Home learning information and residential update

 

Hello everyone,

We have a busy and exciting week ahead of us with our popular writing workshop "The Bank of Dreams and Nightmares" on Tuesday and our residential trip from Wednesday - Friday. When packing for our residential, please can you label any snacks/ treats that your child may want to bring. It would be particularly helpful if they were in a plastic bag, container or a zip lock bag. Food items always need to be collected by staff to avoid pests in dorm rooms but it is particularly important where children in the class have certain allergies. 

Home learning

This week's home learning is for the children to continue to work on their TinkerCAD creations for their ROAR projects. Mr Spracklen has created a helpful youtube video which should help explain how to access TinkerCAD logins. You can find this link here. 

I understand that it is not always possible to complete the main home learning activities but I strongly recommend regular reading, spellings and times table practice wherever possible. The effects of regular practice cannot be overstated.  

Spellings

We have been in an assessment period during our spellings sessions identifying those words from years 1, 2 and 3 that the children still need to learn. The children have been tested on 130 words and now have their own personalised and individual spelling lists. 

Today the children were sent home with the first 20 of these spellings to learn. In class, the children will have two mornings per week where they will also be given time to work on their own personal spellings. I am only giving children 20 spellings at a time from their lists to learn but will give parents the full list at parents evening (I can email these before at your request)

 

I am also in the process of uploading the full list of all of their individual spellings onto Edshed/ Spelling Shed. With each list being individual to each child it is quite a time consuming process but I hope to have this done by the end of next week at the latest. 

After Hooke Court, the children will also be given new RWI spellings which they will be tested on weekly or fortnightly (dates will be on the sheets).   

Children will not be tested on their personal spellings until January 2025 although it is hoped that children will regularly practice their personal and weekly spellings as often as possible. 

Upcoming Dates 

Tuesday 1st October - The bank of dreams and nightmares

Wednesday 2nd - 4th October - Residential

From Monday 7th Oct - Food, Faith and Farming fortnight

Friday 11th Oct - Farm visit as a WW2 evacuee (dress up)

Friday 18th Oct - Dress as a farmer

Friday 18th Oct - Harvest Festival assemblies KS2 9.15 - 10am

Friday 18th Oct - Autumn Fest 5 - 7pm

Monday 21st Oct - Early Parents' evening

Thursday 24th Oct - Late Parents' evening 

TinkerCAD: Year Four Home Learning Help

Today in Computing, Year Four enjoyed using TinkerCAD again. Across the class, we are starting to develop some CAD enthusiasts while others are still getting to grips with what you can do with this powerful piece of software. 

One of the fantastic features of TinkerCAD is that you don’t need to start from scratch—you can take an existing design and ‘tinker’ with it! For this week's home learning, Mr Spracklen encourages pupils to find a design they like and make their own modifications as part of their #ROAR2024 project.

Once finished, pupils should share their final design by uploading it to Google Classroom or by emailing Mr Spracklen the .STL file (export to > .STL).

Mr Spracklen explains the task in more detail in the Y4 Home Learning Help video here: 

Trip to the Museum

 Hello Year Four Families

We had a wonderful time at the County Museum today. The children learnt about different habitats that animals live in. Animals big, all the way down to microscopic! They used magnifying glasses to investigate creatures close up.

We then had a chance to go down into the basement which was a real privilege, The children got to see where specimens are kept and how they are preserved and looked after. It really was amazing down there!

Back up in the museum we investigated how birds use different shaped beaks to eat different things. The children took on roles as spoonbills, tweezerbills, pegbills and scissorbills. It was interesting to see what they could collect and they learnt how different birds eat different things depending on their beaks. 

Lastly, we found out how a range of scientists collected information about their findings. We learned that many used field journals to do this. The children then had the opportunity to make their own.

We had a fantastic morning at the museum . . .  and beat the rain home!

I am sure the children will have lots to tell you about their trip today and will enjoy sharing their field journals with you this evening.

The Year Four Team

#ROAR2024

On Friday 20th September we welcomed Bill from the Dorchester Lions Club into Year Four to formally launch our #ROAR2024 project -

2024 is the ninth year of Lions ROAR. This inspirational competition is run by the award-winning education company, 8BillionIdeas and Lions Clubs British Isles. 

The unique Lions programme aims to inspire children and young people to think big and dream bigger about their ideas! 

For more information, please see: https://lionsclubs.co/MemberArea/home/lions-roar/.

