so great at playing in time with each other now, even when playing tricky chords too. They're very impressive indeed!
On Monday, the children were delighted to discover they would be making vegetable soup in small groups next week and so spent a little time designing their recipes ready for cooking, tasting and evaluating early next week! Should be very exciting! Thank heavens Miss Nipe (our student teacher) will be back with us on Monday to help!!
The children are continuing to enjoy working on 'The Secret Garden' in English; they have written wonderful diary entries in the role of Mary this week and have created the most impressive pastel drawings of the garden. Next week, they will be describing in detail how the garden looked, sounded and felt next week.
The Industrial Revolution continues to interest the children in history; they are so enthusiastic and very keen to both ask and answer questions. We've been focusing on the enormous benefits the development of the railways must have had on families, factory workers and shop owners in the 1800s. We will be looking at the development of the London Underground next week.
The children worked really well in RSE this week; we have been focusing on how emotions and feelings can change during puberty. The children were fabulous; I gave them all a different 'letter' to discuss together and asked them what advice they would give the writer of the letter who was struggling with their emotions. The responses the children gave were so thoughtful and empathetic. What a wonderful group of mature children I teach!
Finally, we have had an interesting science lesson this afternoon. We are investigating 'sound' at the moment. The children have carried out 3 small investigations to find out how sounds can be altered. They have discovered how volume and pitch can vary. The children blew across 3 bottles with differing amounts of water in (it's trickier than it looks too!!). They created sounds using the rulers; vibrating them at different lengths on the desks and finally bounced marbles on the lids of different containers. In a noisy classroom, it wasn't as easy as we'd have hoped, but we did finally master each of the investigations and learnt a great deal! Below are just a couple of photos.
Have a wonderful weekend together!
See you Monday,
Mrs Matthews x
Friday 26th January
admin on: Class 4
Good evening everyone!
I can't believe it's the weekend again! We've had a wonderful week once again and filled our week with lots of fun activities!
Music has been once again rather noisy, as the children have been working on their xylophones! They're actually all progressing beautifully as they play together; very impressive indeed!
This afternoon however, was a little less tuneful as we investigated how sounds are actually made in our science lesson! The children followed a circuit of different groups of percussion instruments to deduce what it was that actually vibrated to create the sound.
Maths was very exciting earlier in the week too as the children worked practically together to measure length, mass and capacity. Please have a look at the photos below!
The children are continuing to thoroughly enjoy all aspects of P.E. at the moment; they are developing great attacking and defending skills they could clearly apply to a wide range of sports.
History involved learning all about the wonderful achievement of Robert Stevenson and his steam locomotive 'The Rocket'. The children wrote wonderful newspaper articles in the role of journalists reporting on the Rainhill Trials.
We're all continuing to enjoy 'The Secret Garden'; the children have written super character descriptions of Mary and are currently in the process of editing their diary entries for Mary too. They are absolutely loving watching the clips of a version of the film as we share the text too.
Do have a wonderful weekend and I'll look forward to seeing you all again on Monday.
See you soon,
Mrs Matthews
Week ending Friday 19.1.24
admin on: Class 4
Good morning everyone!
We had another wonderful week here in class 4! It's an absolute pleasure teaching class 4; they really are a super group of children and work so hard at everything they do.
We began the week with the start of our new text; 'The Secret Garden'! The children are thoroughly enjoying sharing the text, watching clips of the film, role playing different scenes and developing a super understanding of the different characters. With group work and sharing interesting ideas, the children are really developing their descriptive writing. I'm very impressed with them all.
If you'd have walked past our classroom on Monday afternoon last week you would have heard a wonderful sound! The children were playing xylophones together! They are beginning to learn how to play chords and triads whilst playing to a steady beat; they seem quite a talented bunch!!
Maths has been busy this week; the children are learning how to convert different units of measurement. This has proved quite tricky for many of the children, but with hard work, the children have made some brilliant progress.
In science, we have been focusing on food chains this week; the children have developed a super understanding of ecosystems. Next week, we are beginning a selection of investigations surrounding sound.
The children are continuing to really impress me in art; their album cover designs are fabulous. This next week, we will be moving things on a little further and using paints to develop their final versions. The children have really enjoyed incorporating art into their English work this week too; Mary Lennox illustrations have really impressed me. I can't wait to see pastel drawings of the secret garden too!
Hope you are all enjoying a lovely weekend together and aren't struggling too much with the dreadful weather.
See you all next week,
Mrs Matthews x
Friday 12th January 2024
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
We've had a wonderful first week back; it has, as always, been incredibly busy, but great fun too!!
We began with role play in English, before the children worked on perfecting their punctuation skills as they presented speech in their writing. They've worked really hard and done an incredible job!
Art has involved recreating a number of album covers; we're linking our art to our science this half term! We will be focusing on our ears and hearing. We have a number of investigations to conduct; great fun for a class of budding scientists!
In a final session on digestion, we all enjoyed a very active and hands on lesson in science today!! Using tights, bananas, bread and apple juice, we recreated the digestive system. There was a mixture of reactions to using our hands as teeth and manually recreating the intestinal peristalsis as the food passed down the tights, but the excitement as the children learnt was wonderful to see (and I am sure was heard across the school)!!!
We started our new history topic this week; we are exploring events during the Industrial Revolution and discovering how transport dramatically changed during those years. I was amazed just how much the children grasped even in our first lesson. We worked practically and in pairs; always a good thing!!
P.E. was fun too again this week; we have been working hard to develop the skills necessary for rugby and similar sports. The children have thoroughly enjoyed working in teams to compete for spaces and tags! The unit is called; 'Duel, Win, Lose'; a great name for the fun games we played this week!
Well done everyone for all your incredibly hard work this week. Keep practising those times tables and reading the time too. Keep practising those 24 hour conversions as well!!
Please enjoy some of our recent photos; some of today's science and then a collection taken during our final week in school (visiting Greenacres and performing our Christmas play for you all)!
Have a wonderful weekend everyone!
See you Monday,
Mrs Matthews
8th January 2024
admin on: Class 4
Happy New Year everyone! We hope you have had a fabulous Christmas and have enjoyed celebrating in 2024!
We all had a very busy and exciting Autumn term and the two weeks rest we have all had at home over the holiday period have certainly been very relaxing indeed!!
Thank you so very, very much to you all for the wonderful messages, cards and Christmas gifts you kindly presented us with during the last week of term; we were very touched indeed and just wanted to pass on an enormous 'thank you' to you all!
With love from,
Mrs Matthews and Mrs Scott xx
Friday 15th December 2023
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
What a fun and busy week we have had! As you'd expect, we have been have been working hard to perfect our Christmas performance for you all. I am so very proud of the children this week; they have really risen to the challenge of learning their lines and perfecting the songs. I am hoping you thoroughly enjoy their performance next week. We have a dress rehearsal on Monday and if the children perform as well then as they did in class this afternoon, they will be amazing! Well done everyone!
The children have continued to work exceptionally hard in English again this week. Not only have they completed their own playscripts, but they have now written lovely pieces about two naughty elves creating havoc in the kitchen on Christmas Eve. They have risen well to the challenge of accurately presenting and punctuating conversations between the elves within the text. A job well done everyone!
In maths, we have been working very hard indeed on reading the time; our ultimate aim is to confidently read the time to the nearest minute! This has proved a little challenging to say the least!! We have tried a number of different activities this week and yesterday had fun with a selection of games surrounding time; matching pairs, dominoes and a board game all focused on developing those 'reading the time' skills! Please do keep practising at home too!!
Below, I have added a few images of the children having fun as they played the 'time' games together yesterday. We will continue revisiting 'time' in the New Year!!
Next week, we are very much looking forwards to our dress rehearsal and final performance, as well as a very exciting Christmas party together! Let the festivities begin!!
Have a wonderful weekend everyone!
Mrs Matthews x
Friday 8th December
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
Only 2 weeks to go until Christmas; I can't believe it!! Where does the time go?
We are very busy rehearsing our Christmas performance for you all; the children continue to amaze us every single day with their acting, singing and dancing skills; you're in for a real treat! The children can't wait to perform for you.
As well as thoroughly enjoying all the rehearsals, the children have been learning a great deal whilst practising too. They have developed super knowledge of playscripts; they've loved reading them together and have even begun to write playscripts of their own.
The whole school was treated to a wonderful pantomime this morning; 'M & M Productions' were just fantastic! The amazing cast of just 4 together performed all the parts and did a superb job. The children were delighted and thoroughly enjoyed joining in with the many songs too. It was a real success! Below are a few photos of the show! The pantomime was a fabulous end to a week of very busy assessments; very well deserved!
The children have continued to develop their knowledge of the River Nile this week; they have researched many facts and have created the most wonderful drawings of the Nile, with numerous captions of exciting and interesting facts added. Well done everyone!
Have a fabulous weekend everyone!
See you Monday,
Mrs Matthews and Mrs Scott x
Friday 24th November
admin on: Class 4
Good evening everyone,
The children have really enjoyed a fun and practical week this week! Not only have we ended the week on a high with a very exciting 'Movie Night', there have been so many highlights!
On Wednesday, the children were treated to a fabulous 'Road Safety' afternoon, involving fun activities in the classroom, but also practical tasks outdoors. They have learned so much invaluable information to help keep them safe on our increasingly busy roads.
The children are thoroughly enjoying sharing our new text, 'The Dancing Bear' and have loved exploring role play to help them empathise with the characters and understand the themes in the story really well. Today, they have begun their own playscripts, based on the role play they have worked on.
Music was fun this afternoon too! The children have amazed me as they have created their own musical renditions of the 'Pink Panther' theme tune! They are proving to be wonderful singers too; we have begun rehearsing our songs for the Christmas performance this week. You are certainly in for a treat!
Maths has been busy all week; not only are we practising those times tables and recapping learning through our 8 questions every day, we have been working hard on statistics all week.
The children are all continuing to thoroughly enjoy their P.E. lessons. They have created the most wonderful group dances together and are loving their ball games with Mrs Kendall. Our running track continues to be a hit too; the children are getting fitter and fitter every day!
Have a wonderful weekend everyone and do enjoy the photos I've added from activities this week!
See you Monday,
Mrs Matthews
Friday 17th November
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
We've had a super week this week! As I mentioned earlier in the week, we have been working on poetry this week. We have been really proud of the children's poetry; they have really embraced all the characteristics we have discussed in class with great enthusiasm. We have also begun reading 'The Dancing Bear', a lovely book of Michael Morpurgo's. The children have loved creating their own versions of the setting for the story.
The 'Richard Symonds' animal artwork the children have completed this week have been equally wonderful!
Science today has been fun; not only have the children worked on 'Dental Hygiene' posters, they have also prepared an investigation to determine which drinks have the most detrimental effects on our teeth; is it fresh orange, cola or something else? We will need to wait a week to see if our predications are correct!
Maths has been a tricky one this week; we've been focusing on angles and identifying different triangles and quadrilaterals. I think we will be revisiting 'quadrilaterals' again on Monday so any practise at home would be really helpful!!
The children are loving geography at the moment; they have been confidently labelling the 'Tropic of Cancer' and 'Capricorn', as well as the two hemispheres and the equator and taking note of the countries the equator crosses and the resulting temperature differences. It's amazing how much the children are grasping and so quickly too!
We hope you have a wonderful weekend and look forwards to seeing you all again on Monday!
