Year 4 Term 5 Big Idea

At a time when transport and communication can connect the world in more ways than ever before, what we buy and what we consume can have a profound impact on the lives and societies of people and wildlife of the world. To be a global citizen is to become a part of something bigger than ourselves. Each of us has a responsibility to the communities which we are a part of – to respect each other’s cultures and needs, to support one another and ensure that we work together locally, nationally and globally. As geographers and scientists, who protect our spectacular planet, we are going on a journey through our seas and oceans, explaining the impact us humans have on the environment. Along our way, we will discover the impact of this plastic waste and be inspired to create sculptures using discarded plastic and writing persuasively to campaign against it. 

Learning Landing

During our learning landing, we invited our families and friends to come and join us to create sculptures out of recycling. We had a brilliant time and created loads of amazing pieces of artwork. Thank you so much to all our families who came and joined us for the afternoon!

Natural History Museum Trip

Year 4 had a phenomenal day at the Natural History Museum. Even before arriving, we had past Houses of Parliament, Big Ben, London Eye and Buckingham Palace. We had an oceans presentation where we became marine biologists and dived down to the twilight zone in a submarine, spotting a sperm whale and giant squid.

I loved the skeletons, especially the dinosaur one.

It was truly magnificent to witness the amazing exhibits.

I loved the moving dinosaurs.

When we returned to school we were collaborative cats and created a group refection on what we saw.

Lasagne

On Wednesday we became chefs and following a recipe created individual vegetable lasagnes. The children gave their efforts 5/5. Delicious.

Art

We have been environmental artists like Steve McPherson, who collects plastic debris along the North coast of Kent and create our own sculptures Look at our collaborative work.

Oceans

We have been looking at how our oceans are being impacted by the use of lots of plastic across the world and have written letters to the government and Rishi Sunak to let them know how we are feeling.

We looked at the impact of oil spills on bird’s feathers and then tried out different ways of cleaning them up after a spill. we all tried different methods, like making brushes, blowing, gentle rubbing, using tights as a glove so we did not have to touch it and washing in warm water and sponging off.

Yoga

Justice class enjoyed yoga with Adele on Wednesday. We loved the bee breathing, to help us feel relaxed and the group yoga bingo. We were all winners. Finally, we completed some paired poses and realised how well our balancing has come on.

Yoga makes  me feel happy and relaxed.

I love the sessions because we are learning different ways to breath deeply. That helps us be calm.

My favourite is warrior pose. I feel strong.

Music

In music we have been playing a melody by understanding the notation on the stave.  We had to read the notes and play on a variety of tuned instruments. We are building up to work as an ensemble, each person in the group playing a different melody aft the same time.

English

In English we have started a new class book, Run Wild about a wasteland. We have been using our reading skills of inference and justifying, by thinking of our main characters and describing g their personality and finding evidence to back this up.

Our reading skill this term is authorial intent; why the author chooses words to create an atmosphere. We read a setting description and underlined words and phrases that we thought created a dark, desolate atmosphere.

Maths

In Number maths we are investigating decimals recognising that a decimal is smaller than a whole number. We have been partitioning, ordering, placing on numberlines, comparing, rounding and reasoning about them.

Plastic Pollution

We have been investigating the impact on plastic on our oceans. We had to decide whether statements were true or false before we were given images and as collaborative cats make inferences about what is happening, think of questions for the photographer who took it and explain  why that image is significant and was chosen to be an advert for WWF.

Learning Lift-Off

As part of our Learning Lift-off we discovered what plastic is so destructive to our environment by watching some David Attenborough videos about its effect in our oceans. Here are some of our reactions to what we watched.

We want our children to swim in the oceans , not be scared to go in!

What surprised me was that people let pollution happen. Also, 2/3rds of coral reefs are affected by our pollution.

If we don’t change, there  will be only bottles in our oceans.

So many animals think that plastic is food.

If we don’t act now, there will be nothing to see in the oceans!

There won’t be any small animals left to eat, so the food chain will be affected.

There will be more plastic than fish by 2050.

Most people don’t realise that plastic is a danger to animals.

The second part of our Learning lift off was going out in groups to pick up litter in our community. We picked up nearly 12 kgs of litter. This included: single use plastic bottles, glass bottles. sweet wrappers, clothes, toys, parts of a bike, food containers and much, much more.

This was fun and we have made a difference to our environment.

What a lot of rubbish we picked up!

I really enjoyed it but it was hard!

When can we do it again?