Thank you and Happy Christmas

 

Dear year 4 children and families,

Thank you very much for your kind and generous Christmas presents. They are very much appreciated. 

The children did such a great job of researching charities for us to support that it was very difficult to select just one! After a class vote, three charities were selected and donations have been made on behalf of the class. 

We hope you all have a lovely Christmas break and we look forward to seeing you in 2023!

Kind regards,

Ms Browne, Mr MacBean, Mrs Bernard, Mrs McConnell, Mis Street, Mrs Burgess, Mrs Thomas and Mrs Scott. xxx

Important notice: Dorchester Library books

 

Dear parents and carers,

During our visit to Dorchester Library, as part of our Matilda experience, the children were given the opportunity to take out a library book. These books will have a Dorchester library stamp in them. 

Please could Dorchester Library books either be returned to the year 4 classroom (there is a separate box for these so they don't get mixed up with other books) or directly to Dorchester Library by Friday 16th December 2022.      

If you have any questions or queries about this pease get in touch. 

Kind regards,

Year 4 Team. 

Macbeth Cast

 

Hello everyone,

I was delighted to share with you the cast list for next year's Macbeth production today (Tuesday). The children were told their roles in class but for any children absent or for those that may have forgotten please click here for the cast list (the list is alphabetical by first name). 

I won't be giving the children their lines to learn over Christmas (I think its much more important that they have fun and relax). However, should any of the children be super keen they may like to become familiar with the plot of the play and gain an understanding of their character. Taking a look at the BBC Macbeth class clips should hopefully give them everything they need for now. 

Full details will be given next term, however, If you have any pressing questions that can't wait till the new year please get in touch.

Kind regards,

Ms Browne

Home Learning and upcoming Dates

 

Hello everyone,

I hope you are keeping warm as the temperature drops. With this in mind, if you are sending in gloves, hats and scarves please label these as it makes it easier to reunite them with their owner at the end of the day.

I can't believe that it is almost the end of term. It has been a lovely term with your children and myself and the year 4 team have enjoyed getting to know them. 

See below for upcoming dates, home learning and an update on the Shakespeare roles and dates. 

Upcoming dates:

Friday 9th 

Tomorrow is Christmas jumper day in aid of Save the Children. Children are invited to wear non school uniform and Christmas jumper and may give a donation to Save the Children. 

 

Christmas technology day. Children will be in mixed year groups to create three Christmas based crafts. 

POWSA Christmas Fair straight after school in the school hall, library and reception classroom. Any remaining tombola items can be given to the office in the morning. 

Monday 12th 

Christmas performance dress rehearsal. Please can all costume items be brought to school by Monday at the latest. 

Tuesday 13th

Christmas performance 1. Years 3 and 4 will perform at 11am. 

Wednesday 14th 

Treehouse Theatre pantomime. Year 4 children will be invited to perform minor roles in the pantomime of Jack and the Beanstalk. 

Whole school Carol Concert 5pm - 6pm. Preschool and Reception children will act out the nativity and Year 4 will be narrators (please check emails for location details) 

Thursday 15th 

Christmas performance 2 at 11am. 

It will be year 4's last swimming session on Thursday 15th. 

Friday 16th 

Last day of term. Christmas party day. No hot dinners on this day. Children should bring a packed lunch wrapped up as a present. 

Home learning:

For this week's Home learning, the children are being invited to choose a charity they would like Year 4 to support this Christmas. Children should research possible charities and then write down a few reasons why they think their chosen charity should be supported. Children will be given the opportunity to debate charity options on Monday afternoon before a whole class ballot.   

Year 4 Home Learning link.  

Shakespeare Update:

The Shakespeare play that will be performed by Year 4 in February with be Macbeth. Children will go to Weymouth Pavilion on Monday 9th January for a behind the scenes walkthrough. The final play will be in the evening on Wednesday 8th February 2023 (more details to follow next year).  

A few week's ago the children listed their role preferences.  Where possible children have been given their first choice or they were allocated roles based on what sort of role they requested and their enthusiasm for the play. The involvement of children in Snow White were also considered.  Doing the castings for the Year 4 Shakespeare play is a tricky and time consuming job. It is unfortunate but inevitable that some children may be disappointed but please be assured that the casting has been done in as fair a way as possible.

I hope to give initial scripts out for the children to take home and familiarise themselves with over the holidays. It is highly likely that the script and staging will evolve somewhat next term with lines being possibly added or removed. 

If you have any questions, comments or concerns about Shakespeare or anything in general please contact myself, Mr MacBean or Mr Spracklen.

