Hello everyone, welcome to Year 4's Class Page. I am Mrs Shaw, the Year 4 class teacher. The children are also supported in their learning by Miss Duffy. The children in Year 4 are fantastic learners. Explore this page to see some of the fantastic, exciting things we have done this year. You can also head over to our Curriculum Page to see more about what we are learning this year!

Your child has access to Purple Mash, Mathletics, Oxford Owl, Timestable Rockstars and Spelling Shed. Please allow your child to access these websites at home to continue their learning at home.

Reading is a very important aspect of learning, so we actively encourage children to read every night. Please listen to your child read and write what they have read in their Reading Record. Your child should bring in their Reading Record into school in their school book-bag every day.

Every Friday, homework will be given out or set online using Purple Mash and Mathletics, and this is to be handed in on Thursday the following week. The purpose of this homework is to review what the children have learnt during the week. Year 4 will also complete arithmetic/reasoning tests in class which they are to take home and revise from each week. The children should identify areas of the test that they find challenging. The children are encouraged to come and see me in the morning if they are unsure on any of the questions and we can go through this together.

The children will also be given spellings to take home to learn. Please practise these spellings with your child.

If you or your child are ever unsure on a piece of homework, please do not hesitate to speak to me. A positive work ethos makes all the difference to your child's learning, so your support from home is welcomed and encouraged.

Thank you for your continued support,

Mrs Shaw.

Please click the link below to view the Year 4 curriculum. 

Look at this amazing art work created by a member of our Year 4 classroom! This amazing piece won a Marybone art competition!

Physical Education: Outdoor and Adventurous Activities

PSHE: Mental Health Awareness Week

Look at this wonderful Lego creation!

Collective Worship

Pyjamarama fun

Holy Cross enjoyed wearing pyjamas today all day long! We donated £1 - this will go to the BookTrust, to help make sure no child misses out on their bedtime story. We spent the morning listening to a wonderful 'bedtime' story called Rainbow Bear by Michael Morpurgo and completed a range of lovely activities - including; designing our own book cover and designing our own funky pjs!

Yoga

The children in Year 4 have been enjoying lovely Yoga sessions every Tuesday morning. The children are working through the different chakras each represented by a different coloured bear. 

Global Learning Project

Year 4 and 5 were incredibly lucky this week, to have visitors from Liverpool Hope University working with the children to complete a 'Global Learning Project'. The children learnt about global warming and what we can do to help. The children worked together to plant their own apple tree on the school playground. The children also baked their own tasty apple crumble. 

Eggshibition

Look at the amazing Year 4 Egghibition. Well done to all the children who took part and all the families that helped the children with their wonderful creations. I was very impressed. An extra well done to our 3 winners of 1st, 2nd and 3rd place in the Eggshibition competition. These children took home some wonderful Easter eggs! We also say well done to the children who won The Easter Egg Raffle, Guess the Name or the Attendance Competition. Well done everyone. 

Good Friday Assembly

Thank you to all of the parents and guardians who came to watch Year 4's Good Friday Assembly. The children performed so well and sung beautifully. We hope you enjoyed it. 

Design Technology: Nightlights

Year 4 have been working hard during Design Technology lessons to create wonderful nightlights. The nightlights were created for a younger child who was scared of the dark - they had to be both innovative and appealing. The children designed and created these themselves including their own electrical circuit and switch. 

Science: States of Matter - The Water Cycle

In Science, we have been learning about the Water Cycle. To help us observe the water cycle in action - we created our own Mini Water World. We will observe evaporation and condensation form as little droplets form on the side of the bag. When we tap the bag which will cause precipitation. Year 4 can take these home to cellotape to their windows at home, to observe the water cycle happening at home too!

Year 4 enjoyed cakes from their cake sale raising money for Ukraine and the Good Shepherd Appeal which is for Nugent Care. Thank you for all of your kind donations. The children had lots of fun. 

Computing: Animations

Year 4 enjoyed creating their own animations in Computing with Mr Mills. 

Science: Electricity

Year 4 tested a range of different materials, by adding them to a simple circuit; to test if they are conductors or insulators.

Holy Cross joined many other schools, across the globe, as we all came online together to sing Lean on Me and dedicate it to the people of Ukraine. Thank you to all our wonderful families that donated to the DEC Humanitarian Appeal. The children sung beautifully. Children in Year 3 and 4 also created posters to show our support to the people in Ukraine. Year 4 have also shown their support in many other ways outside of school including painting the Ukrainian flag on their football kits. Well done Year 4!

Science and DT: Electricity

In Science, we have been learning about Electricity. This will help us with our DT project, creating Nightlights. We have researched about Electricity and Nightlights that are for sale online to give us ideas. We then created a simple series electrical circuit.

