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Barasingha - Year 4

Welcome to the Barasingha Page!

Welcome to Barasingha Class with Mr Togher and Mrs Litten and our teaching assistant Mrs Bell. An exciting new school year awaits! The children have settled in brilliantly and are already impressing us with their enthusiasm, thirst for knowledge and impeccable behaviour. They are a credit to you!

We have an exciting term ahead and we know that the children are going to love our WW2 Evacuee topic, where they will learn what life was like for children in 1940s Britain. A trip to Stibbington Education Centre for an evacuee day will really bring the topic to life and help them to empathise with the thoughts and feelings of children living at the time (details of the trip will be available shortly). We are sure they will lose themselves in our class book ‘The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe’, in which evacuees Lucy, Susan, Edmund and Peter are taken from their home in London to live in the house of an old professor. However, all is not as it seems and an exciting adventure awaits! We want children to develop a life-long love of books and we ask you to help us in this endeavour! Please encourage your child to read daily and discuss their reading with them.

This term, the children will also be learning about artist and sculptor Henry Moore. Additionally, they will study Electricity and Sound in science as well as developing their investigative skills.

GENERAL INFORMATION

Our PE day is MONDAY.
Please send your child to school with a water bottle and coat every day.
Spelling homework is set on a FRIDAY and due in the following THURSDAY.
Challenge 5 Maths homework is set on a MONDAY and WEDNESDAY and due in the following day.

We really value our relationship with parents and we are always available to discuss any questions or concerns. Please catch us at the end of the day or call the school office and we will return your call within the day.

We look forward to working with you and thank you for your continued support.

Mr Togher, Mrs Litten and Mrs Bell

September 2019

LATEST NEWS!

The Barasingha Twitter Page!

Please follow us and find out what we have been doing in the classroom. If you do not wish your child to appear on the Twitter pages please let us know.

Please click on this Twitter link to go to our page.

Please click on this link to go to Mr Togher's Twitter page.

Stibbington

What a fab day we had!

We started the day by arriving at Nene Valley Train Station in Stibbington, where we were met by two ladies who introduced themselves as the children’s teachers for the day. They led us on to the steam train and took the register (using our new 1940’s names, which were the names of real evacuees from the war who were evacuated from London to Stibbington!) We then walked through the village with our teacher and stopped at different houses which were used as real evacuation houses during the war.

After that, we were taken to Stibbington Education Centre, where we took part in 1940’s-style school lessons. We created our own ID cards, learnt how to use a gas mask, practised our spellings using authentic pens, ink and blotting paper and enjoyed a break time on the school playground where we played with war-time playground toys!

During our spelling lesson, we were suddenly interrupted by an air raid siren and our teacher swiftly led us out to the school air raid shelter where we waited until the siren stopped. This really helped us to understand what life was like during the air raids in the war! We all thoroughly enjoyed our trip to Stibbington as it helped us to empathise with children who lived during the 1940s and taught us so much historical information! All in all, a fantastic day out for Years 3 and 4!!

You can find more photos in the Gallery.

World War 2 Learning

What a great term it has been for both Barasingha and Impala! The children have worked with such enthusiasm and have wowed us with their ever-growing knowledge of WW2. The topic has been one that has captured their minds and imaginations. The children have been bringing in artefacts and photographs from their own family history, as well as some truly amazing homework projects.

It was wonderful to welcome Jack and Hevenle-Babi’s Great Grandad and Eliyana’s mum into school to talk to the children. The children loved listening to Ken talk about his childhood during the war and how he was evacuated from London. It really brought the topic to life and the children were brimming with yet more questions about the past - fantastic. Eliyana’s mum talked about what life was like for her grandmother growing up in Germany during WW2. A big thank you to our visitors for further enriching our curriculum.

Harvest Festival

Thank you so much to all who joined us for our Harvest Festival celebration - it was wonderful that so many of you were able to come. We hope you enjoyed it as much as we did! The children in Year 3 and Year 4 worked so hard to learn their lines and songs and what a great performance they did.

We would also like to thank everyone who made a donation to the Grantham Foodbank which will be gratefully received.

Super Poetry!

We are really enjoying learning why children needed to be evacuated during WW2, and watched a film clip of people arriving at a train station during that time. We used an OSIE grid to explore the film clip and then created our own poems. You can hear a wonderful example below.

The Evacuee

Music and Stories!

We have a wonderful time on Friday afternoons learning to play the violin followed by story time in the Wild Life Area!

2018 - 2019

French Cafe

The classroom was transformed into a French cafe at the end of term! The children had great fun practising their speaking skills as they ordered delicious bread, croissants and ice creams!

National Centre for Craft and Design

We had a wonderfully, creative day at Sleaford's National Centre of Craft and Design. As well as seeing an exhibition of work by artist, Quentin Blake, the children were able to learn a new skill - collagraphy.

Harriet and Sarah from the Centre, showed us how to create a design in the style of printmaker, Angie Lewin and then cut and stick it onto a collagraph plate, which was then varnished. When completely dry, the children had great fun painting the plate which was pressed onto paper to reveal a print. The end results were fantastic!

You can find more photos from our day in the Gallery.

Inspiring Workshops!