Kind regards,

The year 4 team,  

 

Class reward tomorrow (Wednesday 7th).

 

As a treat for earning the whole class reward marbles, year 4 voted to have a movie afternoon with PJs (or onesies) and some festive treats. 

This will take place tomorrow (Wednesday 7th).  Children should come to school in school uniform but can bring in PJs and a cuddle toy to change into (if they want to).

Kind regards,

Ms Browne

Upcoming dates, costumes and other bits and pieces

 

Hello everyone,

I hope you are having a lovely weekend so far. I can't believe that the term has raced by and we only have two more weeks of term left. There is always lots to think about at this time of year so I will attempt to make a list below of upcoming events and what needs to be done. 

This week:

POW Passports - children are invited to bring their POW passports into school this week together with any evidence collected so far. 

From Sunday 3rd - 11th December

Year 4's artwork will be on display at Jubilee hall Poundbury. 

Monday 5th 

In the morning I will also be asking the children to choose what activities they are interested in for Christmas technology day. Each child will do three activities on Friday and whilst I can't guarantee that they will be able to do every activity I will try to make sure they get at least one of their preferences. If you wanted to give them a preview of the activities you can look at the choosing slip I will give them tomorrow here.  

From 5pm - 6pm there will be the musical showcase for children that have learnt to play piano and recorder this year. This will be in the school hall and the children should have been give ideas for the clothes they should be wearing. Children should arrive at 4.45pm. If you have any questions please contact the school office or Mrs McCourtie.

Tuesday 6th 

By Tuesday, the STEM figures that the children made last week should be on display at Brewery Square. They will be in a shop front next to the ice rink and under the screen. If you get the chance to go, I'm sure your child will be very excited to see their figure displayed.  

Wednesday 7th 

Please could you aim to bring the children's costumes in by Wednesday for the Christmas performance. If you are unsure of what your child should be wearing, please get in touch with the year 4 team. 

On Wednesday afternoon,  I will endeavour to do some auditions for the Macbeth performance next year. A few weeks ago I asked the children to give me their preferences of what roles they would like and how many lines they are happy to do. Where possible children have been given their first choice, however where more than one child has elected for the same first choice role I will need to do auditions. 

Thursday 8th 

There will be no swimming on Thursday. The children will be doing a special activity with their reception buddies today. Please see an email from Mr Spracklen for details.  

Friday 9th 

Christmas jumper day in aid of Save the Children. It is also Christmas technology day. 

After school on Friday it is the POWSA Christmas Fair in the school hall, library and reception classroom. 

Next Week:

Monday 12th 

Christmas performance dress rehearsal. 

Tuesday 13th

Christmas performance 1. Years 3 and 4 will perform at 11am. 

Wednesday 14th 

Christmas dinner day. Hot dinners should be ordered at least a week in advance. 

Whole school Carol Concert. Preschool and Reception children will act out the nativity and Year 4 will be narrators and do readings. If your child would like to be involved they will need to be available between 5pm - 6pm on Wednesday 14th. More details to follow soon.   

Thursday 15th 

Christmas performance 2 at 11am. It will be year 4's last swimming session on Thursday 15th. 

Friday 16th 

Last day of term. Christmas party day. No hot dinners on this day. Children should bring a packed lunch wrapped up as a present. 

As ever, if you have any questions, comments or suggestions please let me or Mr MacBean know.

Kind regards,

The year 4 team. 🎄

Home Learning Activity - Friday 2nd December

How do we celebrate Christmas?

Here’s a list of things that my family generally does at Christmas time. 

How many of these do you do? (Perhaps you could tick them off on the list.)

Visit family members and friends,   Christmas Tree – decorate,      Presents under the tree,    Sing Christmas Carols/Songs,    Receive and give presents,         Stockings for Santa,     Leave something for Santa + reindeer,       Go to church,            Special Christmas Meal,      Christmas Crackers,     Decorate the house,     Christmas cards,      Advent Calendar,       Watch a Pantomime

Can you add any things to the list that your family will be doing?

Can you do some research to find out about some of the things that people in different countries around the world do at Christmas time?

 

What an incredible end to the week we had on Friday. The children were very well behaved and a wonderful time was had by all. 

Last week, we also completed our learning on the water cycle and started a new maths topic on area which the children seemed to enjoy. 

Next week, will have a very strong design and technology focus as we will have our STEM week earlier in the academic year to coincide with our festive surprise on Monday.

Home Learning

The home learning for this week is to become familiar with any lines the children have been given for the Snow White performance and to read through the lyrics of the songs. Children in mine and Mr MacBean's spelling groups also have new spellings available on Ed shed for next week. Paper copies will be given out on Monday but should they want a head start they can be accessed here.      

