Year 4 is the year for building the underlying skills that Year 5 and Year 6 will polish into 11+ readiness — without yet doing 11+-specific work.
The year in shape
In Year 4, the child should be consolidating fractions, decimals, percentages and basic problem-solving. KS2 maths is largely cumulative: a wobble in Year 4 fractions becomes a Year 5 ratio problem and a Year 6 11+ blank.
Reading should be both wide (different genres, fiction and non-fiction) and increasingly self-directed. Aim for 30 minutes of independent reading every day plus a chapter a night read together.
Term-by-term plan
Autumn term. Through autumn term, focus on consolidating maths fluency: written methods, times tables to fluency, and basic word problems. Use the school's recommended workbook plus targeted weak-spot work.
Spring term. In spring term, introduce light-touch reasoning practice — a 15-minute VR or NVR session three times a week. This is exposure, not drilling: the goal is familiarity with question types, not mastery.
Summer term & holiday. Over the summer, build vocabulary deliberately. Mrs Wordsmith, Bond Vocabulary, or a daily word-of-the-day routine all work. Vocabulary is the single biggest underestimated predictor of 11+ English performance.
Topics to prioritise
The highest-leverage Year 4 topics: written multiplication and long division (still wobbly for many Year 4s), fractions of amounts, decimals to two places, and reading clocks accurately.
Common mistakes parents make this year
The most common Year 4 parent mistake is buying GL or CEM-format practice papers and sitting them with the child. The child is too young; the format-mismatch noise drowns out any signal. Wait for Year 5.
Signs to look for
By the end of Year 4, the child should be a fluent reader, confident with times tables and the four operations, and curious about word puzzles and number games. That is the entire goal. If these signs are present, the year is going well; if they are absent, the issue is rarely intelligence — it is usually pacing, format unfamiliarity or the wrong tutoring relationship. Identify which and adjust deliberately.
Where to go next
In the summer between Year 4 and Year 5, decide whether you will pursue the 11+ at all. If yes, plan the Year 5 routine before the autumn term begins. Read across the related guides on this site — the guides index groups them by category for easy navigation.