Stanway Fiveways Primary School

This week year 4 have used thin brushes to add detail to their watercolour paintings from last week, taking inspiration from the artist Andrei Derain. In forest school, they enjoyed toasting hot cross buns over the fire, as well as all the usual activities of den building, mud kitchen, hammocks and tree climbing. Another new activity for this week was walk along slack ropes - a kind of tightrope creating by tying strong ropes between two trees (one for holding on to with their hands and another for moving their feet along. In maths, the children have learnt about the value of decimals to two decimal place and explored how to partition them. In English, they have begun to plan and write their innovated version of instructions on how to either defeat, tame or look after a river monster. In science, Damson class took part in a science experiment to explore how water evaporates from a liquid to a gas when it is heated.

This week in Forest School the children enjoyed making pizza wraps which they wrapped in foil and then safely placed on the fire. This was definitely one of the favourite activities in Forest School this week, as well as the children enjoying the den building, playing in the mud kitchen and using clay to make their own creations. Year 4 have also learnt to create colour washes in art this week and it has been lovely to see that every piece of artwork has been unique. In the mornings, the children have been working hard to complete assessments and have shown amazing resilience and perserverance when completing these to the best of their abiilty. 

This week has been a busy week in year 4! On Tuesday and Wednesday the children went on a trip to Daws Hall Nature Reserve, where they learnt about rivers, the water cycle and took measurements to record temperature, ph levels and water speed in the river and stream. They also took part in orienteering where they found trees across the site and used pictures to identify the type of tree. In the river, the enjoyed taking samples using nets to identify creatures living there. All classes had their second week on forest school and many children chose to make wand using whittling tools and elder wood as well as den building, chilling in hammocks and other outdoor activities. On Thursday, some children from year 4 took part in the squash Roman Cup and were excited to represent our school in the tournament! 

This week, year 4 have been learning about the water cycle in geography, drawing a diagram and completing a practical activity to watch the water cycle in action in a sealed bag on the window showing the process of precipitation, condensation, collection and evaporation. In maths, they have been learning to convert between km and m as well as work out the perimeter of a shape. In English, the children have shown great concentration to independently write their own suspense story using the grammar tools that they have been learning about over the last few weeks. Yesterday was a particularly exciting day - world book day, the book swap and ukelele lessons in the afternoon. All year 4 classes also had their first forest school sessions this week, which introduced them to the rules of forest school and allowed them some time to begin to explore how they could use the resources and enjoy the outside space.

It has a been a busy first week back after the February half-term. In English, the children have been writing their own version of a suspense story about either a spooky graveyard or tropical jungle with an abandonned temple. They have shown great concentration when writing, using the tools of 'show not tell' how the reader is feeling, dramatic adverbials, rhetorical questions and the power of three. In maths they have been learning to find fractions of quantities using concrete objects, then the pictorial method (drawing pictures) and finally using the abstract method (working out multiplication calculations in their head.) In other subjects they have been learning to experiment with watercolours, taking inspiration from the artist Andre Derain. In geography, they have used atlases and I-pads to learn about the rivers of the world, identifying them on a map and learning about the countries that they pass through.