Thank you those families that are completing and sending in the reading records. We did a recent AR assessment and I noticed that a significant number of children had increased their reading age which is fantastic. Listening to your child read or sharing a book together is still very valuable for already fluent readers (whilst it builds fluency for those not quite fluent). Click here to find out more about reading with older children.          

Upcoming dates

Monday 28th

Festive surprise. Doors open at 8.30am

Friday 2nd December

Elf Day - dress up as an elf 

Week beginning 5th December 

Year 4 to bring in their passports for Mr Spracklen to check them.

Friday 9th December

Christmas jumper day and school technology day

If you have any questions please email me (Ms Browne) or Mr MacBean. Should you have any complaints or concerns please email Mr Spracklen headteacher@princeofwales.dorset.sch.uk

Kind regards,

The Year 4 team 

Home learning and Year 4 updates

 

This week and Next week

This week the children have been continuing their map work, learning about climate zones and biomes and tackling word problems in maths. Next week, they will be writing an explanation text about water cycles, learning about area in shape and starting to think about the upcoming Christmas and Shakespeare performances.

Snow White and Shakespeare

On Tuesday and Wednesday, Mrs Thorpe and I will be running rehearsals for year 3 and 4 for main roles in the Christmas Snow-white performance. The children should have come home with some lines to practise in preparation of the auditions.

Next week, the children will also be told what Shakespeare play we are performing in February. I will be asking the children about how they feel about the Shakespeare play and will ask each child to indicate on a slip of paper what sort of role they are hoping for (main role, medium role, small or non speaking part). I am hoping that I can cast for Shakespeare before Christmas, so that the children can begin practising their lines over the holidays.

This week's home learning

For this week's home learning the children have been asked to create their own water cycles. They can choose to draw and label a diagram or use their own creativity to create a model (this can be out of household objects to represent the different stages). Photos or videos of their model should be emailed to c.browne@princepfwales.dorset.sch.uk

Additional home learning tasks for the children are:

• Spelling practise
• Times tables practise
• Mathletics
• Daily reading

Upcoming Dates

Friday 25th November:

Special morning experience (see letter from Mr Sprackbull)

Monday 28th November:

Inspired to learn festive surprise

Friday 2nd December:

Elf Day, dress as an elf

Friday 9th December:

Christmas jumper day,  Christmas technology day & Christmas Fair

As ever, please get in touch is you have any questions, comments or

concerns.

Kind regards,

Ms Browne, Mr MacBean, Mrs Bernard, Mrs McConnell, Miss Street,

Mrs Thomas and Mrs Burgess

           

Year 4 update

 

Hello everyone, 

This week in year 4, the children continued to extend their geographical knowledge, learning about climate zones and time differences. A big thank you to those families that supported their child's home learning last week in recording the connections they have in other countries. Over the next few weeks we plan to create a display that showcases these connections we have around the world.     

The children proved themselves to be animation whizzes during a successful computing lesson. This animation unit will continue over the next few weeks but a reminder that your child is welcome to log onto purple mash at home should they want to. 

The children have almost finished their science unit on sound, having enjoyed carrying out experiments to determine what factors influence how loud a sound is. Our next science unit will be states of matter. 

This week's home learning:
In this week's home learning the children have been given some maths problems to solve. 

  

Coming up:

Monday 14th - Odd socks day. Children are invited to wear odd socks. In school they will be celebrating our individuality and what makes us unique. 

Thursday 17th     - Bling your bike or scooter day. 

Friday 18th         - Non school uniform day in aid of children in need. 

                            - Children to bring in their reading journals. 

Monday 21st              - Christmas shoe box collection day. 

As ever, if you have any questions, comments or suggestions please get in touch. 

Kind regards,

The Year 4 team. xx

 

#ROAR2022 Presentations

Year Four did a brilliant job presenting their #ROAR2022 projects at the Dorchester Corn Exchange yesterday - 

THE TWO WASTE FIGHTERS - Leftover Eating Plate

Lisa and Anna

THE TWO ANTI-POLLUTIONERS - Anti-Pollution Plane

Vasilis and Sebastian

THE THREE ANIMAL SAVERS - Animal Cruelty Detector

Asimina, Anna (and Soniia)

POLLUTION PULVERISERS - Shark Robot 

Hugo, William, Henry W and Alfie

THE ROCKING WAVES - Vibration Bubble (Hydro Energy)

Amber, Henry C, Cody and Sherif

ROBO CLEAN - Robot Litter Picker

Arthur and Isaac 

POTATO TWINS - Ocean Helper

Ursula and Marissa

ROBO CLEAN - Robot Litter Picker

Tristan

THE OCEAN SAVERS - Ocean Saving Machine

Ava and Isabel

OCEAN PHOENIX - Ocean Cleaning Robot

Elliott, Ben, Rohan and Jayden 

And the winners are...