Mrs Matthews, Miss Nipe and Mrs Scott x
Wednesday 15.11.23
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
Class 4 have had a wonderful start to this week! They have created some fabulous poems this week all about Bonfire Night and Halloween. I have been absolutely amazed by their super enthusiasm and the speed at which they have understood different types of poetry and have had a go themselves. I will post a few examples later this week.
We were delighted this week that Ishan felt confident enough to tell us all about the wonderful Diwali celebrations he and his family have enjoyed at the weekend. Thank you so very much Ishan and Dad for the fabulous power point we could all share in class. Ishan proudly showed us some of the gorgeous divas he and his brother made and also the delicious food he and his family enjoyed. Thank you so much Ishan for your wonderful presentation.
The children are thoroughly enjoying their P.E. lessons; their group dances were brilliant this week. Again, poetry helped inspire the dances the children created. Miss Nipe and myself were very impressed!
We hope you enjoy the photos below,
Mrs Matthews and all in class 4
Friday 10th November
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
We've had a wonderful first week back in school. The children have arrived every day with renewed enthusiasm and wonderful smiles, keen to begin the new half term.
We have worked incredibly hard in English; the children have finally added the finishing touches to their super non-fiction texts on 'Saving our Planet'. If you need any advice on how best to help improve our environment, simply speak to class 4. They know all the most interesting facts! We are now currently working on writing our own poetry!
Maths has been busy too; we are working so hard at those times tables and the children are improving all the time. Thank you so much for all your fabulous support at home. We have focused on recapping 2 and 3D shape; both identifying and describing the characteristics of them. The children have worked really hard on symmetry too; it's not always an easy one, but they're certainly getting the idea now!
We have started our new geography topic this week too; the children have enjoyed identifying each of the 7 continents and have enjoyed learning all about their different sizes and populations and making comparisons.
Our new topic in art has interested the children enormously; they were very impressed with the life-sized art work of Richard Symonds and have begun sketching similar pieces, although much smaller!
Science was fun this afternoon too; the children should now be able to name all their teeth and yours too! They enjoyed examining each other's teeth to identify the different types and discovering the different roles each type of teeth has. We are really looking forwards to learning all about digestion this half term. I'm hoping they will love recreating the digestive system!
Dance proved to be a very exciting lesson; the children absolutely loved using different images and even a poem for inspiration for their paired and group dances this week. It was absolutely great to see the children discovered they had a love of dance they were unaware of. Watch out 'Strictly', here we come!!
Hope you all have a wonderful weekend and enjoy the brief spell of improved weather we're having!
See you Monday,
Mrs Matthews x
Week ending 20th October
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
We've had another wonderful week here in class 4. Before all the dreadful weather began, we headed outdoors earlier this week for some very relaxing art work! Having examined some of the landscape scenes created by the wonderful David Hockney, I asked the children to initially create some pencil sketched landscape scenes of their own! The children loved every minute; some sat on the running track, others on the benches and one or two of the children focused on the cherry trees besides our netball court. With three of us available to supervise the children, we were able to allow them a wider area to select from. I can't wait to see the finished paintings.
We had a change to our literacy plans this week as we challenged the children to first plan and then begin writing their own story for the BBC 500 Words Competition. We spent quite a while exploring different ideas for characters, settings and plots and really enjoyed reading other story examples. The children were really inspired and loved having a go themselves. I can't wait to read their final versions. Well done everyone and good luck with the competition if you do decide to enter.
Friday morning was very exciting as we were thrilled to join Matt Lucas and the staff from 'Read' in a live event as Matt introduced his brand new book to us all. He was so entertaining and wonderful with the children. Many of the other schools in our local area joined us at the event. It was so perfectly timed too as Matt gave the children lots of advice on how to write a captivating story. Just by chance, our lesson to follow his discussion was our final literacy lesson on writing our short stories. What better inspiration than a famous author telling you what makes a good story!!
The children thoroughly enjoyed their gymnastics lesson again this week. Each week, they have developed more and more skills and continue to impress me. This week the children performed some wonderful paired routines incorporating all the skills they have been learning across the half term. Next week, we will be progressing from the benches to the floor beams and introducing the springboard to our vaults too; very exciting!
Netball skills are developing all the time too! The children are having great fun playing a wide range of games with a range of different balls and other equipment aimed at helping them develop each of the skills required in attacking and defending in netball games.
Please enjoy the photos below; there are just a few examples of some of the sketches the children have begun, as well as photos of some of the brave children that have been reciting their poems to the whole class. The children have loved this challenge; next week I am really looking forwards to hearing more of the children reciting their selected poems too. I have also added a photo of the Matt Lucas 'Read' event, along with a very excited class 4 at the end of the event. They were waving goodbye to Matt!!
Have a wonderful weekend!
See you Monday,
Mrs Matthews and the class 4 team x
Week ending 13th October
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
Hope you are all thoroughly enjoying the gorgeous Autumn sunshine today; cold, but bright blue skies!!
As you'll be aware, Tuesday was Mental Wellbeing Awareness Day. As a class, not only did we share some super discussions surrounding the importance of talking to others and voicing any worries or concerns, but we very much focused on different ways we could help ourselves relax. The children thoroughly enjoyed a very relaxing yoga session and nearly fell asleep during the very soothing mindfulness activity. They were all absolutely amazing and loved taking part. Hopefully they all came home on Tuesday totally free from stress and very quiet too!!
The children have loved our literacy activities surrounding 'The Lorax' this week. They particularly enjoyed the role play earlier this week! The children worked in small groups together and interviewed the Once-ler, telling him how badly he was affecting the environment around him whilst persistently chopping down those Truffula trees and working in the factory. He has since had 32 letters of complaint from class 4, all trying desperately to persuade him to change his ways!! I have been so impressed by the children's persuasive letters; well done everyone! Next week, we will be working on the BBC 500 words story competition; we can't wait!!
We have enjoyed getting more familiar with atlases in geography this week. The children have been working on route finding between settlements; they found this a little tricky at first, but very soon became experts in map reading!! So, if your satnav fails, please do pass a map to your child and you will still 'arrive at your destination'!!
Having worked hard last week on classifying animals in science, the children have now swiftly moved onto identifying many different plants, flowers and trees and sorting them carefully into groups according to different criteria. The children worked so well with partners and whilst supporting each other, were able to successfully sort them all.
Yesterday, the children took part in a democratic vote; they watched video clips of a number of year 6 canditates and voted democratically to select their preferred captains to lead our house teams. The votes were counted, verified and then finally announced in assembly yesterday; we now have 4 very proud captains and vice captains for our house teams! Well done to everyone who put themselves forward and created fabulous speeches; you are an inspiration to others in school!
The children have worked extremely hard in maths this week; we have primarily focused on written addition and subtraction as we have also tackled lots of related problem solving. This is always a tricky one, but I do think we have made some superb progress this week! Well done everyone; keep up the super hard work!
We ended our week singing beautifully on Friday; what a perfect end to the week. We have a number of songs we are beginning to practice as we are considering performing a selection of special songs for the residents of a local nursing home in December. We will keep practising and let you know when plans have been made. For now, let the practising continue! The two songs we have focused on first are 'This Little Light of Mine' and 'Little Donkey'. The next one will be 'Silent Night'! Please do enjoy singing these together at home as this will be super practice!
Have a fabulous weekend everyone!
See you Monday!
Mrs Matthews and the class 4 team! xx
Friday 6th October
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
We've had another great week here in class 4.
The children have loved our new text, 'The Lorax'! We began the week by watching a short animation of the book and discussing the main characters. The children have drawn the most wonderful images of the Lorax and the Once-ler. They really are amazing artists! They have then worked together to create endless lists of fabulous adjectives to describe the two characters, before then writing wonderful descriptive extended sentences about them.
Maths has been as busy as ever! The children continue to keep practising everything we are learning through their daily 8 question starter! Active times tables keeps them all fit as they learn too! We have focused on calculations this week (addition, subtraction and multiplication) and today have concentrated on solving missing number sentences; a little trickier!!
Geography has involved the children using the atlases to find different locations in Britain. The children were amazed to find that for many places you could discover it's origins by looking at the name endings. They enjoyed listing those places that originated in Viking, Roman and Anglo-Saxon times and creating their own tables.
The children are continuing to thoroughly enjoy developing their skills in both netball and gymnastics and are having great fun using the running track every day. We've incorporated different ways of moving along the track this week too; exhausting but fun!!
This afternoon, we decided we were going to battle with the elements and venture outdoors for our art. The children thoroughly enjoyed working together to create fabulous Andy Goldsworthy inspired sculptures with leaves and other natural resources. Do enjoy the photos below!
Have a wonderful weekend; let's hope the sun shines as much as we have been promised!!
See you Monday!
Mrs Matthews x
Friday 29th September
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
We've all had a great week here in class 4; busy as always, but full of fun and learning!
The children have amazed me with their acting skills again this week! We used role play to enhance our literacy earlier in the week. We have been focusing on the book 'Window' in order to inspire exciting descriptive writing. We then decided to write an informal letter of complaint to the council regarding the changes to the environment seen in the book! Obviously, we had to role play a meeting with the councillors first; the role play was superb and certainly inspired the children's writing. It was lovely to see!
In geography, we have been looking at arial views and OS maps to spot different land uses. It has been interesting to compare different areas. The children are becoming quite skilled at spotting the differences whilst developing their map skills.
In art, the children have continued to focus on natural resources and have created some lovely patterns using charcoals and chalks. Next week, we are looking forwards to going outdoors and creating some Andy Goldsworthy sculptures using a variety of resources in the woodland area. If the winds begin again I am sure we won't be short of plenty of leaves to help with those sculptures!!
The children are broadening their knowledge of animals and the different characteristics. Today, we have been focusing on using classification keys to allow us to accurately group animals using more scientific terminology.
Gymnastics and netball skills are developing week by week and the children are thoroughly enjoying using the running track every day.
We hope you all have a wonderful weekend.
See you on Monday morning!
Mrs Matthews and Mrs Scott x
Blog update; Friday 22.9.23
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
I just thought I'd give you a little update on life in fabulous class 4! The children have settled in beautifully and continue to be an absolute pleasure to teach. They are thoroughly enjoying all aspects of each day and come into class with lovely beaming smiles, full of enthusiasm and keen to learn more!
Art has been great fun as we have searched for natural resources outdoors, even in the rain! The children have then created the most wonderful patterns with chalks and charcoals; a very artist class I think!
Our literacy has involved the outdoors too. Would you believe it was raining again when we ventured outside for inspiration for our descriptive writing? It's amazing how inspirational our outdoor area is for developing a bank of exciting adjectives and noun phrases!!
The children have all enjoyed reading everyday; in guided reading groups and independently too. It's so lovely to see how much progress the children are already making. We're all enjoying sharing our class novel too; 'Lucky Button', by Michael Morpurgo.
Science has been busy too! We're learning lots about animals and their habitats, particularly ways in which we classify them at the moment.
We've all been really enjoying our music; it's amazing how many versions of the song 'This Little Light of Mine' there are. So far, it seems the gospel version is most of the children's favourite; I think the fact that we are adding movement to the song is adding to the fun of learning!
Our running track has been a hit with both children and staff! Our extra daily exercise session on the track is getting us all fitter and fitter every day!!
P.E. has been great, as always! The children are focusing on netball skills with Mrs Kendall and gymnastics with me. We have been concentrating on developing routines involving symmetrical balances with partners. We have also introduced hoops, bands and balls; I have been amazed how creative the children have been. I don't think I'll be short of gymnasts when selecting for our gymnastics display this year!!
