Hazel Class

This half term our main topic is "Does it always rain in the rainforest?." In science, we are learning about 'Plants.'

We will be using 'The Iron Man' as part of our English lessons and Whole Class Reading to support us with our learning. 

Please take a look at our Topic Plan. 

Year 4 Multiplication Check information. 

This half term our main topic is "The Mayan Civilisation." We will be learning about: What life was like at the height of the Mayan Civilisation. In science, we are learning about 'States of Matter.'

We will be continuing using 'The Butterfly Lion' as part of our English lessons and Whole Class Reading to support us with our learning. 

Please take a look at our Topic Plan. 

26/02/24

Welcome back to Hazel class!

I think I've finally settled in over the last 6 weeks: thank you all for your support, well wishes and patience.

I just wanted to do a few reminders for the next half term:

1) Spellings - spellings will be handed out every Thursday and will be tested the week after. Children should be aiming to improve their score each week and this will be celebrated. I've already seen a huge improvement in scores in the past few weeks, keep this up everyone!

2) Homework - this will be set on Thursday on Google Classroom. Children also have access to paper copies on a Thursday.

3) Reading - Children should be aiming to read everyday but a minimum of 3 times a week is expected. Please fill in reading records and bring books back in once they need changing. Once reading bookmarks are full children can exchange this for a book. 

4) PE and swimming - everyone has PE on a Monday afternoon. On a Tuesday, Year 3 children also have PE whilst Year 4 children go swimming. On PE days children can come to school in their PE kit (dark joggers and a white t-shirt). 

As always, I am available before or after school 

Miss MacKinnon

Autumn 2: Week 5

27.11.23 - 01.12.23

✏️English - This week, we have started a new writing genre; Biographies. To link with our Geography unit on India, we have been researching the life of Mahatma Gandhi. Please ask us what we know, we have learnt so much about him and his fascinating life. 

🧮Maths - We have started our unit on multiplication and this week we have focused on our 3 and 6 times tables. We then applied our knowledge to problem solving and reasoning questions. 

🔎Our Topic - In D&T, we have designed our own salads which also include an egg based dish and a salad dressing. Next week, we will be making them!  

⭐️ My Stars ⭐️ 

👩🏼‍🏫Teacher's Award: Eleanor Pitman - For having a very positive attitude this week to learning. 

🖋️Handwriting Award: Sienna-May West - Sienna tries hard in every lesson to join her letters and keeping her writing on the line and one size - she really wants her pen licence. 

➕Maths Champion: Charlotte Melvin - Her effort in maths this week has been amazing, and she worked extremely hard on her maths assessment last week.

📚Reading Champion: Milo Wilkinson - Milo has shown enthusiasm in our book, The Sheep Pig, remembering key events and information when answering questions. 

Autumn 2: Week 4

13.11.23 - 17.11.23

📝 This week has been assessment week in school. The children have worked so hard on their assessments and Mrs Wilson is very proud of them. 

📚 This week, we have had the pleasure of our parents being able to join us and read with us. It was lovely having you all in, and we look forward to having you in to read with us again soon. 

Autumn 2: Week 3

13.11.23 - 17.11.23

✏️English - We have started our writing this week, drafting 2 journal entries in the character of Babe. After planning our journals using a story map, the children will then be writing their journals all about Babe's adventures on the farm. 

🧮Maths - This week, we have looked at area. I am so impressed with how the children have picked this up, and applied it to reasoning and problem solving questions. 

🔎Our Topic - In D&T this week, we looked at how salad dressings are made and the ingredients needed to make one. This lesson brought back memories of our tasting lesson and some children were still expressing their dislike to them!

Autumn 2: Week 2

06.11.23 - 10.11.23

✏️English - We are now deep into our book, The Sheep Pig and this week we have focused alot on emotive language. The children have immersed themselves into the role of Babe the pig and thinking about his feelings and why. 

🧮Maths - We are still working on subtraction. We have cracked 1 exchange - we now need to continue working on more than one exchange. 

🔎Our Topic - In Science this week, the children learnt all about electrical circuits, and working with a partner, were challenged to make a working circuit. We had lots of happy faces when they managed to do it. We learnt the names of the components of an electrical circuit. 

⭐️ My Stars ⭐️ 

👩🏼‍🏫Teacher's Award: Elton Avedji - For his positive attitude to all learning in school - a role model to others. 

🖋️Handwriting Award: Jacob Nguyen - Jacob has been practising for 2 weeks with his handwriting pen, he is now ready to transfer this into all of his books - the first one in Hazel class!