Today, we followed up Bill’s input with a Computing session focused on idea generation and exploring what it means to ‘prototype’ -

We worked in our #ROAR2024 booklets to complete the following statement -

The problem my idea will solve is…

Future lessons will see us prototype our solutions in TinkerCAD.

Y4 trip to the museum

 
Reminder:

We are visiting Dorset County Museum this Wednesday (25th September) as part of the 'Urban Nature Project'.

The children will be leaving school at around 9.30am.

We will be eating our lunch at the museum so please make sure that your child has a rucksack that they can carry their lunch and a water bottle in. 

The weather looks showery at the moment so suitable wet weather gear is advisable.

The Year 4 Team

Home learning and upcoming dates

 

Hello everyone,

I hope you are all doing well and that your child is feeling settled and happy in year 4. Myself and the team are very happy with how they are doing so far. 

It is now officially Autumn and as we start 'welcoming' cooler days please can I remind you to make sure your child has a labelled coat everyday. We will launch our Food, Faith and Farming fortnight in a few weeks and have some lovely Autumn related activities to look forward to. 

We head off on our residential trip a week on Wednesday and you may be starting to put items aside now. Here is an electronic copy of the packing list but if you need a paper copy please ask a member of the team.    

Homelearning

The deadline for Home learning is generally Tuesdays when the children will be given their new piece of work. 

The previous home learning can be found here. 

This week's home learning (which the children will bring home on Tuesday) can be found here.  

Spellings

Most of the children will not have come home with spellings to learn yet. We have been assessing the common spellings that are helpful to know by year 4 and the children will then have their own personalised spelling lists. These will be ongoing spellings to learn and in addition tho these the children will have weekly or fortnightly RWI spellings to learn once RWI sessions start (hopefully later this week). 

Dressing Up

We have a number of dressing up opportunities coming up at POW and in Year 4. To help you get prepared I have listed those likely to happen before Christmas below. We don't expect or want you to spend lots of money on these, items that you already have with tweaks are very welcome. Please feel free to ask a member of the team if you need help with costumes. 

Upcoming opportunities for children to dress up include 

-  dress up as a WW2 evacuee  on Friday 11th October - link here for costume ideas

- dress up as a farmer on Friday 18th October 

- Children in need on Friday 15th November 

- Dress as an elf (possibly in December)

- Christmas jumper day (possibly in December)

Upcoming Dates 

Wednesday 25th Sep - Urban Nature project visit

Wednesday 2nd - 4th October - Residential

From Monday 7th Oct - Food, Faith and Farming fortnight

Friday 11th Oct - Farm visit as a WW2 evacuee (dress up)

Friday 18th Oct - Dress as a farmer

Friday 18th Oct - Harvest Festival assemblies KS2 9.15 - 10am

Friday 18th Oct - Autumn Fest 5 - 7pm

Monday 21st Oct - Early Parents' evening

Thursday 24th Oct - Late Parents' evening 

Please email me or contact a member of the year 4 team if you have any questions comments or concerns. 

Kind regards,

The year 4 team. 

🍂🍁🎃🌰 😊

 

Y4 Computing - A1 W3

Today was a special day at The Prince of Wales School as we celebrated our 30th anniversary with a whole-school photo on the school field! 

To make room for this exciting event, we had a shorter Computing lesson than usual. But don’t worry – Mr. Spracklen made sure we still had a fantastic time.

In our combined Year Three and Year Four session, we delved into the amazing world of 3D printing. We learnt how to design our own 3D models using Purple Mash and TinkerCAD.

Mr. Spracklen also made a super cool promise: if we design something at home and send him the .STL file (with a bit of help from our parents or carers), he’ll print a mini version of our design using the new 3D printer recently purchased by POWSA!

What a wonderful way to celebrate our school's milestone and learn something new at the same time.

Happy 30th Anniversary The Prince of Wales School! 🎉📸✨

Help: Residential dormitory groups and dietary needs

 

Dear parents and carers,

As you know our class residential trip is fast approaching. I will look forward to talking through everything that you should expect this Friday afternoon (from 2.45pm), however the residential providers would like to know our dormitory occupants list a few days earlier than I was expecting. 

Therefore I will be asking children to choose 4 - 5 children that they would like to be in the same dormitory with tomorrow (Thursday 12th September) so that I can plan the dorm and give the residential providers list by this Friday.

