Year 4 Science – Term 4 (WA Curriculum): Forces in Action

What this unit covers

In Term 4, Year 4 Science in the WA Curriculum centres on the unit “Forces in Action”.

Students explore contact and non-contact forces through hands-on investigations, developing scientific inquiry skills while learning about friction, magnetism, and gravity.

Lesson sequence (8 lessons)

The unit breaks down into the following lesson-by-lesson sequence — each title below is a teachable lesson, in order:

1. Discovering Forces Around Us: Contact vs Non-Contact Forces
2. Investigating Gravity: The Force That Pulls Everything Down
3. Exploring Magnetic Forces: Push, Pull, and Distance
4. Planning Fair Tests: How Do We Investigate Friction?
5. Measuring Friction: Testing Grip on Different Surfaces
6. Recording and Graphing Our Force Investigation Results
7. Comparing Our Findings: What Made Our Tests Fair?
8. Designing Solutions: Using Force Knowledge to Solve Problems

Curriculum codes in this unit

Content codes:

Reading the codes: WA codes (the ones starting with WA) pack the year level, learning area, strand and content number into one string, while the national Australian Curriculum v9 uses a different anatomy that starts with AC9 — same content family, different labels. Our complete WA Curriculum guide decodes both, character by character.

Planning notes for Term 4

WA terms run roughly 9–11 weeks, and in 2026 Term 4 runs from Monday 12 October to Thursday 17 December — 10 weeks for WA public schools. With 8 lessons in this unit, that leaves breathing room for assessment, moderation and the weeks that disappear to carnivals, camps and public holidays — plan the assessable work to land two to three weeks before the end of term rather than in the final week.