We had some visitors from Into University to come and show Class 4 all about different career paths. We spent time digging for fossils as palaeontologists, building and planning as construction workers and designing shoes for customers as product designers.

Animal Magic Parties came into Southwold today and bought a whole host of rainforest animals in to show our Year 4s. There was a tarantula, snakes, a chameleon, a gecko, frogs, sugar gliders, tenrecs, scorpions and much more. We learned so much about these animals and how they survive in the different layers of the rainforest. Miss Wheeler was blown away by how brave they were! An unforgettable experience.

Class 4 have made fruity flapjacks! They had to follow a recipe, including gathering their ingredients, weighing everything out, following the instructions given, cooking, mixing and baking. They turned out brilliantly and we had a fab time making them (and eating them!)

Years 3 and 4 loved their collaborative mission during Science Week: to investigate how we affect some parts of the world without going on a journey.  They learned about the layers of rainforests and designed and built their own rainforest in a box.  They discussed the affects of plastic and created a happy ocean environment.

Year 4 have been timing each other running the length of the playground so they could learn how to record data. They then displayed their data in a table.

Year four children have taken part in a Mighty Maths Mission about plotting and reading coordinates. In pairs, they had great fun playing Battleships with Viking longboats.

Class four enjoyed using papier-mâché to create Viking helmets. They measured their heads, blew up a balloon to the correct size and then moulded their helmets. when all the layers were dry, they trimmed them and painted them.

As part of their Viking project, class four were lucky enough to have had a visit from a real life, time travelling Viking!! His name was Kiltun Hairything. The children had prepared many questions for him and enjoyed listening to his stories about Viking life. They even gave him some bread and honey so he could keep up his strength on his return journey to 800AD. 

Class four went outside to learn how to classify shapes, using a Venn diagram. They talked about the properties of the shapes and put them in hoops, depending on their criteria.

Years 4, 5 and 6 played their guitars and flutes beautifully in the end of term music performance.  It was clear to see and hear the progression through the year groups and the impact of weekly lessons.  It is also true that most children respond so well to music and art sessions within the curriculum.

Year 4 have been working really hard at school and at home to win the Times Table Rock Stars Battle of the Bands! against Year 5. Miss Wheeler and Mr Dray are super proud of their efforts … keep it up everyone!

Year 4 children made a great effort to be ‘little monsters’ for their pantomime performance of the Monster Mash

Year four have been having fun learning the ‘Cha Cha Cha.’ They learnt the moves and then joined a partner to perform the dance to music.

Year four have been taking part in a debate about standing desks. They stood throughout the lesson input and then, with a partner, they studied research to compile a list of arguments for and against!

Year 4 pupils have written to David Walliams with great enthusiasm in response to reading  the Demon Dentist … they could not stop talking about how much they loved the book and about all the questions they have for him. Here is one of the examples

Year 4 have been enjoying their last gymnastics session; plenty of jumping and climbing. Some children even managed to make it to the top of the ropes! Miss Wheeler and Mr Dray were really impressed by their athleticism.

Year four went on an exciting trip to the EUREKA! Museum as part of our study about the digestive system.

The children had a great time learning all about how the body digests food in a workshop entitled ‘From Chew to Poo!’

They followed the journey of a peanut butter and banana sandwich from being made, to being eaten and all the way to the ultimate finishing point. POO!

Gross but great fun!!

We had a visit today from Rebecca at Animal Magic Parties who showed off her incredible animals. We met Black Beauty the tarantula, Comet and Turbo the meerkats, Shimmer the rainbow boa, Leggery the millipede, Boo the owl and a host of others, including a gecko, a chameleon and even a skunk! We learned lots about the animals and in particular, those you’d find in a rainforest, linking brilliantly to our project. A fantastic morning for sure!

We created rainsticks by creating lots of strips of colourful patterns. We wrapped them and glued them onto tubes and filled the tubes with rice. We’ve had plenty of practise at shaking them and we will be using them in future music lessons! We’re really proud of how they turned out.

We were hooked into our rainforest project by making rainforest animal puppets! We had to design and label our puppets, choosing colours and materials. We measured carefully and cut our materials. Sewing was tricky but we managed it and made some fantastic puppets ready to use later on in our project!

We were lucky enough to be a part of this year’s Great Orchestra Experiment! We went to the Albert Hall and played our guitars and flutes alongside a lot of other schools with a lot of other instruments. It was a great experience and we had a lot of fun.

We made Viking bread and Viking pancakes as one of our hook sessions. We learned some important cooking skills such as mixing, kneading and weighing. We realised that this might have looked a little bit different over a thousand years! The bread turned out great and even though the pancakes looked very different than we were used to, they didn’t taste half bad! A lot of the ingredients were different so it was interesting to compare the tastes. A busy but fun afternoon indeed.

After discussing how we thought the Vikings used to invade new land, we wanted to see what it would have been like for ourselves. We went out onto the playground (it was very cold – which only added to the atmosphere as we know Scandinavia was rarely warm!) and prepared to battle! We split ourselves up into Vikings and villagers and prepared ourselves with out teachers. It was great fun to practise our battle cries and have our weapons at the ready. We think we could have shown the Vikings a thing or two!

After discussing the importance of longships for the Vikings, we re-created models ourselves using a template, card, a straw and tape. It was a little bit fiddly to put them together, but they look great dangling in our classroom! Whilst we were making them, we learned all about longships and what great navigators the Vikings were. The Vikings even remembered to put their shields along the side to protect themselves and a fierce animal carving at the front to warn others that they were coming to attack.

In Class 4 we have been exploring human teeth as part of our science essential question. We looked carefully at our teeth using mirrors and tried to replicate them using modelling clay.

How important is saliva in the digestive system? Year 4 experimented how quickly they could eat dry crackers vs with butter topping or a cup of water!

Year 4 have been writing about a day in the life of a piece of broccoli!! Who would have thought it could be so interesting?!

Year 4 enjoyed linking their Maths with their ‘What makes human beings so amazing?’ project work through their Mighty Maths Mission. They even wrote tweets!

Year 4 got hands on with their science lesson and made their learning memorable with balloon lungs and marshmallow teeth!