HIGHLY COMMENDED - Tristan 

THIRD PLACE - Hugo, William, Henry W and Alfie

SECOND PLACE - Lisa and Anna

OVERALL WINNERS - Amber, Henry C, Cody and Sherif

The Rocking Waves will now create a video of their pitch, the model, posters, and jingle.  This video will be presented at the local finals coming up in a few weeks time. 

In December, the Lions will organise a specialist panel of Judges to select the ‘Overall Winning Idea’  in each of the local finals. These Winners will then be recognised and awarded at a National Final hosted in December. 

Around the world home learning

 

Hello everyone,

The children have had a wonderful time today with Mr MacBean launching our new geography based topic and honing their map reading skills. 

For this week's home learning we would like the children to do some research and make a note of any extended family or friends they have that have links to other countries. It could be that someone was born in another country, have lived there, emigrated there or even had an amazing holiday overseas. 

The children should have come home with this map worksheet. They have been asked to colour in the country that they have connections to and to make a note of the person and country in the box below. Over the next few weeks we will be making a display showing the links that we have around the world. I'm excited to see how many countries we reach.   

The children have also been sent home with a maths home learning sheet which should hopefully give them the opportunity to further practice what we have been covering in class this week.    

As ever, if you have any questions, comments or suggestions please get in touch.

Kind regards,

The Year 4 team. xx

Mapwork with Mr MacBean

 Year 4 have been busy refining their mapwork skills with Mr MacBean this morning -

Welcome back to Autumn term 2

 

Hello everyone, 

Welcome back to Autumn term 2. It's always an exciting and inspiring term and this year it should be no different. 

Firstly, the class will be presenting their inventions next Monday as part of the Lions Roar 22 competition. This week, the children will be writing their scripts and preparing their presentations and prototypes ahead of next week. It has been wonderful listening to their creative ideas and innovations. 

This winter, the children will perform a Christmas show in December (13th & 15th). I am hoping to do lots of drama sessions during weeks 3 and 4 of this term and begin casting for both our Christmas show and our Shakespeare performance in February (8th). Year 4 children are also given the opportunity to read passages during the reception Nativity and Carol service.

Whereas last term our learning had a strong history focus, this term we are leaning more towards geography as the children learn about Australia, the water cycle and climate and time zones. Future home learning activities for this unit will involve the children doing some family research to find out about family members (or close friends) that have links to countries overseas. They will also be asked to make a model of the water cycle in a few weeks time. 

In literacy, the children will be looking at features of non fiction texts and learning to use organisational devices such as paragraphs, headings and bullet points. They will write their own non fiction texts including an explanation text on the water cycle. If you child tends to favour only reading fiction texts encouraging them to explore non fiction texts this term would be beneficial. 

And finally, in terms of dressing up this term, you might want to have a dig around for some odd socks (for odd socks day on 14th November), something spotty or non school uniform for Children in Need (18th November) and something Christmassy for our Christmas jumper / elf day (9th December).     

As ever, if you have any comments, questions or concerns please email me or Mr MacBean or talk to a member of the team. 

Kind regards,

Ms Browne, Mr MacBean, Mrs Bernard, Mrs McConnell, Miss Street, Mrs Thomas and Mrs Burgess.  

                

Home learning poppy design project

 

Dear parents and carers,

For the half term home learning we would like your child to design and create their own single poppy for remembrance day. Each individual poppy will be made into a whole school remembrance day wreath. which will be placed on the town war memorial. For details of the the design challenge, look at the photo below or click here to see a larger version of the details.

In addition to the poppy challenge, any reading or times tables practice your child might like to do over half term is always a good use of time, although primarily I hope you and your child have a happy, fun and relaxing half term.

Kind regards,

The Year 4 team.  

Home learning and times tables talk

 

Thank you to everyone that was able to come to this week's consultations. It was great getting the chance to meet with you and talk about your wonderful children. If you didn't manage to find a timeslot that worked for you, please get in touch and I will try to find a time when I could meet with you before half term.

We have had a lovely week in year 4 and we have been so impressed by all the children's incredible writing in our WW2 inspired big write. They should all be very proud of themselves. On Thursday, the children looked at different sources of evidence and information and I was very impressed by their thoughtful observations and reflections. Next week, we will be looking at the significance of the Battle of Britain and how the second world war ended.