Enjoy the gymnastics photos!
Have a lovely weekend everyone,
Mrs Matthews x
Friday 8th September 2023
admin on: Class 4
What an absolutely wonderful start to class 4 the children have had this week! I feel very lucky to have such a fabulous group of children to teach this year!
Your children are all so incredibly well behaved, wonderfully polite and a real credit to you all. I feel very excited to have the opportunity of sharing lots of exciting topics and activities with them all. What a brilliant year we have ahead of us!
The children have settled into the routine in class 4 exceptionally well and have certainly deserved their whole class certificate this week.
Do enjoy the gorgeous weather this weekend everyone; it may be our last sunny one for a little while.
See you all on Monday!
Mrs Matthews
xx
Our Final Week!
admin on: Class 4
What a fabulous final week we all had here in class 4!
Our wonderful visit to Greenacres Care Home on Tuesday could not have gone any better! The children were absolutely fantastic; they sang and performed so beautifully and behaved just perfectly throughout our visit. We were so very proud of every single one of them. Well done class 4; you were superstars!! The residents were absolutely delighted with our choice of songs and joined in as the children sang. They even asked for an encore!! The staff were so very impressed and are keen to invite us all back!
Our final day was great fun! We had some wonderful science fun outdoors! We investigated how to create the biggest and longest lasting bubbles and went into the forest to investigate which were the most popular habitats for our minibeasts, insects and bugs!! We had a brilliant time!
I'll miss every single one of the children next year; they have all been brilliant! We have worked hard, but had great fun too!
Thank you so much for all your fabulous support this year and for your very kind and thoughtful cards and gifts too. Teaching here at Netherthong is an absolute pleasure; I love every minute!
Have a wonderful Summer everyone!
Take care too!
Love from,
Mrs Matthews
Friday 14th July
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
Wow! Where has this year gone? One week left before the Summer holidays! I have thoroughly enjoyed every single minute teaching class 4 this year; what an amazing group of children they are!
We have been working very hard to practise the songs for Greenacres; some of the songs have been a little tricky for the children to learn but I hope you will agree, their hard work has certainly paid off. The children sounded absolutely amazing today. We decided to have a big practise this afternoon in view of the rain letting us down today! I'm so sorry we had to cancel today's sports day; let's hope the weather is kinder to us on Monday!
Thank you so very much to the parents that have kindly offered lifts to some of the children for our visit to Greenacres on Tuesday; it will be so lovely to be able to go to by car, rather than squeezing onto public transport. Please come to school for 1:30pm if you are able and we will have plenty of time to ensure all the children can take up their places in the cars and we can set off together.
The children have worked incredibly hard on their NFER assessments this week; I am so proud of every single one of them as they have put in so much effort and are making some super progress. Well done everyone!
We have lots of interesting art and science activities planned next week so I am sure the children will love every minute!
As promised, here are more of the wonderful Cliffe House photographs for you to enjoy! The children were all absolutely fabulous and had such a wonderful time. It was a real treat to share those very special days with them all.
Have a super weekend and enjoy our Summer Fair!!
See you on Monday,
Mrs Matthews and the class 4 team! xx
Friday 30th June
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
Just a quick blog to tell you all how very impressed we were with every single one of the children during our 3 day stay at Cliffe House. They were an absolute pleasure to be with! The children demonstrated wonderful resilience and great team work as they took part in the most exciting outdoor activities. From the tricky bed-making on day 1, to the bush craft and fire-making on day 3, the children thoroughly enjoyed every single minute. As I have highlighted to the children in assembly, our residential at Cliffe House has so far been my favourite of events with the children! We're all very tired (staff and children) but it has been worth every single second; we've all loved it! Thank you everyone for being such a fabulous team!
Thank you to Miss Monday, Mrs Scott, Mrs Robb and Miss Hewitt for all your support this week and Miss Kelly, Miss Watkins and Mrs McLoughlin for your very welcome evening support!!
Today, the children have thoroughly enjoyed sharing their buzzer games and quizzes with their buddies; a rather noisy, but lovely final activity of the week!
Please enjoy a selection of photos we took at Cliffe House; I will add more next week!
Well done everyone! Have a big rest this weekend (as will we)!!
See you on Monday,
Mrs Matthews and the year 4 team xx
Friday 23rd June
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone,
We have just arrived back following our amazing visit to the Sports Barn! We're all exhausted but we have had a fabulous time. The children have been a real credit to our school; beautifully behaved! We're so proud of them! What a wonderfully well organised event too! The children have taken part in so many sports activities; volley ball, boccia, cricket, rugby and athletics and have loved every minute. Below are a selection of lovely photos for you all to enjoy!
This week has been a busy one, as always. The children are obviously so excited about our forthcoming visit to Cliffe House, but have worked incredibly hard on many other tasks. In maths, we have been working hard recapping a number of the trickier mathematical concepts we have focused on this year; ordering decimal numbers, problem-solving, division and much more! Keep practising on 'Mathletics' everyone as it really helps consolidate your learning further.
In literacy, we have been using non-fiction texts and the lap tops to research exciting facts about the Romans. The children have loved it! They have enjoyed working in small groups, working as teams to research a different area of the lives and the Romans each; hopefully, very soon they will be able to tell you an endless list of facts!
Have a wonderful weekend and enjoy the photos!
See you Monday,
Mrs Matthews and the year 4 team xx
Friday 16th June
admin on: Class 4
Good evening everyone!
What a wonderful week we have all had this week! We have been busily working on our exciting 'Romans' topic; the children have been sequencing, role playing and retelling the ancient Roman myth 'Romulus and Remus' this week. They are now just finishing their own written versions and a great job they're doing too.
Maths this week has kept us very busy too; we have been recapping multiplication and division calculations. Today, we have been working on problem solving; always a tricky one!
The children have loved creating their electrical circuits and buzzer games; they can't wait to test them on their buddies next week!
On Thursday, we were treated to a wonderful musical assembly; the fabulous musician Simeon entertained us all with his selection of flutes. Would you believe you can play wonderful music on a crutch, a bicycle pump and even a 50ml syringe? The music Simeon played for us was simply divine; whatever the instrument! He then joined us in class to entertain us further with his talent and answer lots of questions. I have added a photo below.
We also had a brilliant time this week during our outdoor yoga class. As boccia activities were taking place in the hall, we simply took the yoga outdoors; perfect! It was just the relaxation we all needed.
I have added one or two photos for you to see below; enjoy!
Have a wonderful weekend and enjoy the sunshine (while it lasts!!)
See you on Monday,
Mrs Matthews and the year 4 team x
11.6.23
admin on: Class 4
Good evening everyone!
I hope you have all enjoyed the gorgeous weather this weekend and also had a wonderful half term break.
As the children worked so hard on their Ancient Egyptian topic and completed so many super pieces of artwork, I thought you might like to have a little look at some. I have uploaded a few examples on the previous blog; I hope you have enjoyed looking at them!
This week, we have begun our new topic of 'The Romans'; I am sure we will have just as much fun! The children showed off their amateur dramatics skills during a role play session this week. We are looking at the Roman myth 'Romulus and Remus' at the moment; the children have worked in small groups to role play each scene and a great job they did too. Very entertaining indeed!
We have had a very busy week of P.E. this week; yoga, badminton and orienteering too. We have just purchased a fabulous new scheme and the required equipment to teach very exciting orienteering lessons. They children loved a taster session this week!
We have continued working incredibly hard on our times tables this week as next week we will be completing the Multiplications Test; please keep practising at home as it really does develop the children's confidence as well as their knowledge of the times tables. Thank you for all your wonderful support at home.
We're all very much looking forwards to our visit to Cliffe House; lots of very exciting and adventurous activities have been planned! We can't wait!
See you all in the morning!
Mrs Matthews
Week ending 19th May
admin on: Class 4
Good evening everyone!
We have had a super busy week both this week and last.
Our music lessons this week and last have been very noisy, but lovely at the same time! We are planning to go along to one of our local residential homes and entertain the residents with a few cheery songs. The children are so excited and absolutely love practising. We aim to show off our singing later in the next half term.
We have also been learning all about 'pentatonic scales' and have been beginning to learn to read some music too. The children will even be having a go at composing some of their own music this next week. They have loved using the glockenspiels whilst trying some of their own improvisation.
Our Ancient Egyptians topic continues to be popular in class 4 too. The children have loved learning all about the life of the ancient Egyptians and are keen to learn all about Tutankhamun's tomb this week. We are even using clay to create some sculptures of pyramids, canopic jars and perhaps even some mini death masks on Monday!
The children are loving the science topic too; we have been looking at electrical appliances at home and in school and have very much focused on safety around electricity this week. Next week we will be creating electrical circuits, before then looking at insulators and conductors of electricity.
Boxercise continues to be very energetic, fun and certainly a hit with the whole class. The lessons are such good fun. The children took part in a very energetic circuit training session this week; each exercise boxercise related of course. I haven't quite recovered myself yet!!
Below are just a few photos of the children. You'll notice I have added a photo taken during the Stephen Mulhern 'Read' event; it was absolutely brilliant! Rosie was even selected by Stephen to take part in a magic trick; Netherthong are famous at last!!!
Have a lovely week and we'll update you on events this week in class 4 on Friday!
See you soon,
Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott and Miss Hewitt xx
Friday 5th May
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
Thank you everyone for all your super hard work, smiley faces and beautiful singing this week! What a lovely day we have had today! We have been focusing on King Charles' Coronation today and have thoroughly enjoyed a special whole school singing event this afternoon. The children have been rehearsing 'Close to You' by the Carpenters all week and were amazing during their performance in the playground! Well done everyone! The sun even came out for us all too!
The children have begun creating wonderful fact files on King Charles and his coronation; they're loving designing a full 'two-page spread' of interesting facts, interesting information and images. They have loved it! We will continue to develop these further next week, but will also be working on writing formal letters to King Charles himself; very exciting!
Our Ancient Egyptians topic continues to really interest the children, as does our text 'The Egyptian Cinderella'. The children loved their Egyptian art session with Miss Monday on Tuesday afternoon; very impressive art work, as always!
P.E. was another highlight of the week. The children absolutely loved their first 'boxercise' session; they were exhausted afterwards, but loved every minute!
French this week has involved the children beginning to read the time in French! The children found this a little tricky initially, but we're definitely getting there! More practice needed on Thursday I think, but it's certainly coming!
Here are a few photos taken on the playground today as we waited for our turn to show off our singing; well done class 4, you were fabulous!
Have a wonderful weekend everyone; see you Tuesday!
Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott and Miss Hewitt xx
Friday 28th April
admin on: Class 4
Good evening everyone!
We've had another super week in year 4! The children continue to work incredibly hard, whilst having great fun as they learn!
We are working hard to perfect our singing ready for our whole school singing celebration in the playground on Friday. The children seem to have developed a keen ear for 'The Carpenters'! They are thoroughly enjoying practising their song and today sang it beautifully (brought a tear to my eye); perhaps they'll all be singing for you at home too!!
We began the week with some wonderful art; the children are enjoying completing their Egyptian patterns, ready for creating their Egyptian headdresses. They are looking fabulous already!
In our PSHCE lessons, the children have created ornate 3D pyramids and have filled them with wonderful positive comments about themselves. They have then written equally positive comments for others in class. The children have loved doing this and are enjoying keeping these on their desks and reading the notes whenever they need to.
