Year 4 Class News

Skipping Festival 2026!

Today, Year 4 took part in the 2026 Skipping Festival and we won! This means we’re through to the finals in June and we can’t wait.

They did a brilliant job and worked so well as a team – all their practising definitely paid off! It was amazing to watch them all showcase their incredible skipping skills. They also showed great support for each other and the other teams. I was so impressed by their determination, teamwork and respect.

In between the skills, the children had the chance to skip, dance and sing along to the music which they loved. They even got the chance to learn some new skipping skills like the butterfly.

Both the individual skills and the group skips were fantastic. Your children won lots of awards – including five gold medals! We’re all so happy to win and be through to the finals in June.

Well done Year 4 for trying your best and representing Moortown so well – we’re so proud of you! Let’s do it all again in June!

Topic: we’re computer programmers!

This half-term in Topic, we’re computer programmers!

So far, we’ve had a few unplugged lessons where we have discussed what an algorithm is, how to use repetition to be efficient programmers and what logical reasoning is.

This week, we began looking at how a computer can ask questions to sort items. We created a branching database to sort a group of dinosaurs based on their various attributes. However, we had to be careful to only use closed (yes/no) questions.

An attribute is a quality or characteristic that can be used to describe someone to something (e.g size, colour, material).

Next week, we’ll begin building these branching databases on the iPads.

Help at home: choose a selection of kitchen utensils. Can your child sort them using yes/no questions. Is it made of metal? Is it sharp? Can you use it to stir? 

World Book Day!

Today was World Book Day and we had a fantastic day celebrating all things reading! The theme for this year was reading for pleasure. We want all our children to develop a love and a passion for reading and we discussed lots of different ways we can encourage this.

We started the day by doing a class swap with Reception. Your children each paired up with a child from Reception to share their love of reading. It was lovely to watch them read together and share their favourite books with each other. It was also a great opportunity for Year 4 to demonstrate their oracy (speaking and listening) skills as they made sure they were reading with prosody and clarity. We were all wowed by Reception’s incredible reading!

We then joined the BBC World Book Day live lesson where we discussed reading for pleasure and sharing how we like to read.

We also had time for your children to discuss their favourite books and favourite characters with their peers and share with the class what they’d dressed up as. Everybody looked amazing!

Overall, we had a fantastic day in Year 4 and look forward to the Book Fair coming 16th-18th March to spend our £1 book tokens!

Help at home: read daily with your children to continue developing their love of reading as well as their fluency.

Cross country

We’ve had two cross country events this week.

First of all, it was the final Saturday morning race at Middleton Park. Well done to all of the children who have taken part in the four races held across the year and for parents who supported at these events.

On Tuesday, five of our Key Stage 2 children represented Leeds at the West Yorkshire cross country final at Temple Newsam in the glorious sunshine.

We are very proud of all our runners who raced in tough, competitive conditions, with the best runners from across West Yorkshire. They all put in 100% effort and were a great support for each other. The children should feel proud of competing at this level.

A special mention to our Year 5 runner who finished 10th place out of 151 runners and has now qualified for the national cross country final later this month. One of our Year 4 runners narrowly missed out on this qualification by two places.

Thank you to parents who helped with transport and supported at the event.

Writing: narrative

This half-term, Year 4 are writing a narrative inspired by The Dragon Slayer.

purpose: to tell stories to interest and entertain

audience: children sat around a campfire listening to stories of legends from the past

Our narratives will..
– describe the main character (and his back story)
– create tension as he rides towards the dragon

When we’re writing, we’ll be thinking about including our R2s (remember tos):

• adverbs
• verbs
• apostrophes for possession
• ENPs (expanded noun phrases)

Keep your eyes peeled to see our writing develop.

Help at home: watch The Dragon Slayer (up to 1 min 53) and discuss the character with your child. What might his background be? What words could you use to describe him? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S_f3AtPfuiw

Y3/4 production – Sir David Hattenscarf

Hello!

We hope you’ve had a great half term. This half term, we’re going to begin rehearsing for our production – Sir David Hattenscarf!

If your child has a part in the production that has lines, please help at home by supporting them to learn their lines. We’ll be rehearsing at least once a day at school so any extra practice would be greatly appreciated.

Here are some strategies that might help…

• Repetition & “Line-by-Line” Method: Take it one line at a time. Read a line, cover it, and try to recite it without looking. When mastered, move to the next, then combine them.

Any questions, please ask!

Living & Learning: I know what a drug is.

In L&L this term, we’re looking at drugs, alcohol and tobacco. In Year 4, we discussed what a drug is:

A substance that changes the way the body or mind works.

To begin this topic, we looked at a range of medicines and household products and spoke about their benefits.

Medicines can make us better when we’re ill.

Bleach is good for cleaning the toilet so we can be more hygienic.

Soap is really important so we can wash our hands and body properly.

Calpol can help if you’re feeling unwell or in pain.

We then discussed the importance of staying safe when using these products. We identified the risks of these items and how we can reduce these. I was really impressed to hear so many brilliant suggestions for how we can always stay safe when using these products.

Always put medicines and cleaning products up high or locked up so children can’t touch them.

Never take medicine that isn’t given to you by a doctor or a trusted adult.

Wear gloves when using bleach.

Always read the label on medicine to make sure you’re using it safely.

Help at home: talk about some household products or medicines you have at home and how you make sure you’re always using these safely.

Trip to Yorkshire Museum!

Yesterday, Year 3 and 4 were lucky enough to visit Yorkshire Museum. This trip linked brilliantly to our History topic – Romans and Anglo-Saxons.

Before lunch, we had plenty of time to explore the museum exhibits. In Year 3, your children learnt about rocks and fossils in Science so the Jurassic exhibitions were a clear favourite in our class!  We loved dressing up as Romans, spotting Latin words we recognised from our lessons and getting up close to swords and helmets discovered by archaeologists.

After lunch, we continued the fun with a Roman workshop. We learnt and played a real Roman board game and had a chance to hold some Roman artefacts that were around 2,000 years old!

We had a fantastic day exploring the museum and stayed safe by listening, staying close to our adults and walking in pairs.

Help at home: ask your child one new fact that they learnt while at the museum.

Basketball half term holiday camps

There are the last remaining places available on these half term City of Leeds Basketball Club holiday camps held locally at Allerton High School.

Safer Internet Day!

Today is Safer Internet Day! This is a day designated to all things online safety.

In Year 4, we focused on some key elements of online safety:

• Fake news
• Sharing personal information
• Respect online

We began by discussing fake news and how we can spot it. Not everything we read online is true and we must make sure we don’t trust everything we read. Fake news can either be spread accidentally or on purpose:

• Disinformation is when people spread false information deliberately to trick others.
• Misinformation is when people share false information by mistake, thinking it’s true.

Questions we can ask when deciding if an information source is trustworthy:

• Who’s written it?
• Do they have a good reputation?
• Why has it been written?
• Is it opinion or fact?
• Is it high quality?

It’s really important to always speak to a trusted adult if you’re unsure about something you read online.

Help at home: ask your child how they can spot fake news.