Language · Grade 4

Skills

• Listens to an opposing view without interrupting, then restates it fairly before replying.
• Takes rough notes from a spoken explanation and reconstructs it later from them.
• States an opinion and gives at least two reasons for it.
• Disagrees with a peer's idea without attacking the peer.
• Uses a simple visual aid (poster, slide, object) without reading from it aloud.
• Takes questions at the end of a talk and answers them, including "I don't know".
• Decodes an unfamiliar long word by breaking it into parts.
• Summarises a chapter in five sentences without copying phrases.
• Distinguishes fact from opinion inside a single text.
• Names the narrator and notices whether the story is told from inside or outside a character.
• Has a favourite author or series, and can say why.
• Reads at least one non-fiction book on a subject that interests them.
• Keeps handwriting legible when writing fast or under time pressure.
• Types with two hands, without hunting for every key.
• Spells homophones correctly according to the sense of the sentence.
• Builds word families from a root, and guesses an unknown word's meaning from its root.
• Punctuates direct speech correctly.
• Identifies the subject, the verb and the object of a sentence.
• Varies sentence length deliberately for effect.
• Writes a factual report on a topic, organised into sections, in their own words.
• Writes an opinion piece: claim, reasons, conclusion.
• Revises a draft after feedback — rewrites, rather than just fixing spelling.
• Recognises common story shapes: quest, rescue, rags-to-riches, trickster.
• Says why a character acted as they did, using evidence from the text.