➕Maths Champion: Marci Blackburne - For showing a 'can-do' attitude in Maths this week, and persevering when exchanging for subtraction.

📚Reading Champion: Livvy Ross-Clayton - For showing such enthusiasm in our new book, and immersing herself into Babe's thoughts and feelings. 

Autumn 2: Week 1

30.10.23 - 03.11.23

✏️English - This half term, we are moving onto a new book - The Sheep Pig. The children started to gather their ideas and predictions about the book, the characters and what may happen. This will help us to write our own diary entries in the role of a character in a few weeks time. 

🧮Maths - We have now moved onto subtraction! We have completed lots of practical learning using place value grids before moving onto the pictorial and abstract approach. 

🔎Our Topic - Our new topic, India! This week, the children have located India on a map, looked at the flag of India and discovered its capital city. In D&T we are looking at food! The children had a tasting session this week - trying lots of various salad items. Some liked it more than others! 

⭐️ My Stars ⭐️ 

👩🏼‍🏫Teacher's Award: Kilton Atkinson - A fantastic, positive week in school. 

🖋️Handwriting Award: Honey Kelly - For always completing her learning in all books to a fantastic standard, with a focus on her handwriting. 

➕Maths Champion: Ireoluwa Sikiru - For showing fantastic enthusiasm when learning the column method for subtraction this week. 

📚Reading Champion: Ace Nguyen - Ace loves his books, he always has one in his hand! Mrs Wilson may need to buy some more soon. 

Autumn 1: Week 6 and 7

9th - 20th October 2023

✏️English - After completing our instructions (which were amazing), we have spent our final week on Poetry. We began our week by watching the poem 'Chocolate Cake' by Michael Rosen. The children found this poem so funny and it really inspired us to write our own about our favourite food. 

🧮Maths - Over the last 2 weeks, we have focused on addition. We have completed lots of practical learning using place value grids before moving onto the pictorial and abstract approach. 

🔎Our Topic - We have finished our topic on The Romans and the children have learnt so much! We now know what the Romans did for Britain and how they changed our country. We have finished our art work, creating our own mosaic - take a look below, they look fantastic! 

⭐️ My Stars ⭐️ 

👩🏼‍🏫Teacher's Award: William Horricks - A fantastic first half term in Year 3. 

🖋️Handwriting Award: Lexis Spary - Always trying with her handwriting to achieve her Bronze Award.

➕Maths Champion: Alana Medwell and Milo Wilkinson - Fantastic attitudes in Maths this week. 

📚Reading Champion: Sienna-May West - Showing enthusiasm for the full half term with our class book, The Twits. 

Chocolate Cake Poem - performed by Michael Rosen

Autumn 1: Week 5

2nd - 6th October 2023

✏️English - This week we started our unit on instructions. We have identified key features and looked at some language features such as imperative (bossy) verbs and adverbials of time. The children are working towards writing their own set of instructions on how to play a trick on an adult at home! I am sorry in advance if any of these are carried out at home, but children do need to ensure their tricks works! 

🧮Maths - This week we have continued to work on our rounding skills. We are very secure with rounding to 10 and are getting there with 100 and 1000. Mrs Wilson thinks this will be revisited throughout the next few weeks to ensure we've definitely mastered it! 

🔎Our Topic - This week we have learnt about a woman called Boudica; a strong, female warrior who fought for her tribe against the Romans. The children used sources to find out about her and form their own opinion. Some of the vocabulary used to describe her were, fighter, courageous, brave and strong.

Whole Class Reading

An area we are focusing on at the moment is partner reading. By working together, children are able to develop their fluency, accuracy and tone of voice, with the support of their peer. We have really enjoyed our book 'The Twits' and have learnt alot about the gruesome couple. 

Autumn 1: Week 4

25th - 29th September 2023

This half term seems to be flying by at the moment - the end of week 4! 

✏️English - This week we have moved on to Mrs Twit, Mr Twit's wife. The children had a lovely lesson on Monday using their knowledge of expanded noun phrases, similes and adjectives to describe her ready for our writing lessons. I am super impressed with their vocabulary choices. 

🧮Maths - This week we have been faced with a challenge - rounding! It has taken us a few lesson BUT we are finally getting the hang of it. The children have made me so proud with their perseverance. 

🔎Our Topic - We spent a lovely afternoon completing our art. The children have been working hard learning about the colours, meaning and materials associated with mosaics and this week had a go at printing using wooden sticks. The pictures below show their incredible art work. 

⭐️ My Stars ⭐️ 

👩🏼‍🏫Teacher's Award: Ellis Valentine - Always working hard in lessons and having a big smile whilst he does it. 