Home Learning

The children's home learning for this week was to continue working on their World War 2 creations. This home learning was intended to give the children the opportunity to get creative with their learning and was not intended to be something to worry about. The best home learning is that which has been created primarily by the child with support and guidance from parents and carers as needed. Previous home learning creative pieces for our WW2 project have been posters, drawings, cartoon strips, playdough or lego creations. If for example, your child wanted to recreate the evacuation of Dunkirk or the Battle of Britain using their toys and then you emailed me a photo of their creation that would be wonderful. Ideally, if your child's creation could be in school by Wednesday then we have an opportunity to display and celebrate their learning in the school. 

Feedback from parents and carers about times tables

Having spoken to many of you this week there were a few common questions and comments about Times Tables. 

Your child will be assessed in the times tables in June. Whilst we do cover multiplication in class, helping your child to learn their times tables at home is incredibly beneficial in helping this learning stick. 

- If your child doesn't know their tables confidently then Hit the Button may be an option, as the correct answer is among many for your child to choose from. 

- Purple mash also has a number of multiplication games your child may enjoy. 

- On https://www.timestables.co.uk/ there are a range of different games to choose from as well as a multiplication check which is similar to the actual check in June. Please only look at this if your child is VERY confident with their times tables.

-  Some parents may want to consider making or buying times tables flash cards for opportunities when being on a device isn't suitable. As well as asking your child questions it may also be very motivating for them to ask you or an older sibling. Having them ask the questions will still expose them to the correct answers without the pressure being on them to work out the answer.      

- Some families reported that their child find Times Tables Rockstars overly busy and distracting. I have emailed the makers of TTRS and they have given me instructions as to how you can adjust the settings:

1) Once logged in, go to settings:

2) Once in settings, you can select declutter mode (which makes the page less busy) as well as remove timers and change sound settings. 

Hopefully these options will give your child an opportunity to learn their times tables in a format that works for them. Last year, I also provided times tables booklets for those children that wanted one. If you would like a paper booklet for your child, please let me know.

Kind regards, 

Ms Browne 

Home Learning Activities

 

Hello everyone,

Firstly a big thank you to everyone that donated food to our harvest festival or came to the harvest celebration. The children enjoyed a wonderful week of food, faith and farming with an evacuee experience to boot. Your support is greatly appreciated with all these events, especially last week when I think they needed three different outfits. 

Literacy

Next week the children will be doing their Big Write about the experiences of a child evacuee during the Second World War. They will plan their writing on Tuesday before doing the actual writing on Wednesday. If you are able to talk to them about what they plan to write on the Tuesday evening this may help them develop their ideas and benefit their writing the following day. 

Maths

In maths we will be continuing with our addition and subtraction unit. We will be looking at formal methods to do this but if you are able to help and support your child in developing speedy and secure recall of adding and subtracting within 20 this will be a huge help in giving your child confidence in the topic. As discussed in our parent information session, little and often practice is really helpful here so if your child is receptive giving them verbal additions and subtractions would be great or alternatively online games such as hit the button would be useful. Once in hit the button, select number bonds and then the options: Addition within 10, Missing numbers; Addition within 20 and subtraction within 20 will be helpful for our current maths unit. 

   

     

Spellings

Your child should either have spellings to learn each week or a spelling activity. In addition to these your child also has a spelling shed login. These are stuck in the front of your child's home learning books, although I will also hand these out to you during our consultations this week. 

If you visit the https://play.edshed.com/en-gb page your child will need to enter their username and password and then they can click on Spelling Shed (for those children needing more phonics practice they are also welcome to click on Phonic shed). 

In Spelling shed, most children will have an assignment set which has their spellings for the fortnight / week to learn. There are a choice of spelling games which help the children learn their spellings in a fun and engaging way. 

Most children also have a personalised list of spellings to learn. These are based on spelling tests that we carried out at the beginning of the year and will be changed once children have mastered their current set. Children can also find games of all years 3&4 or years 1&2 spellings to practice. 

This week's home learning 

For this week's home learning the children have been given a maths worksheet (which should have come home on Friday) to complete for next week. They have also been set a longer project to create a diorama or display piece based on the Second World War which is to complete by the 19th October please.     

 

I have copied some designs from last year to give you some ideas, should this be useful.

I'm looking forward to seeing many of you this week for our consultations but as ever please contact a member of the team at any point should you have any questions, comments or concerns. 

Kind regards,

Ms Browne, Mr MacBean and the Year 4 team.