Year 4

We look forward to working hard this term and have fun while learning! 

Reading

Welcome to grade 4! This term the students are going to begin the year with our ’Learning to Learn’ set up program. This gives the students a refresher of what the expectations are for reading and sets the students up for the year. We look at things such as, how to choose Just Right text, how to record our thinking in our reading journals and how to respond to  a range of texts. After the first 20 days of reading, we are going to be delving into looking at a range of text structures and features. The students are going to be learning about the different structures text have and how their features help us as readers. We are also going to be revising and practicing our other comprehension strategies such as Inferring, making connections, visualising and determining importance. 

Writing 

In writing this term, the grade 4s are going to begin the year by setting up the writers workshop. Just like in reading, we are going to be revising the expectations for writing but also looking at what sparks our joy of writing. Later in the term, we are going to be working on explanation texts. The students will explore a range of explanation text before having ago at writing one themselves. 

 Mathematics

This term in maths we are going to be learning a range of things! We have begun the term with our maths start up program, to help establish and set us up for the year in maths. 

We will then dive into learning about Time for a week. We are going to be looking at solving time problems using the correct am and pm notation. 

We will then spend a big chunk of time focussing on place value. We are going to be working on making, building, sorting and ordering numbers to 100,000. 

After we have completed out unit on place value, we will spend some time learning about data and length. 

 Inquiry

This term in Inquiry, for the first 20 days we started the  year with our ‘Learning to Learn’ program. This start up program provides the students with the opportunity to establish a collaborative working environment and helps set us up for the year. 

Following on from this, we are then going to be doing our first Inquiry topic for the year called ‘ Let’s get physical’. This unit is about understanding how the food choices we make contribute to a healthy body and healthy mind. 

 ART

The students have started the term exploring collage to decorate their art folios; Collage is an art technique that uses coloured paper, magazines and newspapers, the students are cutting and gluing images and words that represent their interests.

The main focus of this term is about colour theory, we will start by revising primary colours and students will make connections to famous artists that have worked with primary and secondary colours, such as Andy Warhol and the Pop Art era. The students will be introduced to the colour wheel and they will explore where primary, secondary and tertiary colours live together on the wheel, and how they complement each other. The students will also be mixing and experimenting with the different colours to create new ones, and will create artworks using these colour groups. 

The 3/4 students will have great fun working in the art room and getting messy with paint, as well as experimenting with a range of colouring materials, such as pencil, Texas, crayon and chalk pastel this term. I look forward to a fun and creative time in the art room this term.

LOTE-CHINESE

Welcome back to an exciting new year! In term one, the grade threes and fours will be learning basic language skills in the Chinese Mandarin language, including listening and speaking, recognising sounds and pronunciation, as well as Chinese character reading and writing. They will learn about some Chinese culture such as the Chinese New Year celebrations and traditions, for example red envelopes lanterns and good luck symbols. We will also be learning Chinese vocabulary and phrases about bodies and clothing. Throughout the term, the students will be involved in various activities and learning songs with actions like Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Toes in Chinese. They will also explore stories of legend such as the race of the Chinese zodiac animals.

 

PHYSICAL EDUCATION

Welcome back to an exciting year ahead of Physical Education! In term one students in grade three and four will be developing their gross motor skills such as throwing, catching and striking in order to effectively use these in a game scenario. These games will include the likes of cricket, tennis, bat tennis and many more. Students will be generally focusing on each skill over a two-week block. Week one will be re-introducing the skill and week two using these skills in a game sense scenario. Students will gain cardiovascular endurance along with developing their gross motor skills to use within games.

 

SCIENCE

Welcome to STEM to our Grade 4 students! This year, Grade 4 will be undertaking a new and exciting approach to learning called STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) with a focus on developing skills including problem solving, thinking critically and creatively. 

In Term 1, students will be focussing on two subject areas – Biology in the Science stream and the design process in Engineering. 

In Biology, we will be learning about the life cycles of living things, particularly plants, with lots of hands-on experiments and investigations of how seeds germinate, the different parts of flowers, and the life cycle of various fruits. 

In Engineering, we will be studying the engineering design process and how products move from ideas to design to production, which involves some really interesting projects and activities.