The Ancient Egyptians topic has well and truely began! The children are thoroughly enjoying our new text, 'The Egyptian Cinderella'. Earlier in the week, they used role play to develop a deeper understanding of the text and today we have been comparing it to the well known fairy-tale of 'Cinderella'! History is becoming very exciting too; we have been considering what we already know about Ancient Egypt and what we'd like to learn over the next few weeks.
Have a super extended weekend everyone! See you next week!
Mrs Matthews, Miss Hewitt and Mrs Scott xx
Friday 21st April
admin on: Class 4
Good morning everyone!
Welcome back to our Summer Term! I cannot believe we are already beginning our final term together in year 4! What a wonderful class of children we have in year 4; let's have a fantastic final term together!
This week, we began the week in style!! Art involved creating wonderful Ancient Egyptian patterns ready for decorating the Egyptian headdresses we will be displaying in the next few weeks.
Tuesday was certainly a big hit!! As our science afternoon involved using thermometers to compare the melting and boiling points of different materials, we based our lesson around creating beautifully tasty chocolate crispy buns!! Whilst learning how to use a thermometer and comparing boiling points, the children really enjoyed baking!! Who can blame us when Easter was only a week or so ago!!
On Thursday, our Sports Partnership coordinator joined us to lead some wonderfully active maths lessons. Whilst practising their addition, subtraction and multiplication, the children enjoyed lots of fun, physical activities in the sunshine on our playground. They all loved every single minute (as did I)!!
Music was fun on Friday too; we were learning about 'Pentatonic Scales' as we compared the melodies of very different pieces of music from around the world. I was delighted to see the children thoroughly enjoyed every minute, especially as they were then able to create their own pieces using the glockenspiels; what a beautiful ending to our week!!
Enjoy your weekend everyone! See you on Monday!
Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott and Miss Hewitt xx
Friday 31st March
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
It is so lovely to be back in class this week; the children have been so wonderful and welcoming (as always) and have really kept me smiling! Thank you so much for all your lovely messages and words of support.
We had a super busy week! We began with some relaxing 'seascape' artwork and forest activities before we began our week of quizzes on Tuesday. I'm so sorry to have returned to school and immediately begun testing, but amazingly the children have seemed to enjoy them!!
We have kept busy in geography this week; the children went on a fact finding mission to complete very interesting and colourful posters all about the longest rivers in the world. Currently, our classroom is decorated in facts about the Nile, Amazon, the Ganges and lots more!! Today we have been learning all about the different physical features of rivers.
We have very much linked our learning in science to our geography too; the children have recreated the water cycle whilst growing cress. Today, we have observed evidence of the 'evaporation', 'condensation' and even the 'precipitation' processes. Who knew you could learn so much from growing cress on a window ledge!!
We have been perfecting our vaulting skills in P.E. today; we have been focusing on perfecting the 'squat on' and also those dismounts. The children have used a variety of different dismounts and have shown some super control on their landings too.
French was fun this week; we focused on healthy/unhealthy foods and sports too. We use a 'Eurostars' program in French which involves some super activities; animations, vocab word bank games and quick whole class quizzes. The children loved it this week.
As you can see, they have worked extremely hard and certainly deserve a great Easter break!
Enjoy the holidays everyone! Keep your fingers crossed for good weather; you never know, we may be dusting off the garden furniture and enjoying the sun!!!
See you very soon,
Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott and Miss Hewitt x
Friday 3rd March
admin on: Class 4
Good evening everyone!
We have had another great week here in class 4. We began by focusing on some relaxing artwork on Monday; recreating some of the work of David Hockney. The children enjoyed copying his 'swimming pool' pieces and his 'beach' scenes; once again, we were very impressed indeed!
Science was particularly good fun on Tuesday! We began an investigation to calculate if gas had a mass at all and to then compare the amount of gas in different fizzy drinks. We are looking forwards to completing our investigation and recording our results this week.
'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory' has remained a hit in our literacy lessons this week! The children have written some beautiful character descriptions of Charlie Bucket and have created fabulous 'persuasive posters' advertising Wonka Bars! I would certainly buy one! Next week we will be working on writing persuasive letters to Mr Wonka to allow Charlie a free pass into the factory!
Gymnastics was once again a great success today; the balances the children are creating in their paired work are brilliant; photos to follow next week! Well done everyone for your super swimming on Wednesday too!
Yesterday, we had a wonderful World Book Day! The children all looked very comfortable in their pajamas, whilst we staff looked 'very interesting' in our wide array of character costumes! The children loved sharing their favourite books with their buddies; it was so lovely to see how nurturing the children are with each other. We shared lots of story times throughout the day and told the children all about our favourite books too. Enjoy spending your tokens and don't forget your Readathon Challenge!
Have a super weekend everyone and we'll look forwards to seeing you all on Monday!
Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott and Miss Hewitt x
Friday 24th February
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
We have had a great first week back; the children have returned refreshed, enthusiastic and ready for another action packed and exciting 6 weeks!
This week we have begun our new text; 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory'. The children are loving it! Earlier in the week the children worked in small groups to role play the beginning of the story, as Charlie returns home to see his family and enjoy cabbage soup!! The children were amazing. They have been working hard today to write their own versions of the conversation Charlie may have had with his family, particularly good old Grandpa Joe! They have been focusing on ensuring the conversation is presented correctly and with accurate punctuation.
In art, the children have begun to create their own version of one of Claude Monet's famous 'Water Lilies' paintings. I have been amazed by the wonderful work the children are producing; they're developing into super artists!
Maths this week has centred around 'measuring'; we have explored lengths, capacities and masses, working practically in pairs and small groups. I have suggested the children keep practising measuring at home too; using measuring jugs at bath time to practise measuring capacities and helping with baking etc. We have extended this learning by moving onto converting measures too; a little tricky at first, but the children have made so much progress and now have a much clearer understanding.
The children had their first swimming lesson on Wednesday morning and were so keen to tell me all about it on their return! Understandably, there were mixed emotions the day before, but it does seem they have thoroughly enjoyed their first lesson. If you have any questions at all, please don't hesitate to ask.
The children were all amazing in their 'Sports Acro Gymnastics' lesson with me today. They worked exceptionally well in pairs, performing routines with super balance sequences. I'll take some photos as they develop their balances further and add some to the blog for you to see.
Have a fabulous weekend everyone!
See you on Monday,
Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott and Miss Hewitt xx
Friday 10th February
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
What a fast half term this has felt! The children have all been amazing and have had some great fun. Their enthusiasm for everything we do is just wonderful to see.
Rugby and hockey have been a great hit this week; we have played a mini tournament in each lesson. I am so impressed with the progress they have all made; what a sporty class we have!!
This week we have all made very tasty flatbread. The children have all loved every minute. They have flavoured their breads with wonderful herbs and have created very tasty flatbreads indeed! Miss Hewitt has been a fantastic assistant chef, supporting the children at their work!! Thank you Miss Hewitt (and thank you, too for my gorgeous sample!)
Science has been fun too. We have been tasting different materials to detect which one is the best insulator of sound. We wrapped hand bells in different materials and discovered the thick fabric was the most effective at masking the sound. Well done everyone!
Here are a few photos of the soup making last week!
Have a super half term holiday everyone.
See you very soon,
Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott and Miss Hewitt x
Friday 3rd February
admin on: Class 4
Good evening all!
We've had a very exciting week here in class 4. I asked the children this afternoon which activities they had enjoyed this week and was overwhelmed by their responses. Between them, the children practically named everything we have done this week; I'm so pleased we're keeping the children enthused and happy in class!
We began the week with a very exciting Monday! We designed, prepared and cooked our own fresh vegetable soups. I must say, we were very impressed with all the soups made. The children worked beautifully in small groups; designing and cooking as a team. They absolutely loved their soups too; they thoroughly enjoyed 'seconds'!! I will post some of the photos I took early next week.
Science was fun and exciting too! The children worked in small groups to investigate whether a sound becomes fainter with increased distance. We used body percussion, musical instruments and even homemade 'telephone' lines using plastic cups and string. We used different lengths of string and compared them. The children loved it.
Hockey and rugby continue to be very popular too! The children took part in mini tournaments in both sports. They have learnt so many skills and are developing a good understanding of the rules of each game too.
The children thoroughly enjoyed their art lesson with Miss Monday earlier in the week too. They have created some beautiful abstract designs using the paints; well done everyone!
We are all continuing to enjoy 'The Secret Garden'; the children love joining me on the carpet to share more of the story; story time has always been a favourite of mine!!
We hope you all enjoy a lovely weekend and very much look forwards to seeing you all again on Monday morning!
Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott and Miss Hewitt
Friday 27th January
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
We've had another great week here in year 4. The children have been busy planning their soup recipes ready for an exciting cooking experience on Monday! It looks like I'll be buying all the vegetables in Aldi this weekend, so if you need any I'd go early!! We're really looking forwards to Monday; Master Chef here we come!!
The children are absolutely loving 'The Secret Garden'; they are totally transfixed when I read chapters to them. They were so excited to see the reveal of the actual garden; I'm enjoying seeing their reactions as much as they're enjoying the story. We do keep checking the facts in our book are correct by watching snippets from the film, but we're definitely reading it first (it's much more exciting that way)!! The children have written diary entries, character descriptions and are currently working on exciting descriptive sentences for the garden. They have worked together beautifully in small groups to create the most wonderful sentences. Below are just a couple of examples of the fabulous pastel drawings they have been creating this week.
History remains very interesting; this week the children learnt all about the Rainhill Trials, designed to find the best first steam locomotive back all those years ago. The children were so interested; they created brilliant newspaper articles on the trials or created a number of questions to use during an interview at the trials. We had a great afternoon.
In French, we have been learning how to count all the way to 100; focusing today on the multiples of 10 and solving number sentences!
We have been incredibly busy in maths; we have worked on fractions this week. We have added, subtracted, solved problems and even found the fraction of a number. The children have worked incredibly hard as some of the tasks have been very difficult.
Rugby and hockey continue to enthral the children. They have been focusing on attacking and defending in both. Today, in hockey we have progressed to playing mini games. The children have really impressed me, so next week we will certainly have a mini tournament.
Hope you all have a wonderful weekend. See you all on Monday morning,
Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott and Miss Hewitt xx
Friday 20th January
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
What a fabulous week we have all had in class 4. We are so proud of the children; in view of the icy conditions in the playgrounds, we have had to endure indoor breaks all week. This must have been so difficult for the children but they really have coped amazingly well! Don't tell them, but I think they deserve a special treat next week!!
It has been very noisy in science this week! We have been exploring sound and playing a wide range of musical instruments to check for the source of the vibrations. How we reached the end of the day without dreadful headaches on Tuesday, I really don't know!! It was very noisy, but great fun too!!We will be looking into 'dynamics' in music next week so I think earphones may be a good idea!!
The children are thoroughly enjoying 'The Secret Garden' in literacy and have been producing some wonderful work. Today they have been completing their diaries from Mary Lennox. That poor girl, she really wasn't happy on her arrival at Misslethwaite Manor!
The children continue to really enjoy our Friday morning hockey; they are developing some brilliant skills. Today we have focused on attacking, defending and scoring. Next week we'll definitely be ready for some matches. Rugby is going really well too; the children had great fun scoring their tries as they launched themselves onto the crash mat!!
We held our democratic vote today to elect our school government class representative; many congratulations to Abi on being elected. An enormous well done to everyone who worked really hard to prepare your fabulous speeches and stand for election. We were very proud of you all and the results were very close indeed.
