Year Four

We can’t believe we’re already more than halfway through Term 2! It’s been a busy and exciting few weeks in Year Four.

Inquiry

In inquiry students have been looking into the transdisciplinary theme How We Express Ourselves. Students are inquiring into the different ways people communicate ideas, feelings, beliefs, and values, with a particular focus on how media serves as a creative and influential tool. Students unpacked the central idea 'Media can be a powerful tool that influences thinking'. Through the use of provocations, such as a See, Think, Wonder activity with a variety of impactful images, students were encouraged to observe closely, make inferences, and pose meaningful questions. This helped them reflect on how media messages are constructed and how they can shape emotions, opinions, and beliefs. The unit invites deep inquiry into visual language, symbolism, bias, and purpose, while also encouraging students to create and critique media in ways that demonstrate their growing awareness of its power and reach.

Numeracy

In Mathematics, students have been developing their understanding of 3D shapes by exploring their properties and representations. They have learned to identify and name common three-dimensional objects such as cubes, cones, spheres, cylinders, prisms, and pyramids. A key focus has been on describing the properties of these shapes, including the number of faces, edges, and vertices, as well as distinguishing between flat and curved surfaces. Students have also been introduced to nets,the two-dimensional patterns that can be folded to form 3D shapes and have enjoyed constructing these using paper and other materials to see how flat shapes become solid forms. Through hands-on investigations and real-world connections, students have developed their ability to describe, compare, and classify 3D shapes. This learning lays the foundation for further exploration of measurement concepts such as volume and surface area in future lessons.

Reading

In Reading, students have been focusing on the important comprehension skill of inferencing. They have learned that good readers go beyond the words on the page to make smart guesses using clues from the text combined with their own knowledge and experiences. Through a variety of texts, including narratives, poems, and information texts, students have practised using evidence to support their thinking, asking themselves questions like, "What do the character’s actions tell me?" or "What might the author really mean here?" They have participated in rich discussions, shared their inferences with peers, and explained their reasoning using specific clues from the text. This skill has helped students deepen their understanding of characters, settings, and events, as well as uncover messages that are implied rather than stated. As they continue to develop their inferencing skills, students are becoming more thoughtful, engaged, and critical readers.

Writing

In Writing, students have been learning about the concept of voice, how a writer’s unique style, tone, and personality come through in their writing. They explored how voice can be used to express emotions, attitudes, and perspectives, and how it changes depending on the purpose, audience, and text type. Through writing narratives, persuasive texts, and personal reflections, students experimented with different voices to suit different contexts, such as using a passionate and convincing voice in persuasive writing or a humorous and imaginative voice in storytelling. They analysed examples of strong author voice in mentor texts and reflected on how word choice, sentence structure, and punctuation can influence how writing “sounds” to the reader. As students continue to develop their voice, they are gaining confidence in making their writing more engaging, authentic, and expressive.

ACMI excursion 

The ACMI excursion will take place at the end of June and is designed to deepen students’ understanding of how media can influence the way we think and view the world. The excursion will take place on Tuesday 24th June.