🖋️Handwriting Award: Olivia-Rae Heavens - Consistently trying with her handwriting - working hard to achieve her silver award. 

➕Maths Champion: Jake Gardner - For being an absolute whizz at rounding numbers to the nearest 10. 

📚Reading Champion: London - Leigh Ellison - For her 'can do' attitude in WCR sessions. 

Autumn 1: Week 3 

18th - 22nd September 2023

Another busy week with lots of learning. This week we completed our first computing lesson in which I was so proud of the children. They all tried very hard with Coding, which even Mrs Wilson had to have a little lesson beforehand! 

✏️English - We have started our writing this week, creating a character description of Mr Twit. The children have used their learning over the last 2 weeks to describe his appearance and personality. Some of their similes are very disgusting! 

🧮Maths - Continuing with place value, this week we have been looking at number lines to 10,000 and using estimation to help us. 

🔎Our Topic - Did you know the Roman army was very powerful? You could ask my Roman experts how they became so powerful. 

⭐️ My Stars ⭐️ 

👩🏼‍🏫Teacher's Award: Ella Skade - For a very positive week, building up her resilience each day.

🖋️Handwriting Award: Winner Ota - For joining his letters, focusing on letter size and correct joins.

➕Maths Champion: Praise Olanrewaju - For showing a fantastic attitude in maths lessons, being ready and organised to begin our lessons. 

📚Reading Champion: Lexis Spary - Lexis has worked very hard this week in Whole Class Read, using the text to help her describe Mr Twit. 

Autumn 1: Week 2 

11th - 15th September

We have had a fantastic first 2 weeks back in school. I was so proud of the Year 4 children during their first swimming lesson - they listened well, had a good go and represented New Moston well. The Year 3 children have settled into KS2 and are showing me that they are very ready for the juniors. 

✏️English - We are well under way with our text 'The Twits' and the children have generated some amazing vocabulary to describe Mr Twit and his wife. 

🧮Maths - We have been learning about place value of numbers up to 10,000, completing lots of practical and applying this to problem solving. 

🔎Our Topic - We have been busy learning about the Romans. We have learnt where they originated, timelines and beginning to look at Mosaics, a roman art work. 

⭐️ My Stars ⭐️ 

👩🏼‍🏫Teacher's Award: Honey Kelly - She is an absolute pleasure to have in Hazel Class. 

🖋️Handwriting Award: Amelie Maudsley - For working so hard on joining her letters and thinking about her presentation in all of her books. 

➕Maths Champion: Jacob Nguyen - A maths whizz! Jacob has been engaged in Maths lessons and setting himself challenges every lesson. 

📚Reading Champion: Cara Macintyre - Cara has really delved into the life of Mr and Mrs Twit during our Whole Class Read sessions. Her answers to questions are detailed using the text as evidence. 

Welcome to Hazel Class 

2023 - 2024

Hello everybody and welcome to Hazel Class!

Hazel class is a year 3 and 4 mixed class. In the class this year there will be myself, Mrs Wilson (Class teacher), Mrs Lucas (TA), Mrs Walker (TA/1:1). 

PE:

P.E will be on a Monday and Tuesday. Y4 children will go swimming on a Tuesday as their P.E lesson. 

Please make sure your child has a PE Kit in school. This needs to simply be a pair of shorts and a t-shirt and a pair of pumps or trainers for going outside. P.E kits can be left in school and taken home at the end of the half term for a wash. 

Swimming Kits: 

Year 4 children will need to bring a swimming kit every Tuesday. 

Girls: Full piece swimming costume, swimming hat, towel.

Boys: Swimming trunks (not loose), towel. 

Homework:

Homework will be set on Google Classrooms as in previous years. 

Reading: 

We expect your child to read at least three times a week at home to an adult. This needs to be recorded in your child's reading  record and signed by an adult. This record needs to be brought into school every day. We will check this on a Monday. Children will earn stickers for their bookmarks if they read 3 times each week. Once their bookmark is full, they are able to choose a book to keep. 

Book Changes: 

Book changes will happen every Monday. 

Spellings:

Children will recieve 10 spellings each week and will be tested the following week. Spellings will be given out on a Thursday, with the spelling test being the following Thursday. Scores will be sent home for you to see how your child has done. 

Other:

Children will need to bring a water bottle to school and it would be great if all clothes and coats can be clearly labelled. 

My door is always open and I am only a phone call away. If you have any concerns or anything you want to chat about, please do so. Alternatively, you can drop me an email to the class email address which is hazel@newmoston.manchester.sch.uk 

Here is to a great year and new adventures!