I'm so sorry for the later notice but I would really appreciate it if you get talk to your child about this and help them be prepared for choosing 4 - 5 names. It is essentially just for sleeping and the class spends most of the waking hours together or in larger groups.  

If you have any questions or comments regarding dormitories I encourage you to email me these and I can factor them into the dorm plans (where possible). 

Please could parents also email me if your child has any dietary needs that we may not currently be aware of.  

If there is a year 4 social media parents group please could someone share this message on it. 

Thank you all for your help. 

Kind regards,

Ms Browne 

TinkerCAD

In Y4 Computing today, we were reminded how to login and access Google Classroom safely. From Google Classroom, we then joined Mr Spracklen’s ‘Y4 Virtual Classroom’ on TinkerCAD. 

TinkerCAD is 3D modelling software that we will use as part of our #ROAR2024 unit of work. 

TinkerCAD will allow us to design in 3D before printing on our school’s new 3D Printer (recently purchased by POWSA, thank you POWSA). 

Today, we go to grips with TinkerCAD using the following tutorials set by Mr Spracklen →

The children really enjoyed exploring this software and seeing their designs come to life in 3D. It’s a fantastic way to build their digital creativity and problem-solving skills!

Why not try this at home?

TinkerCAD is free to use and can be accessed from any device. It’s a great way to encourage your child’s imagination, and you might even want to try designing something together. You could start with simple objects like a keychain or toy and work up to more complex designs as you go.

Encourage your child to share their creations with family and friends or even bring them in to print at school. 

Have fun designing!

Week 1 in Year 4

 

We had a wonderful few days in Year 4 and I am so proud of how well the children have settled back into school.  

Thank you so much for returning so many swimming consent letters so far. Please could any remaining letters be returned ASAP. 

We have a busy term ahead of us and so I have listed a few dates below to help you track what is going on. This Friday 13th at 2.45pm we have our year 4 parent information session where I will give more details about what to expect in year 4. This will be followed by our residential adult and child session where I will talk through our upcoming residential trip with the class and their adults so that everyone knows what to expect.

Things to bring into school

- Please could all children bring a labelled jacket, drinks bottle and school jumper into school daily. 

- Children need labelled PE kits for Mondays (we can keep these in school and return them half termly). 

- Swimming kits and rain jackets are needed every Thursday during Autumn terms 1 & 2.

- Reading records into school every Friday please. Thank you to those people that returned their child's reading record last week. To conserve paper we would really like to reuse last year's records so please could you return any that you have at home by Monday. 

Upcoming Dates

Monday 9th Sep - Whole school bike show & KS2 bike workshops

Thursday 12th Sep - Y4 swimming starts weekly

Friday 13th Sep - Parent info & residential info sessions from 2.45pm

Monday 16th Sep - Individual and whole school photographs

Wednesday 25th Sep - Urban Nature project visit

Wednesday 2nd - 4th October - Residential

From Monday 7th Oct - Food, Faith and Farming fortnight

Friday 18th Oct - Harvest Festival assemblies 

Monday 21st Oct - Early Parents' evening

Thursday 24th Oct - Late Parents' evening 

Kind regards,

The Year 4 team 😊

Welcome to Year 4

Hello everyone,

I hope you had a lovely summer and are looking forward to all the adventures we have in store for you in Year 4. 

We are so excited to welcome you back and we have lots of fun, team building and relaxing activities to help your child get settled into year 4.  

Drop off and collection points for year 4

Please be aware that year 4 should be dropped off and collected via the year 4 front door (opposite Maiden castle road and the bicycle shed). If your child has younger siblings at POW please feel free to collect them first before coming to us. 

   

PE kits

This term, year 4 will be having PE lessons on Mondays, so ideally we would like your child to come to school with a labelled PE kit by Monday morning please. I will be sending home swimming letters on Thursday so please look out for these and return them ASAP as swimming starts next Thursday. 

Reception buddies

Year 4 will have reception buddies but please be aware that they will not given their buddy this week. We will be meeting the reception children on Friday and staff will start thinking about what personalities will be best suited to being buddies. 

Parent Information / Residential session

The Year 4 parent information session is on Friday 13th September at 2.45pm. For the first 15 minutes Ms Browne will update you on general Year 4 information then in the remaining time we will invite your child into the session and talk about what to expect during our residential. We have found adult and child residential info sessions to be really useful for families in the past and if parents aren't free please send grandparents, aunties or uncles. 

See you all in the morning

😊 The Year 4 Team 😊