Congratulations too to all the year 4 children who entered the boccia/boules competition at Holmfirth High on Tuesday; you were all amazing! It was so lovely to see so may of you there!
Have a super weekend everyone!
Love from Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott and Miss Hewitt xx
Friday 13th January
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon all!
We have had such a fabulous week this week; fun and very practical! Not only have we had great fun as always in our rugby and hockey lessons, but we have been very hands on in our science and active in English too.
In science, we re-created the digestive system as we helped banana and biscuits travel through the stomach (a plastic bag) and the small and large intestines (tights). The children were horrified at the final result as we followed the food all the way to the end of the large intestine!! The children took on the role of our teeth with their fingers, added acid in the stomach (fresh orange juice) and used 'peristalsis' to help the food along. It was great fun and very messy; a great learning experience though!
We are now focusing on 'The Secret Garden' in our literacy and have had a super time re-enacting the roles of Mary Lennox, Basil, the Officer's wife and 'lovely' old Mrs Medlock! The children absolutely loved it; stage fright was certainly not a problem!!
Finally, yesterday we explored 'pitch' in music, as we played and examined both tuned and untuned instruments. The children developed an understanding of how instruments can be used to change the pitch of music.
Here are one or two photos!
Have a super weekend,
Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott and Miss Hewitt xx
Friday 6th January
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
It has been so lovely to welcome the children back into school this week and hear all about their Christmas holidays! I hope you all thoroughly enjoyed celebrating Christmas and New Year with your children.
Can I just add an enormous thank you to you all for our gorgeous Christmas cards, good wishes and very kind gifts. You really have spoilt us and you absolutely should not! Coming into school every day and spending time with your children is an absolute pleasure. Thank you so very much from us all!
Miss Hewitt has been working incredibly hard this week to complete class 4's writing display; it looks absolutely lovely! Well done class 4; you created wonderful playscripts for 'The Snowman' and should be very proud of yourselves. In order to ensure everyone has their work display, we will extend our display into the classroom too. Please do take a look whenever you are in school.
Have a super weekend; let's hope the weather forecast has been incorrect and it's actually going to be lovely (not a drop of rain!!)
Have a great weekend,
Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott and Miss Hewitt x
,
Friday 16th December
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
Wow! What a week!! It has been very, very busy, but seriously good fun for everyone, staff and children!!
We hope you enjoyed our Christmas production; we absolutely loved all our rehearsals and the children loved performing for you all. We were very proud of every single one of the children and know you will have been too. They sang beautifully and were amazing at learning and delivering their lines; thank you so much for all your wonderful support at home.
Yesterday, we were all treated to watching the year 6 carol concert dress rehearsal; it was such a lovely event and really got us all in the spirit of Christmas.
Yesterday afternoon, the children loved sharing exciting Christmas activities with their buddies in year 1.The children shared a snowman biscuit they made together, created a photo frame for a lovely picture of themselves with their buddies and a colourful Christmas puppet too. It was a great afternoon; busy and noisy, but great fun!!!
This morning we all thoroughly enjoyed our Christmas party; we had great fun dancing (staff included) and playing lots of games. The children enjoyed a lovely tasty snack too; thank you FONS.
Below are a selection of photos from our Christmas performance, 'Straw and Order'!
Have a wonderful Christmas everyone and a great New Year too.
Love from,
Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott and Miss Hewitt x
Week ending 9.12.22
admin on: Class 4
What a fantastic week everyone! We are all so proud of how hard you are all working, especially with your lines for the play. I can't wait to see you in your costumes on the stage.
We had a wonderful morning (oh no we didn't!), watching the panto of Cinderella. Miss Watkins, Mrs Moran and Mrs Kewley were brilliant dancers! You joined in the singing and giggled all the way through.
Keep practicing your lines and acting, ready for next week.
Well done everyone.
Mrs Matthews
Friday 25th November
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
The weeks are absolutely flying by! I can't believe we only have 3 weeks left before we break up for Christmas; time certainly flies when you're having lots of fun! We definitely are here in class 4; we love working with your fabulous children. What a super team they are!
We began the week by recording our findings following our investigation on the effects of different drinks on our teeth. The children absolutely loved carefully revealing the eggs and checking the colour changes to the egg white. Thank goodness it worked as expected and both water and milk proved to be harmless! The children were horrified at the colour changes (coke being the worst) caused by the sugary drinks. You never know, you may never be nagged for a drink of juice or coke again!! Hopefully, the children have realized milk and water are the best!!!
The children have really enjoyed art this week too; Richard Symonds would be very proud of the animal art work they have produced this week. We are very impressed indeed!
Our Christmas performance is coming together too; the children are thoroughly enjoying taking on their roles and practising their lines. Next week we will be moving into the hall to practise stage directions so the sooner the children can learn all their lines, the better!
Congratulations everyone on once again winning the 'Mathletics' trophy this week; your hard work is certainly paying off!! Keep it up!!
Can I also add an enormous 'well done' to those of you that joined me at Colne Valley for your wonderful gymnastics festival; you were all amazing!
Have a fabulous weekend everyone! Mine will be a very busy one; I'm hitting the busy floors of Meadowhall!!!
See you all on Monday,
Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott and Miss Hewitt x
Friday 18th November
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone,
The weeks are really flying by and Christmas is now very much 'just around the corner'!! We are sure you will have heard that our Christmas production, 'Straw and Order' has now finally been cast!! This week we have begun reading through the script together and practising the songs. The children are all just amazing; they are loving every minute! I'm sure you will be in for a treat when you come and watch!
Science has been particularly exciting this week. We have been learning all about dental health and hygiene and as well as creating fabulous health education posters, the children are in the process of conducting a week long investigation to discover the effects of different drinks on our teeth. We are, in fact, using eggs and pretending the egg white is enamel!! The children can't wait to see the results next week! I am sure they'll keep you informed!
The children are loving P.E. at the moment; netball on a Thursday and gymnastics on a Friday. The children are doing so well in gymnastics we have today moved onto synchronised routines and vaults; very impressive indeed!
Despite the dreadful weather earlier in the week, it has been another great one! The children are all amazing and continue to work incredibly hard and with great enthusiasm!
Congratulations everyone on achieving the highly acclaimed 'Spelling Shed' award once again this week; you have worked so hard on those spellings and certainly deserve it! It is standing proudly on our book shelf once more!!
Have a great weekend everyone!
See you all Monday,
Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott and Miss Hewitt
xx
Friday 11th November
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
We've had another wonderful week in class 4 with your super children! They're all working so hard and seem so focused and enthusiastic. They're even becoming a little quieter too!!!
We began the week with some lovely, calming artwork. Whilst some of the class went out into the forest area with Miss Monday, the remainder stayed with me and we worked on beautiful animal pencil sketches, inspired by the work of Richard Symonds. We are continuing with this work next week and adding colour so do keep an eye out for some photos in the next couple of weeks!
The children are really impressing me with their geography knowledge this half term. We have begun by recapping the 7 continents and locating the equator, tropic of Cancer and Capricorn and identifying each of the hemispheres and poles. The children are real fountains of knowledge!
In science we have been identifying and learning the functions of each of our teeth, before we begin learning more about the process of digestion. The children are very much looking forwards to our practical sessions on digestion!
Gymnastics today was super! The children are loving our Friday lessons. They have loved creating wonderful balances, moving in varied ways, vaulting and perfecting their dismounts. I am really impressed with their lovely enthusiasm; well done everyone!
We have all shared 2 minutes silence outdoors today with the rest of the school; an emotional moment where every single child played their part beautifully. We're all very proud of each and every one of them!
Have a wonderful weekend everyone!
See you all on Monday,
Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott and Miss Hewitt
Friday 4th November
admin on: Class 4
Good evening everyone!
Congratulations year 4 on winning the Key Stage 2 'Mathletics' award this week! Well done for all your hard work!
We've had a wonderful first week back this week! The enthusiasm and hard work from all the children has been wonderful to see! The children thoroughly enjoyed their first coach-led netball session this week; we were very impressed with the skills the children already have. Gymnastics on Friday was equally successful; I was so impressed with the enthusiasm of every single one of the children. It was great to see how much progress the children showed in just their first lesson. Well done everyone!
The children thoroughly enjoyed creating their own acrostic Halloween poems early in the week. I was amazed how quickly they got the idea and began creating their wonderful poems! I guess Halloween being the evening before had helped a little!
Music this week has involved listening to and appraising the wonderful work of Camille Saint-Saens in 'Carvival of the Animals'; the children loved every minute. This was great to see! Mrs Parker, our music co-ordinator, would be very impressed!!
We've been working hard on reading comprehensions this week; it's lovely to see the children improving in their fluency whilst reading and their comprehension too.
We hope you all have a great weekend!
See you Monday,
Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott and Miss Hewitt
Friday 21st October
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
We have all had a super week this week! The children have really settled well this half term and are working so incredibly hard and putting 100% into all their work; we have been really impressed.
We began the week with some lovely outdoor art work. The children firstly sketched and then added pastel to wonderful landscapes around school.
We have worked incredibly hard on maths this week; multiplication and division. It has proved quite tricky for many of the children, but I do think we have now mastered them both. Any practise at home would be very useful though- particularly division!!
We have ended the week with a fabulous crafty afternoon with buddies in year 1. The children have made some super Halloween crafts. We finished the day very noisily using percussion instruments and ukeleles to create their own musical composition for 'Peter and the Wolf'. The children loved it!
Here are a couple of photos!
Enjoy the half term holiday and see you all very soon!
Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott and Miss Hewitt
Friday 14th October
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon all!
First of all, can I just say an enormous thank you to all the children and supportive parents/family members for all your hard work with homework. The children are so enthusiastic about both 'Mathletics' and 'Spelling Shed' and are completing their written spelling tasks to a high standard too. Keep it up everyone; you're doing an amazing job. Guess what Mums and Dads, the children won the 'Spelling Shed' award again this week!!!
We've had a brilliant week this week. As the sun was out on both Monday and Wednesday afternoons, we enjoyed some great outdoor learning. The children worked in teams to create the most amazing natural sculptures using the beautiful Autumn leaves; we were so impressed with, not only their fabulous creative skills, but also their team skills.
On Wednesday, the children enjoyed another energetic football lesson outdoors and then moved onto the woodland and lower field area to work in role play groups. They are clearly extremely talented actors and actresses as they all re-enacted 'The Lorax' just brilliantly!
Here are a few photos taken during both art and drama!
Have a wonderful weekend everyone and see you Monday!
From,
Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott and Miss Hewitt x
Friday 7th October
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
Well done year 4 on a super week. A lively and chatty week to begin with, but by the end of the week you have all shown us what a quiet, hardworking and mature team you are! We are very proud of you all; the 'A' team!
Success again in assembly today too! Congratulations on winning the 'Spelling Shed' award this week; your trophy is standing proudly on our bookshelf! Keep up the fabulous hard work!
We began the week with some wonderful artwork. We had planned sculpture work in our lovely outdoor area; however, rain became an issue and hence we practised shading techniques with charcoal. We are focusing on the sculpture work of Andy Goldsworthy just now and hence the children were creating circular patterns with shading as a link to his work. There was almost as much charcoal on the children afterwards, however!! I have added a couple of lovely examples of the children's work below; they produced some fabulous ideas.
The children thoroughly enjoyed P.E. again this week; with football outdoors on Wednesday and dance yesterday, they are certainly keeping fit and healthy! Again, I have added a couple of photos.
