Year 4 Spelling

20 January 2011

This week’s spellings are slightly different. Instead of a list of words, I simply want your child to be able to distinguish between the two forms of  its:

its  – belonging to something, no apostrophe

it’s – a contraction, like we learnt last week, of ‘it is’

We’ll (another contraction!) be looking at this through the week, but if you could practise these activities at home it will ensure your child has a thorough understanding.

1. On piece of paper, write its on one side and it’s on the other. Read out a sentence and they have to show the correct its.
2. Have some sample sentences where they write the correct form of its. For example:

• Whose coat is this? ____ mine!  (It’s)
• The cat wagged _____ tail.  (its)

A good way to distinguish between the two is to check whether the sentence sounds correct if you substitute the word for ‘it is’. If you can do this, then the correct form is it’s. If it doesn’t seem to make sense, then the correct form is its.

If you have questions, please don’t hesitate to come and speak to me.

13 January 2012

This week’s spellings are all words that include contractions.

06 January 2012

This week’s spellings are all words that include the contraction n’t.

09 December 2011

Spelling Rule:

This week’s spellings include all the spellings the children have done on suffixes over the past 3 weeks. The children will be tested on spellings they have been set from the previous lists (suffix al, ary and ic).

02 December 2011

This week’s spellings are all words that with the suffix ‘ary’.

25 November 2011

This week’s spellings are all describing words (adjectives) that use the suffix ‘al’.

18 November 2011

Spelling Rule:

This week’s spellings are all describing with the suffix ‘ic’.

11 November 2011

This week’s spellings are all two words that are joined together with a hyphen to form one adjective.

All the adjectives fit with our current literacy learning: promotional writing.  Look out for words like these in adverts and leaflets.

As part of Takeover Day, the children contributed some of these words.

04 November 2011

This week’s spellings are all appealing adjectives that advertisers would use to tempt customers.

It’s the holiday…

…so there are no homework or spellings.

However, there are lots of ways you can support you child’s learning, first and foremost by visiting our Help Your Child section.

There are lots of things to do in or near Leeds, from geo-caching on Monday to a spooky Halloween walk on Sunday.  Here are a few other ideas to fill the October half-term holiday with activities…

• take your child for an autumnal walk in Roundhay Park to collect chestnuts for a game of conkers or autumn leaves for an autumn collage;
• on a cold, autumn day, stay indoors and spend time baking (What unit of measurement will we use to weigh? If we want to make twice as much, how much will we need? When will the food be ready?);
• take a trip to Leeds Art Gallery – the Damien Hirst exhibition should prove a great opportunity for lots of discussion, description and possibly disagreement!
• and, as always, enjoy some relaxing reading (why not read some Tintin stories from a local library in preparation for the forthcoming film?)

School re-opens on Tuesday 01 November 2011 (following a training day on Monday 31 October 2011).