I am so excited to start the academic year with you! We know that the last two years have been very strange and we are all looking forward to getting back to a new normal and welcoming the children into Year 4. I am thrilled to be teaching your children along with Mr Kett and Mr Restan for Kodesh, Mrs Woodward for Art, Mrs Ridger for music and of course, no class would be complete without our amazing teaching assistants, Mrs Melzack and Mrs Fernando.
At Sacks Morasha we are committed to meeting the requirements of the National Curriculum. It is vital to us that the pupils also understand their Jewish heritage, values, and beliefs, and this is intrinsic in everything we do at Sacks Morasha. We want them to understand our local community, as well as our global community. We want them to be proud of their own culture and legacy, whilst simultaneously understanding and learning about the British Values that underpin our society today.
We teach all the National Curriculum Subjects, in Key Stage 1 and 2, as individual subjects; finding links, where appropriate, between each one. We teach Ivrit as our Modern Foreign Language from Reception. We aim to teach a broad and balanced curriculum, as well as equipping the pupils with the skills necessary for them to move onto the next stage of the educational journey.
We aim for our Curriculum to be varied, fun and exciting. We endeavour for all our learners to be engaged or stimulated, and we are striving to ensure our curriculum is inclusive for everyone especially for all those with disabilities or Special Educational Needs. We are working to ensure all our learners are resilient, can challenge and be enthused by our curriculum, as well as become independent in their learning style by the time they reach Year 6. We are ambitious and want our curriculum to challenge and motivate so that every child can achieve the optimum progress and attainment from whatever their starting point.
Each Class has their own Long Term Plan that is carefully drawn together to provide a varied curriculum for your Child. It is the overview of the work that the Class Teacher (s) shall cover this year. It is worked on carefully by the Class Teacher to make sure there is progression from one year to the next. The Medium Term Plans explain in a little more detail how the Long Term Plan topics will be carried out. The Teachers write this in detail for each half term and you will see the MTP explains the skills the Children will learn as well as the topics covered. We hope you find this interesting and informative as to how your Child will learn with us this year.
Year 4 – November 21 Update
Although we had a stop-start beginning to Year 4, the children settled amazingly well and completed a huge amount of work.
In English, they analysed the book, Voices in the Park, and learned about the features of play-writing. They then re-told the story, written as a playscript, broken down into three scenes and rehearsed and acted them out to each other in the classroom. In Science, the children investigated the topic States of Matter by experimenting with water to discover how it can be a liquid, solid or gas and linking their findings to the water cycle, which they learned about in Year 3. They also enjoyed discovering whether carbon dioxide weighed anything and which type of chocolate melted first and why. In History, they have learned about the rise of the Roman Empire and how the Romans lived, particularly children, looking at toys and games that they played and comparing them to the ones we still play today.
This term, the children rollercoastered into their new English book, The day the Crayons Quit. They have already looked at advertising techniques and created a logo for a new theme park, Crayon land. Expanding on the use of persuasive language needed for advertising and brochure writing, the children will then be learning about persuasive letter writing. We are continuing with our topic on the Romans, considering what they did and how it affects us today, including how they built roads and how their rule came to an end. In Science, we are starting the new topic of electricity. Heads up is our focus for PSHE this term and I know everyone is really looking forward to this. Year 4 were very excited about School Council starting again this year and we enjoyed many wonderful presentations which were confidently given by the children before the voting process took place.
As a whole school initiative, children, staff and parents recently participated in e-safety training, highlighting the importance of supervising children’s internet usage at home, particularly focussing on social media and gaming
Long-term Plans 2021-2022
Medium-term Plans 2021-2022
Your child’s Kodesh teachers prepare a ‘Term at a Glance’ document which serves two purposes; to inform their planning and ensure curriculum coverage, and to indicate to you all, the parents, what your child is due to learn about during the term. This is a flexible document, which allows the teachers to make changes during the term, e.g. to spend more time on a topic, if required, or to swap topics around to fit better with the needs of the class.
Each term we ensure coverage of a broad range of curricula strands. We teach about the Chaggim (described as Moadei Yisrael in the documents), Tefillah (which will include Brachot), Jewish Way of Life (which encompasses topics such as Shabbat, the Jewish Calendar and Brit Milah), Chumash (taught from the Spring term in Year 2), Mishna (Years 5 and 6), Hebrew Reading, and Hebrew Writing.
This week Year 4 were impressing Mr Kett with their knowledge recall of the 39 Melachot, as we began to look at Bishul in more detail and the actions we take in order to enjoy hot, solid food over Shabbat.