The children are continuing to develop their knowledge of 'classification keys' in science as they sort animals and are loving appraising Prokofiev's 'Peter and the Wolf' work in music too.
Once again, it has been a full on, but fun week!
Do have a great weekend together and see you all on Monday!
Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott and Miss Hewitt.
Friday 23rd September
admin on: Class 4
Good evening everyone!
Thank you so much class 4 for all your fabulous hard work again this week; I am so proud of you all! Your homework has been amazing too; I am so impressed!
It has been a funny week as I was out on Tuesday all day at a P.E. co-ordinator's meeting. We were very busy organising lots of wonderful sporting activities for you all this year!
However, I will be back in class as usual all week this next week and have lots planned for you.
This week we have worked so hard in maths; developing mental maths as we add and subtract multiples of 100 and 10. In literacy, we have continued to work hard on developing our grammar and descriptive writing too. I can't wait to mark your 'Window' descriptive work! We have focused on poetry in reading and have even presented poems to the class. We have practised comprehensions too; all linked to our 'Animals and Habitats' topic.
The children are really enjoying our topic work; we have learnt all about the Jewish festival of Hanukkha this week and today we have once again focused on our geography work surrounding settlements. On Monday, I am looking forwards to continuing our classification work in science.
The dance work the children have been working on is really looking fabulous; the children are creating a whole class dance. Perhaps I could post a video of it once they have completed it; certainly more photos anyway!!
Have a wonderful weekend everyone!
See you all Monday,
Mrs Matthews
Friday 16th September
admin on: Class 4
Hey Class 4! How are you today?
We have had a fantastic week with Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott, and Miss Hewitt. We can’t wait for next week, but we’re here to tell you all about everything we have done this week.
We’ve done so much! We got to do Maths outside on the playground with chalk. We drew number lines including negative numbers and then Mrs Matthews quizzed us on our amazing knowledge. It was a really fun lesson!
On Wednesday, we spent Literacy in the forest! Paired in partners, we strolled around the forest writing down nouns, verbs and adjectives all to do with nature. We are very lucky to have such a luscious forest area to learn in because this helped us write a descriptive piece of writing all about the forest.
Thursday was an amazing day! Part way through our morning, we did some street dance with an amazing instructor called Lucy. We focused on corner work that included poses, and at the end we are starting to put together a dance.
Along with our extremely busy week, we also took time remembering Her Majesty the Queen. We’re sure that King Charles III will be an extraordinary King following his mother.
We hope you have a lovely weekend.
From the Class 4 Team (Jess, Florence, Tommy).
Friday 9th September 2022
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
What a wonderful first week we have had together in class 4! Your children are all just fabulous! They have shown super enthusiasm all week for all the activities we have shared. Mrs Scott, Miss Hewitt and myself are delighted with our new class and know we are going to have a great year together.
We had planned to venture out into the woodland this afternoon to bring our science to life! As you might imagine however, the dreadful weather has put a stop to that! We have been discussing animals and their habitats, so if you're outdoors on a lovely walk this weekend do have a look out for different habitats.
The children have told me so many lovely things about their Summer holidays and have written some lovely recounts. I can't wait to read those this weekend.
In view of the dreadful news of Queen Elizabeth, we have spent quite some time sharing images and video clips of the queen today. I have asked the children to do a little research this weekend and list their favourite memories of the queen in their homework books. This might include images, drawings or a list of ideas.
We hope you all have a wonderful weekend; let's hope we see no more of the wet weather!!
Here are a few photos we took of the children this afternoon; we'd planned photos in the forest, but instead we took some indoors to avoid us getting completely soaked!!
See you soon,
Mrs Matthews, Mrs Scott and Miss Hewitt
Our final 2 weeks in Year 4 (23.7.22)
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
We very much hope you are all already enjoying your first weekend of the Summer holidays! What a wonderful last 2 weeks we have all had!
The children have continued to work incredibly hard and have produced the most beautiful work. We are both so incredibly proud of them all and will miss them all next year. Every one of the children have completed their amazing 'Roman Life' informative posters; we are very impressed with them. The children worked together researching many aspects of Roman life and have successfully supported each other in creating their fabulous posters.
After working really hard to develop different 'levers and linkages' mechanisms, the children have designed, made and evaluated a range of moving figures and interactive posters and are rightly very proud of their final products.
Last week could not have ended better with our wonderful sports day! We hope you enjoyed it as much as we all did. Thank goodness we hadn't booked it this Tuesday; 'hot' wasn't the word was it?!!
The children have be just amazing this week! They coped so brilliantly in the intense hot weather; we were so proud of them all.
Here are a few photos taken Thursday and Friday this week. The science photos were taken as the children investigated how much air we pay for when buying our favourite chocolates; they examined solid chocolate, Aero, Maltesers and Crunchie using magnifying glasses and compared the products through weighing, floating, crushing and melting them. The children had great fun!
Maths was fun too; the children worked in small groups (in front of a cool fan in the hall of course) and timed each other doing different tasks and then displayed their results in tables and bar charts etc. The children were all amazing and never once complained about the heat! We'll really miss your incredible children next year!
Have an absolutely fabulous Summer holiday everyone! Thank you so much for all your hard work this year and last!
See you all in 6 weeks!
Mrs Matthews and Miss Hewitt
xx
Friday 1st July
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
We've had a wonderful week here in class 4!
We were treated to a fabulous handball competition yesterday; fully organised by our superb Sports Crew! The Crew are a group of brilliant year 6 children who have been selected and trained to organise and lead sports events within school. They successfully organised a superb tournament yesterday morning between the House teams in both class 3 and 4. They ran the whole event themselves and we were so very proud of them; the children loved every single minute and were so enthusiastic throughout. Well done Noah on being awarded the 'Man of the Tournament' for year 4!!
The children have been working incredibly hard on their adventure/fantasy stories this week; they have carefully planned them, before then completing a first draft and have just completed their final draft. They have even found time to add gorgeous illustrations too. We are so proud of them. They have now mastered the use of paragraphs with fronted adverbials, rhetorical questioning and much, much more! We're very impressed!
The amazing Ancient Egyptians' display is now finally complete (thanks to Miss Hewitt's wonderful design skills). Do come and have a quick look on your visit on Tuesday if you can; we'd love to see you!
Have a wonderful weekend everyone!
Mrs Matthews and Miss Hewitt
Sports Barn visit 24th June
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone,
I hope you've all had a wonderful weekend. Just a quick blog to let you all know how amazing the children in class 4 were on Friday at the Sports Barn. They had an amazing day; very relaxed, but at the same time very busy indeed! They worked in groups with other children across our Sports Partnership and worked through a great circuit of physical activities throughout the day. Activities included indoor athletics, boxercise, sitting volley ball, various games associated with boccia, track athletics, tag rugby and finally cricket. The children thoroughly enjoyed every single minute. They were all impeccably well behaved and both Miss Hewitt and myself were very proud of them all. It was a great end to our week!
On Thursday, not only did we have another fabulous orienteering lesson outdoors with Mrs Barraclough, we also carried out some investigative science in the forest. We conducted a fair test to investigate which area of the forest minibeasts prefer! Today, we examined our results and discovered beneath the logs was their favourite; more than 60 slugs were discovered beneath one of the logs!!
Well, that's all for today folks! I'll post another blog on Friday to give you an update and some photos taken this week.
See you soon,
Mrs Matthews & Miss Hewitt
Friday 17th June
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
We've had a very practical week this week! The children have been working incredibly hard on their Ancient Egyptians topic and have particularly enjoyed learning how to write using hieroglyphics and create a very decorative sarcophagus (Ancient Egyptian coffin)!! The children absolutely love doing any activity remotely creative and artistic; this task was certainly one of their favourites!!
Having spent quite some time designing and building their own 'buzzer game', using their super science skills, the children have really enjoyed showing them to their buddies and allowing them to share in their evaluations. The year 1 children are so impressed (as are we)!
The children were thrilled this afternoon to meet their new teacher for next year, Miss Eastwood! They were so excited to meet her and were delighted she spent the afternoon with us. As always, they were amazing! Miss Eastwood will be joining our Netherthong team in September and can't wait to teach your wonderful children.
Have a fantastic weekend and have fun in the sun!
See you all Monday!
Mrs Matthews and Miss Hewitt
Friday 10th June
admin on: Class 4
Good evening everyone!
What a great first week back we've had! The children have worked exceptionally hard all week. Miss Hewitt and myself are savouring every minute with them all as we know the children will very soon be moving up to Year 5.
This week the children have been working incredibly hard on their science/D.T. task; we asked the children to design and create a 'buzzer game' or 'quiz' with a buzzer. It was a very tricky task, but it was really great to see the children working so well in teams and problem solving. It was great to see the children enjoying applying their skills in both subjects to one task; well done everyone!
Orienteering and athletics have been a great hit this week! The children loved the orienteering activities yesterday and today they have really impressed me with their relay racing and hurdles. We certainly have some great athletes in year 4! We can't wait for Sports Day!
The children have thoroughly enjoyed writing some wonderful thank you letters to the staff at Cliffe House this week; I am sure the staff will be so touched as the children have all written such lovely comments! I'll take all the letters up to Cliffe House next week along with a little thank you treat!
Hope you all have a super weekend; fingers crossed for good weather!
See you Monday!
Mrs Matthews &Miss Hewitt
Friday 27th May
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
I hope you are all very much looking forwards to a restful week next week. Let's hope the weather is kind to us all and the sun shines all week.
The children have worked incredibly hard, as always! They have particularly enjoyed their science this week. We have been creating electrical circuits! The children have loved every single minute! They have enjoyed predicting whether circuits would work and have then created them and tested them! They have also conducted an investigation to determine which materials are conductors of electricity and which are insulators. They loved it!! I have added a few photos below!
The children have been very busy completing fact files on the Ancient Egyptians too! They have enjoyed researching using the computers and a wide range of non-fiction texts and have all developed a fabulous knowledge of Ancient Egyptian life.
We have all had a wonderful day today; celebrating the Queen's Platinum Jubilee. The children have thoroughly enjoyed creating fabulous collages of the Queen; they look amazing! They also created their own union jacks and loved waving them during our amazing 'Proms in the Playground'! The children have all worked so hard all week practising their song and performed it so beautifully today. Miss Hewitt and myself were so very proud of them all. The whole event was fantastic; a great memory for the children!
Have a super week with your lovely children!
See you on Tuesday 7th!
Mrs Matthews & Miss Hewitt
Week ending 20th May
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon all!
Another great week in year 4!
We've been busy writing fabulous reports all about Cliffe House this week; ready for sharing with year 31 We'd like to enlighten them on what to expect next year!! It has been a great pleasure reading the children's work; they have developed some wonderful writing skills and I think a display of their work, with photos is a must! Once completed, we'll take a photo of it, but also you're very welcome to come and have a look too!
The children are really enjoying our Ancient Egyptian topic. They loved hearing all about Howard Carter's discovery of Tutankhamen's tomb in the Valley of the Kings this week! They're in the process of completing their own Pharoah crowns/headresses too; they look fabulous!
We ended the week with great excitement! The children thoroughly enjoyed creating their very own electrical circuits, using cells, wires, bulbs and even switches and motors! We certainly have some budding electrical engineers in our class!!
As promised, here are a few more Cliffe House photos!
Have a fantastic weekend and see you soon!
