Friday 10th January

Happy new year and happy new book!

This term, we are going to be learning all about the Amazonian rainforest. We are really looking forward to finding out all about the environment and the animals, plants and people that live in this amazing part of the world.

Y4JP have started to read their new class novel this week, which is set in the Amazon. The book is written by Katherine Rundell. We have other books by her in our classroom. She says this story was inspired by an expedition she made to the Amazon and also by another book called 'Journey to the river Sea' by Eva Ibbotson. We have that in our classroom too.

Before we started to read it, we looked very carefully at the front cover and tried to work out what the story might be about.

The Explorer

We had to observe closely, wonder and ask questions and then predict and infer from what we could see. We think we did a pretty good job.

When we finally read the blurb, we were even more excited to get started. What do you think?

After crashing hundreds of miles from civilisation in the Amazon rainforest, Fred, Con, Lila and Max are utterly alone and in grave danger. They have no food, no water and no chance of being rescued. But they are alive and they have hope. As they negotiate the wild jungle they begin to find signs that something - someone - has been there before them. Could there possibly be a way out after all?

4CW

In 4 CW, we have been getting to grips with using the distributive law, to help us with our multiplication of bigger numbers. This week we have been practising multiplying 2-digit numbers by 1-digit numbers. We have found out that if we can partition our numbers properly and have a fairly good knowledge of the times table facts, we are able to do this quite easily. Here is a good example that shows what to do.

We have also been glazing our mosaics that we made just before Christmas. We have coated them in a layer of PVA glue which we found gave a lovely shine to our Demon Dogs earlier on last term. At the moment, these mosaics are making a very nice window display as they dry out before we bring them home.