On Thursday 6th June children in Years 3 and 4 were visited by a group of students from Walton Girls’ High School. The Walton students inspired and engaged the children with a series of workshops on the theme of space. They kicked the afternoon off with a space quiz in the hall and our children eagerly answered their questions. Following a presentation, the children split off into groups to write space poems and create their own solar system with polystyrene balls and paint (a bit messy, but great fun). The final session, run by the performing arts team at Walton, was a solar system dance. The Walton students had planned, resourced and prepared everything. It was fantastic to welcome such a hardworking and motivated group of young people into our school and a wonderful afternoon was enjoyed by all!

Term 5 News!

This term we have been working extremely hard and continue to make us proud every day. The children have been really inspired by our Italy topic and they have loved finding out more about this beautiful country. We have enjoyed some delicious pizzas, cooked by the children for their creative homework. Thank you to all the parents who took the time to help their child with the creative homework. We have had some phenomenal models of Italian landmarks, recipes and of course pizza tasting. As well as all this fantastic home learning, the children continue to be enthused by Times Table Rock Stars and it was great to see so many of the children choosing this option from the homework menu too. Well done on your high scores guys; you are all Rock Heroes to us!

In English, we have been learning to write explanations. The children have loved using Wallace and Gromit's 'Cracking Contraptions' as a starting point for some fabulous writing. We definitely have some ' Snoozatron' experts in the class, so if you are having trouble sleeping at night, you know who to call. We will be applying all our wonderful writing skills to explain 'What causes a volcano to erupt?' and ' How do plants make seeds?' We are looking forward to some more amazing writing from our experts.

In SMSC, the children have been working hard to improve their teamwork skills. They worked in teams of 4 to create a Leaning Tower of Pisa out of paper straws. However, this really was a challenge as the tower had to be able to hold a tennis ball successfully too! The children showed their ability to take turns, listen to others and compromise. We also worked on how to communicate effectively in a team. Thank you to Mrs Shales and Mrs Bell for running this activity and well done to the winning team.

The class have flourished as readers this term and they have been gripped by the class book 'I believe in unicorns' by Michael Morpurgo. There's not been a single book by this author left on the bookshelf since we finished the story. They have all been inspired to read other fantastic stories by this amazing author. We have now started to read ' This morning I met a whale'. The class have loved comparing two books by the same author. Keep up the amazing reading everyone!

Crocus

The children have enjoyed their art lessons this term. Given a photograph of a crocus, the children focussed on the shapes they could see, how to hold their pencil to sketch and how to blend oil pastels. The results were stunning, as you can see. Such wonderful attention to detail.

Moving Monsters!

The class showed great resilience and teamwork when building their 'Moving Monsters'. They carefully planned how they wanted their monsters to look and how they could make them move using a pneumatic system. The finished monsters are fantastic and we all had great fun making them.

Bad Egg

We recently used the animation, 'Bad Egg' to develop our musical and artistic skills. The children were intrigued when we played the sound track to the animation, without knowing what the film was about or seeing the picture. We discussed what could be happening and how it made us feel. We then watched the film without sound and concentrated on what we could see. The class were able to link the sound to the visual to understand how the music developed the atmosphere of the film. We then went on to draw a character from the film using charcoal and chalk and created some super pieces of work!

Roman Day

We had a great day with Partake learning more about the Romans. In the morning, we investigated Roman artifacts, and looked at games that the Romans played. We also tasted some foods that the Romans enjoyed such as dates and their very own tomato ketchup! In the afternoon, two of our class got to dress in Roman clothing. They looked super. Finally, we re-enacted a battle between the Romans and Barbarians with big Roman shields, and the boys won! It was a great day.

More photos can be found in the Gallery.

Christmas Cookies

We had great fun baking these cookies at the end of term!

Home Studies

Thank you for all the wonderful Volcano homework projects. We have had some fantastic models, writing and cakes, to name but a few. We really appreciate all the support you give the children at home and we know that all the reading and homework support is having a big impact on their enthusiasm for their learning and their progress.

RE Week

The children worked thoughtfully and with empathy in RE week this term. They learnt about the story of the prodigal son and why it is important to Christians. Inspired by a sculpture by Charlie Mackesy, the children created their own foil sculptures. The children had to choose what belief or feeling they wanted their sculpture to represent. We had some very mature and reflective responses - love, respect, resilience and peace.

Flag Fen

We had a wonderful time on our class trip to Flag Fen Archaeology Park near Peterborough which is home to a unique ancient wooden monument. A kilometre long wooden causeway and platform are perfectly preserved in the wetland. Three thousand three hundred years ago this was built and used by the Prehistoric fen people as a place of worship and ritual. Sixty thousand upright timbers and two hundred and fifty horizontal planks are buried under the ground along with many swords and personal items given as offerings to the watery fen. It was a fabulous opportunity for us to discover what life was like for our prehistoric ancestors. We were able to explore Bronze Age and Iron Age artefacts and made clay pots using natural materials to create patterns. The highlight of the day was listening to a story around the fire in the roundhouse. The children were captivated and we're sure this is something they will remember with fondness in later life. The whole day brought our topic to life and immersed the children in prehistoric life.

More photos can be found in the Gallery.