Mrs Wilson :)

Archive 2022-23

🦁 Let’s go wild! 🐯
 

Hazel class had the best day ever! We danced, limboed, played, bounced got temporary tattooed, petted tortoises, held snakes and then gave ourselves brain freeze drinking slushies and eating ice cream! Safe to say, we went wild! 

🏳️‍🌈 Pride Month 🏳️‍🌈
 

In the month of June, Hazel class were celebrating Pride Month. We learned about the celebration of LGBTQ+ and what this means. 
 

We learned about the History of the Pride flag and what each colour represents. We then selected colours that represent us. The children looked into symbols and shapes and what they can represent and chose their flag shapes and symbols. We reflected on what we are proud of and what makes us uniquely us. 
 

We are proud to be ourselves and love how flags turned out! 

🔎 Local Area Enquiry 🔎
 

For our Geography fieldwork, we created an enquiry based on our local area: Why does New Moston have a river and a canal?

First, we took our clipboards and art pencils to the brook and sketched what we could see. We noticed that it was covered in physical features, trees, flowers, rocks ect. It was very narrow and the water moved very slowly. We decided that it would be impossible for boats to come here. 

Next, we looked at the canal to make a direct comparison. We sketched pictures of the canal and labelled the human features such as the bridge, the walls and the path. We noticed that boats could sail here because the water is deep and the edges are straight.

After that, we worked in pairs to measure the speed of the water flow. One partner held a stopwatch and the other used a stick. We agreed a point in the river that we will time to and discovered that our sticks took less than a minute on average to travel from one side of the bridge to the other. 

☀️ Moston Brook ☀️
 

Today Hazel class went on a sunny walk around New Moston. We looked at some of the physical (natural) features and human (man made) features of our local environment. We visited the canal and the river and observed the local wildlife and spotted similarities and differences between the human built canal and the natural river. The children were excited take a sunny walk outside of our classroom and I was very proud of how they represented our school! 

In RE, we have been learning about the Last Supper. We have discussed how and why Christian’s take the sacrament of Holy communion. We tried lots of different types of bread and discussed why bread was chosen by Jesus and what it means to Christian’s. The children really impressed me when generated lots of philosophical questions! 

Today we went back in time to the Stone Age and used different drawing media to create a variety of cave drawings! We turned our classroom into a cave! 

This week in Science we were learning about how different types of rocks are formed. We learned that igneous rocks are formed when magma from inside the Earth’s crust erupts out from volcanoes as lava. When lava cools, igneous rocks are formed. We represented this with melted chocolate, which cools to form a solid. 
 

Sedimentary rocks are formed when the wind and rain wears rocks down into small pieces of sediment. Sediment, soil, dead animals and plants form layers which build up over time. Over millions of years, the pressure of layers upon layers forms the solid rock. We represented the rock using small chunks of chocolate, sprinkles and chocolate chips which we added in layers. We added pressure to the layers to create our solid, chocolate sedimentary rocks. 
 

Finally, we took our “sentimentary rocks” and added heat from our hands and pressed them hard between our hands to warm and warp the rock. This represents how metamorphic rocks are formed under lots of pressure and heat! After all this we felt very hungry from smelling all the chocolate! We treated ourselves to some well earned cookies! 

In science we have been learning how sound vibrations travel in different states of matter and how they reach our ears so that we can hear sounds.We conducted an experiment to investigate how sound waves change when they travel through different media: gas (e.g. air), liquid (e.g. water) or solid (e.g. the table).

We tried making tapping sounds on the tables and listening with our ears in the air (gas) and then repeating this process with our ears pressed to the table (solid). 

When a wave passes through a solid, it goes faster than it does through a less-dense medium. This means that sound travels faster through water than through air, and faster through the table than through water. When we tried this out it made it sound as though tapping on the table was louder when our ears were pressed to it and quieter when we had our ears in the air. 

In Design and Technology this week, Hazel Class made Ancient Egyptian shadufs!

We used a range of materials such as plasticine, art straws and wool to create these levers which were designed to lift water from the River Nile so that it could be used for irrigation.

This week we were learning about the digestive system.

First, food moves from our mouths, where it is chewed by our teeth! We represented this by crushing up biscuits and bananas.

Next, the food moves down our esophagus, into our stomachs (where it mixes with digestive juices!) We represented this by adding an acidic fruit juice to our stomach bag. 

Then, it travels through our small intestines (this is where most of the nutrients are absorbed!) Did you know your small intestines are 7m long? We represented this using a pop sock and moving the food from the top to the bottom.

