Year 4 - Chestnut 2025 - 2026

Welcome to Chestnut Class home page

My name is Mr Brereton and I am the class teacher for Chestnut and the PE and PSHE lead. 

I enjoy seeing the children working together as a team and learning to develop their skills and grow in confidence.

I have a passion for sport and enjoy supporting Wolverhampton Wanderers and playing cricket for Great Alne CC. 

Ms Cole is our amazing Teaching Assistant.

Year 3/4 Harvest Festival Performance

Holly and Chestnut class this week performed their harvest production of The Gingerbread Man at St Michael’s Church.

The Year 4 children were the narrators and acted out the tale while the Year 3 joined in with the singing and the actions for the catchy tunes.

Caroline from the church then led an interesting discussion about where the food for harvest comes from and the important people involved in growing fruit and vegetables promoting the importance of harvest and community.

Thank you to St Michael’s Church for hosting and to the parent helpers who walked with us to church.

Chestnut Class Spotlight 2025

It has been a very exciting time in Chestnut class. As part of the ‘Invasion’ topic, the children have been very curious to learn interesting facts about the Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain and how the language and culture changed after the Romans departed.

They have applied their retrieval skills to research the topic using non-fiction books and confidently presented their findings to the class in information pages and historical timelines.

In English, the children have started looking at the class text of Arthur and the Golden Rope. They have hot seated Professor Brownstone to ask him questions about his vault before writing a persuasive letter to him to ask to visit to see his historical artefacts. The children have researched Iceland and are now creating playscripts for a travel advert about the country.

In maths, they have used ordered, partitioned and compared four-digit numbers on number lines, rounded numbers to 10, 100 and 1000 as well as showing great confidence when using Roman Numerals.

In geography, the children have been using compass points to give directions and using 4 and 6 figure grid references to locate places on a map. Also, in science, they have looked at food chains and webs including researching a variety of producers and consumers in nature and are now finding out all about the digestive system.

As well as all the exciting curriculum learning, Chestnut class has taken part in the Well Being Ambassadors All About Me Personal Best Festival and have also been practising the singing and acting ready for the Harvest assembly performance at St Michaels Church on Wednesday 22^nd October.

Autumn Term Topic- Invasion

In the Invasion project, your child will explore the effects of the Roman withdrawal and the chronology and geography of subsequent invasions. They will study the Anglo-Saxons and Vikings in detail, examining their reasons for invading, their settlements and their everyday life. Your child will also look at monasteries and the Anglo-Saxon legacy. They will consider how we know about life in this period and investigate the Sutton Hoo ship burial. They will learn about Athelstan, an Anglo-Saxon king, and what happened after his death, before ending the project by learning about the Norman invasion of 1066.

Our class reader will be:

Arthur and the Golden Rope by Joe Todd Stantan

https://play.ttrockstars.com/?_gl=1*1koujn3*_ga*Mjk3MzU0NjE1LjE3MjkwMTUyNjg.*_ga_FYSNH92ZJH*MTcyOTAxNTI2Ny4xLjAuMTcyOTAxNTI2Ny4wLjAuMA.. 

Click the link and sign in to practise your times tables . Keep practising regularly so you can create a heat map to show which times tables you are confident and fluent with. Can you work yourself up to become a rock legend? Do you think you have what it takes to challege Mr Brereton?

Enjoy learning your times tables in a fun and enjoyble head banging way!

Spellings:

To be handed out on 06.11.25

To be tested on 11.10.25

Chestnut Class Reminders :

Chestnut class PE day is Tuesday. PE kit should be worn to school on this day. 

Children should have a water bottle and a coat in school. 

Home Learning:

Home learning will be uploaded each week in the 'files' section at the bottom of this page. There will be three colours to choose from. Your child will be given a colour every Thursday. The colour will be found in the margin of their home learning book. Select and complete the colour your child has been set.

Homework will be handed out on Thursday to be completed and returned by the following Tuesday. 

Ways to support your child:

-Practise your child's spellings with them.

-Read (preferably daily) with your child. Try and encourage them to read a range of genre of books and authors. Here are a couple of useful lists of recommended books for year 4 children:

https://schoolreadinglist.co.uk/reading-lists-for-ks2-school-pupils/suggested-reading-list-for-year-4-pupils-ks2-age-8-9/

https://www.thereaderteacher.com/year4

-Practise times tables with your child. Little and often is often the best way with times tables. Purple Mash is an excellent resource which has lots of times table activities on. Here are a few good websites with games that your child can play whilst also practising their times tables:

Each child has login details for www.timestables.co.uk where they can explore and practise the timestables ready for the Multiplication Check towards the end of the school year. 

https://www.topmarks.co.uk/maths-games/hit-the-button

https://www.topmarks.co.uk/times-tables/coconut-multiples

https://www.topmarks.co.uk/maths-games/daily10

https://www.topmarks.co.uk/maths-games/daily10

https://phet.colorado.edu/en/simulations/arithmetic

-Support your child in completing their weekly maths and English/topic homework which (starting from wk beg 9th September) will be handed out on a Thursday to be completed and handed in by Tuesday. . 

Reading:

Any bit of reading you can do with your child will be hugely benficial. The following link will take you to a list of great books that are recommended for year 4 children: https://shop.scholastic.co.uk/products/Pie-Corbetts-Reading-Spine-Year-4-Pack-x-7-9789951118682

This link will take you to a website that will suggest alternative options if your child enjoys one particular author or genre of book: https://www.booksfortopics.com/booklists/branching-out/

Whilst it is great when a child finds an author or genre that they love, it is also important that they branch out and try alternative authors or genres. The guide above will help you make suggestions for your child to try, based on what they know they already love.