Welcome to Walnut Class

Walnut Class

Teacher: Miss Scrivener

Higher Level Teaching Assistant: Mrs Cousins

Welcome to Walnut class. We are a mixed year 3 and year 4 class. Walnut class is an exciting year where children learn to  transition from the KS1 curriculum into the Lower KS2 curriculum. Children learn to grow in confidence, independence and resourcefulness to become independent problem solvers and learners. 

Curriculum insight

Here is a sneak peak of what we've been up to

What does learning look like in our classroom?

Maths

In lower Key Stage 2, the principal focus of Maths teaching is to ensure that children become increasingly fluent with whole numbers and the four operations, which include addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. Children will also spend this year becoming confident and knowledgeable in their number facts and the concept of place value.

The aim of this year is to ensure that children develop efficient written and mental methods and perform calculations accurately with increasingly large whole numbers, children should develop their ability to solve a range of problems, including with simple fractions and decimal place value.

Many of our Maths lessons include a wide range of practical materials to help support and embed the systems and operations children are learning. 

By the end of Year 4, children should have memorised their times tables up to and including the 12 times table. This is supported through Maths fluency lessons, these will include times table games and activities to stimulate the children's learning. 

Literacy

In English lessons, children cover a range of English skills, looking at composition, which covers learning to write for purpose, using imaginative description in our writing, learning to organise their writing appropriately based on which genre of writing they are studying, using paragraphs and using sentences appropriately. Children will also look at the transcription of their writing, which covers presenting their writing neatly, spelling correctly and learning to punctuate accurately.

English lessons will usually focus around a key text which children will spend time reading and evaluating in detail. Activities and learning experiences are all based around the key text allowing children to have a clear model and guide in which to base their learning around. 

Literacy also covers our Guided Reading sessions. Guided reading takes on two main focuses, word reading and comprehension. Through these sessions children learn to develop fluency and accuracy within their reading, but more importantly they learn how to comprehend a text. Guided reading lessons encourage the children to retrieve information, make predictions and inferences, identify ideas and themes, discuss language and participate in discussion.  During our guided reading lessons children will use the acronym VIPERS to aid the recall of the 6 reading domains as part of the UK’s reading curriculum, these are: 

Vocabulary 

Inference 

Prediction 

Explanation 

Retrieval 

Sequence or Summarise  

At the beginning of Year 3, it is common for some children to need to spend a little extra time on their reading fluency and understanding of words and sounds. For these children, we offer a daily phonics lesson. Our Phonics sessions in school, use a scheme called Read, Write, Inc. This scheme helps to ensure that every child is able to read and write with fluency and accuracy whilst building on their KS1 learning. 

Science

Along with English and Maths, Science remains one of the main core subjects in primary school. It is always our aim to ensure that Science along with all our subject areas, takes place through practical, exciting and hands-on learning activities. 

 In Years 3 and 4, children will be encouraged to ask questions about scientific concepts, they are given opportunities to explore, investigate and find out for themselves how the world works, and then carry out experiments to find out the answers, as they do this children will learn about the concepts of fair testing, taking measurements, gathering and recording data and reporting findings. 

Children will also engage in a series of science topics to expand their knowledge of the world around them, these include, Animals including Humans, Plants, Rocks and Soils, Light, Magnets and Forces and States of Matter.

History and Geography

Afternoon sessions in Walnut class are formed around a key Topic area. These lessons will primarily focus around the foundation subjects of the national curriculum, including History, Geography, Art and Design and Technology. 

The lessons taught cover a broad range of popular themes for cross-curricular teaching and learning. Children will have opportunities to take a trek into the depths of the rainforest and discover what life was like for the ancient Mayan civilisation within our Americas Topic, or join the ranks of a Roman army marching to Hadrian's Wall through our Roman topic, or perhaps even take a trip to the land down under and discover all there is to know about life in Australasia. 

This year our topics are:

Romans and Invasions

The Egyptians

Crime and Punishment

Physical Education (P.E)

On one afternoon a week, we have our P.E sessions. P.E has an important role in our curriculum as it helps to develop our co-ordination, team work and balance skills as well as keeping us fit and healthy. 

Children cover many P.E topics over the year, including invasion games and ball skills, striking and fielding, dance, gymnastics, throwing and catching, athletics, swimming and even yoga!

To encourage healthy bodies and minds, we take regular brain breaks throughout our day where we seize the opportunity for some dance using Go Noodle videos or we head outside for a quick run or to enjoy one of our favourite basketball running games; Golden child!