Mrs Matthews and Miss Hewitt
Friday 13th May
admin on: Class 4
What an exhausting, but totally fantastic week we've all had!! We all enjoyed absolutely every minute at Cliffe House! The children were all amazing and enthusiastically took part in some amazing activities; from team building activities, to climbing walls, archery, river exploring, fire building, tool making and much, much more! The staff were outstanding and attended to every single one of our needs with the utmost care. We had a perfect stay! Please do remind your children how very proud we were of them all too!
Here are just a few of our thousands of photos for you to enjoy! I will post others next week too!!
Have a wonderful, restful weekend and enjoy the gorgeous sunshine!
Mrs Matthews, Miss Hewitt and Miss Gee
xx
Friday 6th May
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
Hope you've all had a lovely week and are ready for a restful weekend!
We've had a great week once again in year 4! We've had both hockey and cricket in the last couple of days; the children have really impressed us with their skills! They're developing great bowling and fielding techniques in cricket and superb control and skill in their hockey too- a very sporty team we have here in year 4! Congratulations to those of you that took part in the football festival last night too; a great result and I hear fabulous teamwork and a lovely positive attitude off everyone!! Great to hear!
The children have thoroughly enjoyed starting their Ancient Egyptian work in History; they're designing Egyptian headdresses/crowns at the moment so we'll have a wonderful display to show you in a week or two. I'm expecting 30 amazing- looking Pharoahs!
French has been very busy too this week; the children are really developing more and more confidence in their spoken French and have been enjoying lots of role play. Remember to keep practising at home too!
We have been focusing on geometry in maths; perimeter and area are hot topics at the moment. Believe it or not, we will even be practising more on Monday morning before our special trip to Cliffe House! There's no time for rest in year 4!!!
We have had a lovely time reading and reciting poetry in small groups this week too; the children have really got the hang of how to read poetry really effectively and have loved presenting their poems to the rest off the class. It has been great to watch the children develop more and more confidence.
Finally, here's a couple of 'Safety Posters' surrounding 'Electricity'. The children have loved working with Miss Gee on their science again this week; hopefully they will now be able to tell you how to keep safe around the home!
We're all looking forwards to Monday and can't wait to spend 2 very exciting days doing lots of wonderful activities at Cliffe House; fingers crossed everyone is fit and well and we can all be together for a very special visit.
Happy weekend everyone!
Mrs Matthews, Miss Hewitt and Miss Gee
Friday 29th April
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
Welcome back to the start of the Summer term. I can't believe we are in the final term of this school year; it has absolutely flown! We have and still are thoroughly enjoying sharing every day with your children; they are just brilliant!
We are all thoroughly looking forwards to our Cliffe House visit; as staff, we are as excited as the children!
We began this week by cooking very tasty flat bread; the children designed their own flat bread, thoroughly enjoyed tasting it and then evaluating it. I do hope you have been treated to homemade soup over the Easter holidays; you never know, you may get flat bread too!!
The children were very excited to begin our Egyptian fictional text today; 'The Egyptian Cinderella'. Miss Gee led a fabulous lesson as the children played 'book detectives' and tried to deduce what the story might be about by simply examining some of the images within the text. The children loved it and can't wait to try some role play as they explore the book further next week.
We began our new P.E. topics this week too; cricket on a Thursday and hockey on a Friday. The children have really taken to both sports and have worked amazingly well in their teams as they've begun to develop a wide range of skills.
Have a wonderful extended weekend everyone!
See you bright and early on Tuesday,
Mrs Matthews, Miss Hewitt and Miss Gee
Friday 8th April
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
We hope you all have a fabulous Easter break with your amazing children. We adore working with them all; they really are a wonderful team of children. We can't believe how fast the year is going!
We have had a super week once again! The children loved their rugby session outdoors today; thank goodness it was such lovely weather (unlike yesterday)!!
The children enjoyed an extra special session in the forest this week; they took part in a wildlife and rivers workshop and thoroughly enjoyed 3 fabulous activities. They went on a 'wildlife facts' treasure hunt/quiz, they used microscopes and magnifying glasses to examine a multitude of exciting river insects and enjoyed sitting in the shelter as they sketched healthy rivers and polluted rivers too. The afternoon was just brilliant and timed beautifully in view of the river work we will be doing at Cliffe House too!
Please do join me for a meeting on the first Monday back so I can answer any questions at all about our fast approaching visit to Cliffe House; we can't wait! The meeting will begin at 6pm. There is a letter in your child's bag this evening.
Thank you so much for sending your children in the colours of the Ukraine flag today; they all looked amazing in assembly this afternoon! The children absolutely loved the bun sale too; thank you so very much for all your kind donations and your wonderful cakes and buns- very tasty indeed!!
Please enjoy the photos below, showing a little snippit into our week!!
Have a super fortnight and a lovely Easter.
See you all very soon,
Mrs Matthews, Miss Hewitt and Miss Gee
Friday 1st April
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
What an interesting week!! We've had sunshine (a little anyway), snow and hail to follow the fabulous warm weather we enjoyed last week!! Hence, we made a 'Winter Warmer' vegetable soup yesterday in our D.T. lesson! The children absolutely loved every minute and were totally amazing. They have insisted on bringing home the recipe so they'll be asking to cook it once again this weekend; so sorry!!!! You will adore it though; gorgeous and very nice with crusty bread! We do aim to bake some bread at a later date too!
The children worked in small groups to plan their soup together. They selected their own vegetables and the seasoning too. We were so impressed with their lovely teamwork! They then prepared all the ingredients and cooked their soup themselves (under the watchful eyes of myself, Miss Hewitt and Miss Monday). We discussed the science behind it too. The whole of KS2 smelt absolutely wonderful all day! The children then finally tasted their own soups and today evaluated their soups, deciding what they might change if they were to try again.
The children have also worked really hard with Miss Gee on their literacy this week. They have performed the most amazing role play surrounding Charlie and the Chocolate Factory; wonderful actors and actresses! I have a funny feeling we may see some of your children on the West End Stage in years to come!!
Here are just a few of the photos taken during our cooking morning yesterday!
Have a super weekend and see you all on Monday!
Mrs Matthews, Miss Hewitt and Miss Gee.
Choosing seasoning!!
Friday 25th March
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
We've had a wonderful week this week! The children are absolutely loving our 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory' text in literacy and were delighted to find real chocolate featured as part of our science yesterday!!
The children together made chocolate crispy buns during their practical science lesson!! The focus was to read and record the temperature at which water boils and also butter and chocolate melt. The children were so excited and thoroughly enjoyed learning as they baked! They practised their weighing skills obviously too!! Below are a few of the photos taken during the science session. Believe it or not, only one themometer perished!!!
Have a wonderful weekend everyone!
See you next week!
Mrs Matthews, Miss Gee and Miss Hewitt
xx
Friday 18th March
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
Once again, we've had a really lovely week with class 4; the children continue to amaze us with their hard work and lovely kindness. Today we enjoyed rugby outdoors in the gorgeous Spring sunshine. Not only did the children show super determination in the lesson, but also made us feel so proud with the wonderful way in which they supported each other.
We followed our rugby lesson with our Comic Relief egg and spoon race. This was such great fun and once again the children were fabulous; cheering each other on and demonstrating great resilience. Congratulations to our winner, Autumn and our runner-up, Noah! Well done everyone!
This afternoon we have been really busy with our science; we're conducting a number of investigations to help with our understanding of 'evaporation' and 'condensation'. It was great to see the children loving every minute of the practical activities; but we were definitely very busy!
Our 'Secret Garden' display is now complete and ,thanks to Miss Hewitt, is looking wonderful in the back of our classroom. Our next one will be 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory'; we're loving this text and all the activities it lends itself to. A great choice of book I think!
Here are a few images taken from today's fun and also a little peep at our 'Secret Garden' display.
Friday 4th March
admin on: Class 4
Good evening everyone!
Wow! Another week has gone already! Where does the time go? The children have certainly settled back into things very quickly and are, once again, working incredibly hard.
We had a brilliant day yesterday for World Book Day. The children began by drawing a picture taken from their favourite book and telling others why they'd chosen it. We then read and focused our activities around the gorgeous picture book 'Molly and the Storm'. Although it unfortunately reminded us all of the dreadful weather and floods we've been enduring recently, it focuses on the fabulous qualities of kindness and thoughtfulness, especially for those in need. It helped us consider the extreme kindness being shown towards the families in the Ukraine at the moment. The children thoroughly enjoyed submerging themselves in the text as they created gorgeous pastel drawings of the setting and mapping the journey the family of mice take. The children then went on to create story maps and worked together to create 3D story boxes too. I was very impressed with the fabulous D.T. skills and team work the children demonstrated as they worked. Finally, the children enjoyed role playing the story too; we saw some very impressive acting!!
Here are some of the books the children said were their favourites;
Thank goodness 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory' was one!!!!
Have a wonderful weekend everyone!
See you soon,
Mrs Matthews & Miss Hewitt
Friday 18th February
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
The children have continued to work incredibly hard all half term and I am sure they are all ready for a very well earned rest this week. I just hope the weather improves as quickly as possible. It definitely can't really get any worse!!
We had our final golf lesson with Rochelle this week; the children thoroughly enjoyed the tournament they took part in. The progress the children have all made with their golf has been fabulous to see; from putting to driving, very impressive!
Today we took things a little easier and had a very relaxing mindfulness session before lunch, followed by a fun yoga session. They absolutely loved it! We are looking forwards to more yoga, as well as gymnastics and tag rugby next half term.
Have a wonderful restful week everyone!
See you on the Tuesday!
Love from,
Mrs Matthews & Miss Hewitt
Friday 12th February
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
What a wonderfully relaxing end to our 6th week in class 4! This week has been 'Children's Mental Health Awareness Week' and just now, considering the continuing epidemic, it remains a the forefront of all our minds. The children were almost asleep by the end of the day yesterday! We had a fabulous session in the forest before lunch. The children thoroughly enjoyed decorating the woodland with lovely bright colours; creating natural wind chimes and adding flashes of colour to branches and trunks. It felt like our magical 'secret garden'!
We continued with our relaxing theme after our maths in the afternoon too! We practised a number of effective relaxing breathing techniques; the children tried them all and found each of them so calming as they focused purely on the different techniques they were learning. We will keep practising those so they become 2nd nature. As I discussed with the children, learning relaxation techniques is invaluable in life for all of us. Miss Hewitt and I thoroughly enjoyed joining in! We tried meditation and yoga once again too. A number of the children have suggested we begin our yoga club at school again. I will certainly speak to Mrs Lindley again as yoga is one of her many skills!
The children have absolutely loved sharing 'The Secret Garden' with us this half term. We finished reading the book this week; the children clapped to express how much they'd enjoyed it as I completed the final page!! They have really loved it! Their writing has been wonderful to see too and the progress they have made is superb. Well done class 4. I have added a couple of examples below!
Have a wonderful weekend everyone!
See you soon,
Mrs Matthews & Miss Hewitt xx
Friday 4th February
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone,
We have had a great week, once again, here in class 4. We have been lucky enough to have 2 golf lessons this week as Rochelle is in a competition in Kenya next week. We wish her the very best of luck. I am amazed at the progress the children are making in their golf; they are putting, chipping and driving beautifully. They have even been landing the ball straight down the 'fairway' and at some distance too. Both the girls and the boys are really flourishing and loving every minute. Below are a couple of photos of Rochelle demonstrating for the children.
The children have completed their gorgeous 'Secret Garden' paintings and this week have produced some amazing album covers too.
