Happy New Year
Date: 7th Jan 2017 @ 8:53pm
Happy New Year! I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and the children have enjoyed their break. Thank you so much for all your generous Christmas gifts - I really appreciate your kindness.
This term our topic is 'Mysteries of the East'. We will be learning about early Islamic civilizations, the rise of Baghdad and trade routes and Islamic art and geometric patterns. We will also be cooking and sampling some middle eastern food.
In science, we will be learning about Earth and space and hopefully arranging a class visit to Jodrell Bank.
Our spotlight authors this term will be Katherine Rundell and Rebecca Stead. I am certain that children will enjoy their books and begin to expand the range of stories they read,
This term we will have a particular focus on spelling and times tables.
Many children are making mistakes with Y3/4 spelling rules and to help improve their knowledge we will be doing some spelling work in the afternoon based on revising these rules. This will involve us looking at 5 words each week in addition to the spelling list given on a Monday. I am not expecting children to learn these words at home, however if they continue to struggle with a particular word we will write this in their planners in order for you to be able to support at home. It is also important that children revise mistakes made in our usual spelling test on a Friday. Children who already apply these spelling rules confidently and consistently will have spelling challenges and words of the day to work on in order to challenge them. Children write their test scores in their planners every Friday and should bring home a homework sheet to revise any mistakes made.
As our work in maths becomes more complex, it is increasingly important for children to have a secure knowledge of their times tables both in and out of order. To support this we will bring back 'beat the clock', however any opportunities you get to work on times tables at home will certainly help. This week we will be working on number sequences involving working with algebra. A sound tables knowledge will really help.
Finally, as you may be aware, Miss Moulton will be completing the first part of her placement on 19th January. She will return in the summer term, but will be working in another school in Y1 to complete the second placement requirement of her course. During her time away we will have Miss Ashworth working with us. She is in her second year of training and is very much looking forward to getting to know everyone.
I look forward to seeing you all on Tuesday