World Book Day 

Year 4 enjoyed celebrating World Book Day. We enjoyed listening to a World Book Day song. We then had a 'Book talk' where we spoke about different books we enjoy and what books we would like to read. We all paraded our amazing outfits around the classroom. I had the difficult task of choosing the winner. The winner was Gangsta Granny! Check out the amazing outfit below. Year 4 also enjoyed an amazing drama workshop. The children created a scene from the Roald Dahl book Matilda. The children enjoyed the session lots. We love reading in Year 4. All the children received a World Book Day token - the children can use this to get a free book or a £1 discount from a book of their choice. 

Computing: Coding

Year 4 have been working with Mr Mills to learn all about coding! The children used Scratch Junior to create their own character and background. Then the children created their own code. 

Safer Internet Day: Together for a better internet

Year 4's digital leaders chose the winners of the E-Safety Poster Competition. Well done to everyone who took part, and to the winners - who have received a £20 Amazon voucher!

Year 4 enjoyed enjoyed celebrating Safer Internet Day! Although we learn about E-Safety throughout the year, we celebrate this special day each year to continue to promote the safe and positive use of digital technology. The theme this year was ‘All fun and games?' We had the help from an alien, we called Jeff, to learn how we can stay safe whilst gaming. We the created our own gaming mascot and wrote lots of tips of how we can stay safe when gaming.

Maths: NSPCC Number Day

Holy Cross enjoyed celebrating and raising money for NSPCC Number Day. The children each brought in £1 and came in dressed like a digit! Year 4 began the day by solving Buddy's Challenge. The children answered a series of maths questions which each revealed answers to where pieces of a key were hidden around the classroom. The children were able to find all the pieces and find where Buddy was hiding in our classroom. The children then played 'Who Wants to be a Mathionaire?'. We also spoke about how Maths is everywhere and needed in our dream jobs for the future. We then took part in a TTRockstars competition! We had lots of Maths fun! 

Art: Impressionism

Year 4 have been working hard to create an impressionist painting of the Liverpool Waterfront. The children have worked very hard studying Monet's style of painting. The children are now painting their own version of the Liverpool Waterfront paying particular attention to Light/ Dark and using short brush-strokes. Every child in Year 4 is an artist. 

English: When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit by Judith Kerr

Before reading our new text, When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit, Year 4 have been learning about WWII. Year 4 opened three suitcases, each was filled with clues with what our new text is about. We then made predictions, what we think could happen in the story. Year 4 love reading. We have really enjoyed reading A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Wide Window and The Stig of the Dump. We are looking forward to reading our new text. 

PE: Rugby Tots 

Each Tuesday, Year 4 enjoy Rugby Tots! The children have learn many team-playing skills. Their co-ordination, and throwing and catching skills are improving each week!

Science: Sound

Look at our amazing musical instruments we created in Science. We explored how our instruments make a high and a low pitched sound!

History: The Indus Valley

In History, we have just begun learning about The Indus Valley. We discussed how there are so many puzzles historians have about The Indus Valley. There were no monuments discovered and no-one has yet been able to decipher the writing they used. We explored different artefacts that archaeologists have discovered and discussed what evidence these sources provide. We then used clay to make our own Indus Valley artefacts. 

Art: Impressionism - Monet

RE: Community

Reading for pleasure

Science: Sound

Year 4 are exploring Sound in Science. We explored the pitch in a range of different instruments. We enjoyed making a high pitch sound and a low pitched sound. We then designed our own musical instrument, thinking about how we could change the pitch and volume. 

English: Newspaper toolkits

Walker Art Gallery: Impressionism

Year 4 enjoyed a wonderful trip to the Walker Art Gallery. We began our visit to the Art Gallery by looking at the Impressionism collection. We began by viewing a beautiful painting by Claude Monet - an artist we have researched in class - called Break up of the Ice on the Seine, near Bennecourt. The children used their sketchbooks to write what they liked and disliked about the painting, and what techniques we noticed. It was interesting to see Monet using longer brushstrokes in this painting - which we read may have been because he was so cold painting this winter scene! The children then explored different Impressionist paintings by other artists, including; Georges Seurat and Walter Sickert. We know that Impressionists are concerned with nature and the properties of light and we could see this in the paintings we observed. The children then explored the whole gallery. We loved viewing the sculpture room too.

RE: Collective Worship

The Worship Warriors in the classroom lead a Collective Worship session in Y4. The children gathered in a circle and they listened to a reading from Matthew Gospel about how Simon called Peter and Andrew dropped their fishing nets and followed Jesus. We sung a lovely hymn called Follow Me. The children wrote on a fish a kind thing they could do this week to be like Jesus and added it to their fishing net. As the children go forth, they will carry out their acts of kindness with Jesus as our role model.

