This week we have started our new unit of inquiry called Cities and How They Function. Our central idea is: Cities have a variety of infrastructures to support their inhabitants. We have so far explored this central idea and the lines of inquiry to make sure the students understand all of the key words that are used. We also presented our summative tasks from our last unit of inquiry on How We Share the Planet to other classes. The aim was to come up with convincing arguments as to why we should conserve finite resources.
In writing we are very excited about our new genre fantasy. The year four students have explored the key aspects such as plot, characters, special events and triggers that are unique to this type of writing. We also had a guest author come and talk to read their very own book to us on Wednesday and Thursday. The students (and teachers) thoroughly enjoyed the story as well as learning more about the key parts of this type of writing. See if you can recognise who our guest author was in the slideshow of pictures below. In mathematics we have continued to work on our multiplication and also focused on automatic and accurate recall of tables. We have continued to use a high level of ICT integration in this subject to assist student learning. A big thank you to the PTA for the wonderful Winter Bazaar which took place last weekend. A wonderful time was had by all and considerable money raised. We also enjoyed a fantastic swimming day last Tuesday which the students thoroughly enjoyed. A big thank you to all the parent helpers that came along to assist us as well as Peter who as usual organised another well run sports day. Have a great weekend! Geoff Cath and Mike We wanted to leave our update of the week last week until today so that we could include a little bit about how wonderful the Winter Bazaar was. Seeing how happy the students were, playing games, trying new foods from different cultures and winning prizes was a fantastic sight. Cath thoroughly enjoyed being involved in the the 'Human Fruit Machine' stand but has mentioned she has quite sore arms today as a result, it was for a great cause though and we look forward to being able to provide more learning opportunities to our students as a result of the well organised, fun filled day.
In regards to our learning within the classroom, the students expanded their knowledge around multiplication through a range of activities and began learning about our new language focus 'Fantasy'. The students loved this and we are all looking forward to this, enabling students to show their true imagination skills. Further updates about this will come at the end of this week. During week 41 the children have continued to learn about different writing styles and how to write reports. In math we have been creating rules for rounding and learning about how to round in different columns. On Friday we had a special guest speaker, Brett Stein, come and talk to the grade about saving the planet. All the children seemed to be really moved by what Brett said and we strongly encourage you to ask your child about what things they would like to change to help us reduce, reuse and recycle better.
We have used two new web sites www.spellingcity.com and www.thatquiz.org to support our learning in Maths and Language in particular. These two web sites support a high degree of differentiation for your child and they will be part of our home learning from Monday. The year four students will have used both of these web sites in class and have their username and password in their reading log book. If any children are having trouble with the site please contact your child's teacher. Next week we are hoping to take the children to see a recycling plant and if you would like to come along please email your child's teacher. Have a great weekend! The Grade 4 team |
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Welcome to PYP 4!
Welcome to the grade 4 website! The year is now half way through but there are still lots of fun educational things happening in Grade 4! Please follow our blog below to see photos from the classroom and to see all important dates for the year!