The children are loving developing their writing as we continue to be inspired by our text, 'The Secret Garden'. Amelia pointed out this week that she was so excited when she awoke in the morning as she knew we were writing up our descriptions of the garden into our literacy books; just what all teachers love to hear Amelia!
Science has become very exciting just recently; we have begun conducting a number of investigations to explore sounds. On Monday we are investigating which material will reduce the sound in a container the most effectively! Very exciting! If you have any egg boxes, polystyrene, wall paper, fabric etc please send it along on Monday!!!!
Here are a couple of photos of Rochelle showing the children how to perform 2 of the shots they were making this week!
Have a fabulous weekend!
Mrs Matthews and Miss Hewitt
Friday 28th January
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
Another great week here in year 4! The children are thoroughly enjoying 'The Secret Garden' and have created some beautiful watercolour paintings of the garden in bloom. They've all really enjoyed completing their masterpieces! I hope you'll agree they're wonderful! We're creating a display of their paintings so you'll be able to take a look yourselves! I've attached a few below.
P.E. continues to be very exciting! The children are loving the golf and are developing some super skills. We're very lucky to have Rochelle joining us until the half term. I'm even getting inspired to take up golf myself! There will be an additional golf lesson next week as Rochelle is in a competition abroad the following week so please can the children wear P.E. kit Tuesday, Thursday and Friday next week! Also, please could the children who brought PJs this week to swimming do the same next week; thank you.
The children continue to work extremely hard in all areas of the curriculum. They are particularly enjoying our science this half term; we have been investigating 'sound' and what makes it louder this week. Next week we will be exploring how and why a sound gets fainter!
I'm going to leave you with just a few of the children's watercolours!
Have a wonderful weekend,
Mrs Matthews and Miss Hewitt
Friday 21st January
admin on: Class 4
Good evening everyone!
We've all had another super week here in class 4! The children continue to work incredibly hard in all areas and really do make Miss Hewitt and myself very proud to be teaching them.
Well done to the children who joined me for the boccia event on Tuesday evening; the event was great fun and the children were all amazing! What a credit you all were to Netherthong Primary!
In art this week we have enjoyed having a first attempt at recreating popular album covers; the children were amazing, such fantastic artists. I have suggested the children bring a copy of their favourite album cover so they can recreate it using paint next week.
We are thoroughly enjoying 'The Secret Garden'; we have enjoyed role play and the children are producing superb writing too. Next week we'll include some art work surrounding the story too!
In maths we have been focusing on measuring; weighing, measuring capacities and lengths etc. The children have also been developing their skills at reading different scales too; a little tricky initially, but they're mastering it now!
P.E. continues to be exciting! Rochelle and myself took the children outdoors this week and we were so impressed with the shots the children were making with their clubs. They're becoming more and more accurate and are developing more skills each week.
The children continue to make super progress in their swimming too. Please can your child bring their pajamas next week if they haven't previously done so. Thank you!
Here are just a few photos of the art the children were enjoying this week! Can you spot the bands/artists?
Have a wonderful weekend!
Mrs Matthews & Miss Hewitt
Friday 14th January
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon all!
We've had a wonderful week this week! The children completed some fabulous water colour paintings on Monday; practising their brush strokes and techniques further. I have attached some photos of their work for you to enjoy. I would love to put on a photo of every single child's work, but I think that might be a little tricky!!
The children are thoroughly enjoying their fabulous golf lessons with Rochelle Morris; we're all learning some great skills! Next week we will be outdoors so do remember your winter woollies!!
This afternoon we have had great fun using practical resources to recreate the digestive process from the mouth, right through to the final destination!!! The children thoroughly enjoyed having a go themselves- great fun and rather noisy, but super learning!
We hope you all have a wonderful weekend and a well-earned rest.
We'll look forwards to seeing you all bright and early Monday morning!
Love from,
Mrs Matthews and Miss Hewitt x
Friday 7th January
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone! Happy New Year!
Before I tell you all about our first week back, can I say an enormous thank you for all the gorgeous Christmas cards and wonderful gifts you gave Miss Hewitt and myself at the end of term. You totally spoilt us both and really shouldn't. We both absolutely lovely teaching your children and really don't expect any gifts at all; you are so kind, thank you so very much.
This week the children have been absolutely amazing as always and have worked incredibly hard. I can't believe how much marking I have given myself!!!
We have been working hard on accurately punctuating speech and we have been so impressed with how well the children have been applying this to their writing. It will be very useful as the children begin to write about 'The Secret Garden'! Mary and Dickon certainly have many conversations!
In maths, we have been concentrating on 'time'; practising reading the time to the nearest 5 mins and then to the nearest minute on analogue clocks. We've looked at digital clocks too; converting analogue to digital and vice versa. Today we have started looking at converting 12 hour clocks to 24 hours clocks too. We'll be focusing on this next week so any practise would be good!
The children thoroughly enjoyed their first golf lesson with our professional golf coach this week. Rochelle Morris, a very successful professional golfer, will be teaching golf lessons over the next 6 weeks; very exciting!
Hope you all have a fabulous weekend!
See you on Monday,
Mrs Matthews and Miss Hewitt x
Friday 10th December
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
Wow! One week to go until Christmas; where has it gone?
We have been so busy this week; the children have been working really hard on their NFER tests. The purpose of these tests is simply to assess progress in maths, reading, spelling and grammar. Class 4 have worked incredibly hard and are making lovely progress; Miss Hewitt and I are so proud of them.
The children have thoroughly enjoyed lots of rehearsals this week too; we're all working so hard and really hope you enjoy our performance on Tuesday.
Today the children were treated to a wonderful pantomime performed by M and M Theatrical Productions. Just 4 cast members created a wonderful show; re-enacting the famous 'A Christmas Carol'. They loved every single minute; what a super start to the Christmas season!
Please practise your lines a little more everyone and have a look at the song words that need a little more rehearsing too!
See you Monday Class 4!
Mrs Matthews & Miss Hewitt x
Friday 3rd December
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
Only 2 weeks to go until we all break up for the Christmas holidays; the children are beginning to get very excited too! They have been working incredibly hard on our Christmas performance and are thoroughly enjoying all our practises. They're working hard to learn their lines; we have been so impressed with their enthusiasm and success in learning both their lines and the many songs we have been preparing for you! They thoroughly enjoyed entertaining the coach driver and swimming staff as they continued practising before swimming today!
We can't wait to show you all; although we do still need a few more practises!! The children have been asking about costumes today; we will let you all know on Monday what you'll need to provide. Please don't spend money buying costumes though as we do have quite a few in school; they are currently all down in KS1 at the moment as they prepare for their performance on Monday, so we will be more informed about what is available then.
Have a wonderful weekend and please do keep going with those scripts everyone. I've suggested the children have scripts until Wednesday but then need to be able to perform without them for the rest of next week!! No pressure at all!!!!
See you all Monday
Mrs Matthews & Miss Hewitt x
Friday 26th November
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
Gosh, Friday again! Where does the week go?
The children continue to work extremely hard and are an absolute joy to work with. They are thoroughly enjoying our 'Animals and Humans' topic and are loving the cross-curricular learning. The have been completing their animal art and have created fabulous health education posters surrounding dental hygiene. Next week we are looking forwards to creating interesting models of the digestive system!
In literacy. the children have been completing their playscripts for a scene in 'The Dancing Bear'. We have been so impressed with their work; they have really taken so well to script writing!
The children are working hard to practise their songs and role play for the Christmas performance; even in the forest!! They can't wait to perform for you all!
They're loving the handball sessions at the moment and becoming quite competitive too! The children were all amazing at swimming this morning and thoroughly enjoyed their lesson. Some of the children have been awarded with Personal Survival certificates; an amazing achievement and very well deserved. The whole class are working so hard and making some wonderful progress.
Have a super weekend and see you all on Monday!
Mrs Matthews & Miss Hewitt x
Book Sale 25.11.21
admin on: Class 4
We have quite a selection of books on sale today and tomorrow. The children have had a good look at them today and one or two of them have spotted a special book they'd like to consider ordering!! Each of the children have brought home an order form just in case there's a special one that has caught their eye!!
Here are the book shelves the children have examined today!!!
Friday 19th November
admin on: Class 4
Good evening everyone!
I can't believe it is already Friday! Where has the week gone?
We've all had a wonderful week and the children continue to produce some fabulous work; not surprising, as every single one of them work incredibly hard.
The children are continuing to enjoy 'The Dancing Bear'. They love using role play and drama to re-enact scenes and are currently working on writing their own play scripts; they are looking amazing too!
They are thoroughly enjoying extending their learning about animals in science and are looking forwards to moving on to the human digestive system too!
Below, I have added just a few photos of their wonderful art work this week; the children are trying to replicate some of the amazing art by Richard Symonds. I hope you agree, they're doing a super job too!
Have a wonderful weekend everyone!
See you Monday!
Mrs Matthews and Miss Hewitt
Friday 12th November
admin on: Class 4
Good evening everyone!
We have had a wonderful week this week in class 4. We are thoroughly enjoying our new 'Animals' topic and the children are loving 'The Dancing Bear'! Below are just a couple of their fabulous pastel drawings of the setting the story, as they imagine it. There is also just a selection of the brilliant clay animal sculptures the children made in the forest on Thursday. They absolutely loved every minute. 'If you went into the woods today, you'd be sure of a big surprise...' because on every single tree is a clay sculpture of an animal. Some are bears, lions, tigers and many more!!!
I'll leave you to enjoy admiring some examples of their work!!
Have a wonderful weekend!
Remembrance Day 2021
admin on: Class 4
11th November 2021
Today, the whole school came together and stood in the playground, in their classes, to take part in the 2 minutes silence. During this time, we remembered all of the people and animals who we have lost and those who are still helping to keep us safe. We are incredibly proud of how all of the children conducted themselves.
Miss H
Remembrance Day 2021
admin on: Class 4
11th November 2021
Today, the whole school came together and stood in the playground, in their classes, to take part in the 2 minutes silence. During this time, we remembered all of the people and animals who we have lost and those who are still helping to keep us safe. We are incredibly proud of how all of the children conducted themselves.
Miss H
Friday 5th November
admin on: Class 4
Good afternoon everyone!
It has been a strange week this week as we have missed so many of you! We are very much looking forwards to finally all getting back together later this next week.
We began the week with Halloween poetry; I was so impressed with the children, they are developing into very talented poets! We then worked on developing exciting descriptive writing using noun phrases with lots of interesting adjectives. I challenged the children to writing about the haunting setting shown; not the most relaxing setting!
In maths, the children have been working really hard at solving column additions and subtractions with 4 digit numbers. We have then worked on applying this learning to solving tricky problems. We'll be doing more of those next week as they're quite challenging!
The children began handball in P.E. this week and absolutely loved it; they're a seriously competitive group!! The children enjoyed ending their lesson by playing a mini tournament; I was very impressed with their skills!
The children thoroughly enjoyed their first visit back to swimming this morning too; Miss Hewitt and I were particularly impressed with the way they all supported each other too! Well done class 4!
As you may have seen in the newsletter, we will be running a range of fun activities for the children during the week of the 15th November for Children in Need. If you are in a position to donate, we are asking this to be done online via this link. Please don't bring any money into school. Thank you!
https://app.parentpay.com/ParentPayShop/Foc/Default.aspx?shopid=4743
Have a wonderful weekend everyone and see you Monday!
Mrs Matthews and Miss Hewitt.