Collective Worship

As part of our Remember topic, the children acted out a scene from Matthew gospel. Simon called Peter and Andrew dropped their fishing nets and followed Jesus.

Music: Glockenspiels 

Maths: Measuring and Estimating

Science: Creating Panpipes

Writing on the Wall - Words are our Power

Year 4 had a great surprise to find that evil creatures had taken over our playground - tearing up books we love reading!! Thankfully superheroes soon appeared and caught the evil creatures. The superheroes reminded us that Words are our Power! Each child got their own amazing book called Superheroes. It was full of amazing stories - each story teaching the children about diversity and inclusion. We loved reading a story based in Liverpool!

Halloween Fun

Year 4 had so much fun at a Halloween disco! Look at our amazing outfits! So scary!

Roman Mosaics

Eyes of the World: COP26 Campaign

Year 4 had an interesting discussion all about Climate Change and what is happening with the COP26 meeting. We joined the CAFOD campaign to call on our government to keep the poorest people at the heart of their talks. The Year 4 children at Holy Cross want the government to know that we are watching. We want to help improve our beautiful Earth. The eyes of the world are watching, and so are we. 

Music: Aaron Copland - Rodeo – Hoe-Down

Originally composed in 1942 for a ballet called Rodeo, the Hoe-Down features two American square dance tunes and fuses evocative music and dance. Rodeo takes us to the exciting, dramatic world of cowboys, cowgirls and the American West. A hoedown is a dance competition that is often described as noisy and riotous. The music is full of vigour and energy as the cowgirls and boys pair off. Watch Year 4 create their own cowboy and cowgirl dance moves to this magical piece, ensuring they keep to the beat and rhythm of the music. 

Judaism: The Torah Scroll

Year 4’s Digital Leaders

These are Year 4’s Digital Leaders. These children have the responsibility of promoting online safety across the whole school. Each half term they will have a Computing challenge to complete. 

Art: Roman Mosaics

The children in Year 4 used lentils, pulses and beans to create some wonderful mosaics! We have enjoyed using a range of different materials to create mosaics in different ways. 

Computing: Hardware Investigators 

In our Computing lessons, Year 4 are currently Hardware Investigators. The children learnt the difference between Hardware and Software. They then explored different parts of a Computer. 

Art: Roman Mosaics

Science: Sound

In Science, as part of our learning about Sound, we created string telephones. We observed how we could hear each other louder using a string telephone than without one. We then spoke about why this was. We learnt that the string and the cups are solid, so the particles are much closer together than the particles in the air, which is a gas. The sound energy can travel from particle to particle far easier in the solid string telephone, so the sound of our voices is louder over the same distance than it was in the air.

PSHE: Talk PANTS

Talk PANTS helps children understand that their body belongs to them, and they should tell someone they trust if anything makes them feel upset or worried. The children remembered from previous years the Underwear rule. We spoke about the difference between good touch and bad touch, how our privates are private, and how we should never be asked to keep secrets about touch. We listened to a fun song by Pantosaurus. Then, Year 4 enjoyed designing their own pants!

PSHE: Zones of Regulation

Using the Zones of regulation approach the children have been learning about their own emotions. We have been exploring how we feel a range of different emotions throughout the school day and have begun to focus on how the different zones affect our learning. We practised techniques we can use to bring us back to green zone. We practised using the Rainbow breathing technique. We also enjoyed writing our worries in a worry bag - we then scrumpled this up and threw our worries away!

RE: People

In our RE lessons, we have been learning about family trees. Year 4 enjoyed creating their own family tree in their books. We have now moved onto learning about all the special people in Jesus's family tree. Year 4 enjoyed listening to the story of Jacob and his sons. In particular, his favourite son Joseph. We watched a cartoon which told Joseph's story. We had an interesting discussion about Joseph's story and gave reasons for his actions. We then painted our own technicoloured dreamcoat! We also enjoyed singing along to a little clip from the musical.

History: Roman Artefacts

Year 4 enjoyed acting as History Detectives as they explored different Roman artefacts. We thought about what the object looked like, what materials it was made from, what it was used for and what it tells us about the past.

Art: Roman Mosaics

Year 4 have been enjoying learning about Roman Mosaics in art. We researched different Mosaic designs, including; the Roman Maze design, the Celtic knot and geometric designs. We spoke about what features we would like for our own mosaic design. We then looked at a modern mosaic artist called Carrie Reichardt. We were amazed to find out that she had created a mosaic house in London! We then enjoyed creating a research page all about her and her work in our sketchbooks.