Year 3 & 4 Class News

Science: sound

Posted on Wednesday 02 December 2020 by Mr Catherall

This week, we carried out a practical investigation to answer our learning objective: Is there a pattern between the pitch of a sound and features of the object that produce it?

First, we used our prior knowledge of sound sources, volumes and pitch to make a prediction:

‘The longer the instrument, the lower the pitch.’

‘The shorter the instrument, the higher the pitch’.

Then, we struck and plucked and range of musical instruments to test out our predictions. We realised that we were right. When we struck the chime bar, we noticed that the shorter the chime bar, the higher the pitch. This happened when we tried out other pieces of equipment like windchimes, tuning forks and elastic.

Ask your child what some of our key science vocabulary means: pitch, volume, medium, sound source.

Virtual after school clubs

Posted on Tuesday 01 December 2020 by Mrs Latham

We know you are missing attending after-school clubs at the moment (in and out of school) so here is some information about a virtual after-school club that can be done at home.
 
The Youth Sport Trust have taken the step to deliver a free virtual after school club as part of a national response to the second lockdown. The 30-minute club will take place at 5pm each weekday and be led by a different member of the YST’s athlete mentor network. These will run until 18 December.


Aimed mainly at primary-aged children, a different theme has been assigned for each day of the club – Adventure Monday, Tuesday Play, Wild Wednesday, Thinking Thursday and Fun Friday. 

Find out more: https://www.youthsporttrust.org/AfterSchoolSportClub

Children in Need

Posted on Tuesday 01 December 2020 by Mrs Hogarth

A Big Thank You!

The children came to school in non-uniform and we asked for voluntary contribution to support this cause. We’ve been completely blown away by your generosity as you’ve raised £566.35. Well done and a massive thank you.

3,4O: Certificates

Posted on Sunday 29 November 2020 by Mr Catherall

We had another super week and it was made extra special by welcoming back the children who’ve helped to keep us all safe by self-isolating recently.

Here are this week’s certificate winners.

For great learning…

Lacey & Amelie- You both made amazing progress with your arithmetic this week – well done!

For living and learning…

Maddison – you really understand emotions in yourself and others.

For sport and physical activity…

Tilly – great determination in PE – you always try your hardest. Well done!

For Times Table Rockstars…

Louis- you’ve massively increased your TTR usage this week – keep it up! Welcome to the TTR band!

Certificates – 3/4E

Posted on Sunday 29 November 2020 by Mr Roundtree

In 3/4E this week, there have been many moments for great learning and achieving highly.

Our Sports certificate went to Arthur for good dribbling, passing and sportsmanship in hockey.

The Great Learning certificate was awarded to Luca for trying hard with his arithmetic and showing progress in his test scores on Friday.

Tommy received a certificate for being ready to learn and showing responsibility for his learning all wekk – well done for all the effort!

Finally, out TimesTables Rockstars certificate went to Sam. Well done for extra effort – no doubt this will pay off in your maths.

 

Living and Learning: Antibullying

Posted on Friday 27 November 2020 by Mr Roundtree

I know how to STOP bullying – this was our statement for the week.

We discussed the meaning of STOP in lessons and the two definitions for bullying. For homework, the children created something that showed their understanding of their learning this week. Here are some examples…

By Sadie

Freya Homework 20 Nov

By Aaron

By Luca

By Stephan

History: Athenia vs Sparta!

Posted on Wednesday 25 November 2020 by Mr Catherall

This week, we’ve been learning all about the Athenians and the Spartans!

These are two of the city states of Ancient Greece. Lots about them is similar – but there are lots of differences, too!

Today, we learnt loads of each state. Each small group were given some information about a particular aspect of life in Athenia (Athens) or Sparta: the role of women, education, economy and government.

Then, we had to go around the room and find out the rest of the information for ourselves. This meant we were learning and teaching at the same time.

Here’s what we learnt…

We’ll be using this knowledge later in the week to practise the skill of debating when was find out once and for all ‘Who is the better city-state’?

Certificates in 3/4 E

Posted on Tuesday 24 November 2020 by Mr Roundtree

Well done to everybody who received our certificates this week – you’ve obviously stood out to your teacher for extraordinary learning or effort. Here are our certificate winners in 3/4 E :

Bobby and William – fab skills: dribbling, passing, turning and shooting in hockey.

Thomas and Cameron – excellent remembering and achieving highly!

Lily and Georgia  – demonstrating resilience when solving problems!

 

This week, we have also added a Times Tables Rockstars player of the week.

Well done to Esmae who has improved her ‘effort’ scores this week.

 

History: democracy

Posted on Friday 20 November 2020 by Mr Catherall

This week, we’ve learnt about democracy. We knew a lot about it already – mainly because of our School Council elections (Did you know that we’ve recently rebranded our School Council? They’re now the Junior Leadership Team).

Democracy is a legacy of the Ancient Greeks. In particular, the Athenian people.

We discussed what we already knew, and came up with our own definition (ask your child what democracy is).

First, we found out about Athenian democracy. We were really frustrated to find out that you had to be a citizen of Athens to have a vote; on the face of it, this seems OK. But then we found out that to be a citizen you had to be a male who was born in Athens and had completed one full year in the Athenian army.

In our next lesson, we compared Athenian democracy to British democracy now – ask your child what’s the same? What’s different?

We all agreed that we’re very lucky to live in a country that is so fair – even though we know it could be even better!

Anti-bullying week 19-20 November 2020

Posted on Thursday 19 November 2020 by Mrs Latham

This week, it’s Anti-Bullying Week and the theme for this year is ‘United against bullying’.

We took part in Odd Socks Day this Monday to celebrate our differences.

STOP is a key message linked to bullying. In our school, STOP stands for two things:

  • the definition: Several Times OPurpose
  • the solution: Start Telling Other People

Recently, our school council (now called the Junior Leadership team) met to review our school definition of bullying and our child friendly anti-bullying policy. Thank you to the JLT for their valued contributions. As a result, our definition and policy have now been updated.

Child friendly anti-bullying policy

What is bullying?

In our school, this is what bullying means:

Bullying is where you hurt someone, physically or emotionally (including online), several times on purpose.

What might bullying look like?

If any of these things happen several (lots of) times, it is bullying.

  • Hurting peoples’ feelings, for example, name calling, teasing, threatening, ignoring, leaving people out or spreading rumours
  • Hurting peoples’ bodies, for example, hitting, punching or kicking

This could be in person or online (cyber bullying) and could be because of someone’s race, disability, gender, appearance, age or any other protected characteristic.

What could you do if you are being bullied?

Start

Telling

Other

People

Who could you tell?

  • Miss Hague, Miss Pallister, Mrs Goodwin, Mrs Beesley or Mr Roundtree (they are child protection staff)
  • Any other members of staff
  • Friends
  • Someone in your family
  • A trusted adult
  • Childline (0800 1111)
  • Write a worry slip and put it in your classroom Voice Box or the whole school worry box
  • Email stayingsafe@spherefederation.org

Our views on bullying 

STOP bullying – bullying is wrong! We’re a happy and healthy school.