Finally, food moves into our large intestines (where moisture is absorbed) before being excreted. We represented this by squeezing the moisture out of the sock! Ewww!

Team Building 

On our first day we played a team building game where we had to stack the cups or build the tallest tower in teams using only 1 finger each or using the elastic band grabber! It was very challenging and we had to work together and show team work and patience but we also had a lot of fun!

Archive 2021-2022

Eid and Platinum Jubilee Celebrations 

We had a great time today celebrating the platinum jubilee 😊👸🤴👑

A lovely end to the half term!

Our new topic question is: Does it always rain in the rainforest?

We will be exploring the different layers of the rainforest, the climate and plants and animals that live in rainforests. Please find a copy of our knowledge organiser for this half term below which further explains what we are going to be learning about.

Suffragette Debate

Last week, we held a debate about whether or not women should get the vote. First we discussed the pros and cons of women getting the vote and then the children were split in half (for and against), they had to choose a point or two to argue and then develop their argument. They all seemed to enjoy the lesson.

Hazel Class Stars

Well done to our Maths and Reading Champions this week.

Elijah received the Maths Champion certificate for becoming more independent in Maths and Merab received the Reading Champion certificate for being a fantastic reading partner.

Huge well done to you both and keep up the good work!

World Maths Day

We had a fantastic day for World Maths Day. We loved the workshop by Rock Kids where we learnt a song to remember there’s nobody like us. We also learnt the phrase YASBA which means, You’re awesome so be awesome!

We enjoyed doing fun Maths activities like tesselation art, Maths PE, Maths riddles and not forgetting the TTRS battle which we came 3rd in 😊

World Maths Day 23/3/22

Today is World Maths Day. 

Below are some ideas of activities you can do at home with your child. 

We hope you enjoy doing some of them.

Suffragettes - Call to Action

We were fortunate enough to have a real life Suffragette come into to speak to us. She told us lots about why the Suffragettes protested, what they wanted and the types of things they did to make themselves heard. In groups, we acted out key words such and unity, political and social. Then we used our posters that we had made in class to have our own rally.

Do actions speak louder than words?

For our new topic, we will be studying the Suffragettes. The children took part in an activity this week to help them to understand how the Suffragettes may have felt not being able to vote. Below you will find the Knowledge Organisers which show what will be covered during this topic, the key texts we will be looking at and key vocabulary that will be used. The children have also brought home a letter with this attached and the weekly questions.

World Book Day

We had a great day to celebrate World Book Day. Dressing up as adjectives, designing our own book covers, book title word searches as well as the book swap.

Science Investigation 

This week we investigated which material would keep hot chocolate the hottest for the longest. We thought about how we could make it a fair test, predicted the result and then considered why we got the results that we did. We then drew a bar chart to show the results of the best and worst materials.

Christingles

As part of Christmas week, we learnt about and made Christingles. 

Merry Christmas to you all and thank-you for the lovely gifts and festive wishes. Love Hazel class staff xxx

Mad Science

We were very lucky this week to be visited by Scientific Sarah from Mad Science. She taught us about circuits and electricity.

We had a go at creating circuits to make a buzzer work, we connected a switch in our circuit and we also tested materials to see which ones were conductors (allowed electricity to pass through) and which ones were insulators (did not allow electricity to pass through).

It was great fun and we especially loved seeing her light a bulb using nothing but the electrons from the plasma ball!

Reading with parents

Thank-you so much to the grownups that visited to read with us on Friday morning.

We loved sharing a book or two with you.

Happy Diwali

To celebrate Diwali on Thursday this week we made Rangoli patterns by colouring them and using coloured rice.

Roman Coins

Today we made Roman coins using air drying clay. We looked at some real Roman coins that had been found and used our knowledge of Roman numerals to make our own. It was a lot of fun and a little messy. We will be taking them home on Monday once they have dried out over the weekend.

Boudicca’s Rebellion 

This week we have been learning about Boudicca’s rebellion. We made Roman and Celtic shields and re-enacted the six main events.

1. The Iceni Tribe peace deal with the Romans
2. The Romans break the deal
3. Boudicca gathers an army
4. Boudicca’s army attacks
5. The Roman’s fight back
6. Boudicca’s death from drinking poison

We really enjoyed this activity, have a look at our pictures to see how much fun we had!

The Romans

We have had a great first 2 weeks in Hazel class and we are loving our topic of The Romans. We have created some mosaics of a Roman Soldier and even learnt to march as one too.

Have a look at some examples of our mosaics and keep check back every couple of weeks for more updates on what we have been getting up to.