School Update- Monday 20th April

Dear Parent/Carer,

I hope you all had a good Easter, despite the strange times we are living in at the moment.

I would love nothing more than to be writing to tell you of a reopening date, but alas, we are again bound by the rules of the Government in an extended lock down.

We are all hopeful that we will at some point return this academic year and really hope that we do, so that our Year 6 children can say their goodbyes, so that our new Reception children can get a taster of next year and of course so all of our other children can meet their new teacher and get to see their new classroom for next year. Fingers crossed…

I am very proud of all of the Newdale teams and how they have responded during this very difficult time. There is so much work going on behind the scenes and everyone is playing their part. The admin team have been battling with all sorts of issues around ordering vouchers and sorting out codes, the Pastoral team making sure all of our families are safe, our teaching team doing all they can to support online learning at home and the teaching assistant team volunteering and doing lots of preparation for this term and beyond.

We have and continue to remain open to the children of key workers. We were open all over Easter including Good Friday and Easter Monday, as we wanted to support the national drive to keep our key workers in work. The volunteers in school have been amazing. Despite anxiety around infection and the difficulties in social distancing with children, they are coming in and offering the best childcare possible in our hub. As ever, if you feel you qualify for provision then please email school or give us a ring (details on the website). If you have concerns about your children at home then we might be able to help with advice or signpost you to support, so please do get in touch.

I am trying really hard to see the positives and am very thankful that the weather has been very kind to us during this time. I am hoping children can get outside in gardens and enjoy their exercise sessions each day: I know I am!

I will update you when we know more, but in the meantime we thank you for your support with home online learning. It really will make a difference to the children when they finally return to us.

Kind regards and stay safe…

Miss Cook

 

Fun fruit snacks 🍎 , outdoor painting 🎨 and teddy bear hunts 🧸

On Thursday, we enjoyed playing cricket outside in the sunshine. When we got hungry we re-fuelled by making our own fruit caterpillar snacks 🐛. We took them outside to eat in the sunshine and played some more  games. After lunch, we used some old wallpaper to do some Spring painting outside. Then, we went on our very own bear hunt. There were 10 bears for us to find and each bear had an exercise challenge for us to complete. We finished our day by watching an animation of ‘We are going on a Bear Hunt’ on YouTube. Thank you for such a lovely day everyone!

 

Spring sunshine

Today we went on a lovely nature walk. Mrs Perkins made some fantastic envelopes so that we could collect our findings. We spotted a mouse taking cover in the roots of the hedgerow, looked at how Holly leaves are not all the same and also discovered lichen on the trees. After all our exploring, we chilled out by making daisy chains.

In the afternoon, we made our own playdough and played outside! Well done Harry and Jack for making school really enjoyable!

 

Y4 Spelling Test

 

Ask your parents/siblings to test you on your spellings either today or over the next few days. Email us with your scores.

different

exercise

regular

complete

remember

sentence

separate

special

Well done everyone! We have loved receiving all of your wonderful work. Keep it up!

Value of the Month- April

Our value of the month for April is Freedom

What is Freedom?

  • Rights and responsibilities
  • Self-expression
  • Freedom of speech

Suggestions for parents to work with children at home:

  • Together, talk about people in history who were being ruled by someone else and wanted freedom, e.g. Moses and the Israelites, slaves in the US before the Civil War; Hanukkah; Nelson Mandela.
  • Discuss with your child about historical slavery and modern day human trafficking.
  • Discuss with your child about the Syria Refugee Crisis.
  • Different Rules of Law around the world. Discuss with your child democracy in Britain and how this may be different from countries around the world.
  • Freedom of self- expression. Discuss with your child the importance of their identity and being able to express themselves. Explain that people living in Britain are able to express themselves how they choose; as long as it doesn’t break the law (Individual Liberty).
  • Discuss inner freedom– having positive thoughts. What does inner freedom feel like? When do you feel most free? What kinds of thoughts make you feel free? Constrained?

 

Y4 Communication

Hi Parents,

Just a reminder that you and your child can send us emails using Purple Mash if you have any questions etc.

Please check the website daily for updates.

Thanks

Miss Macfarlane & Mr Jackson

Y4 History Homework

Our new History unit is based on the Anglo-Saxons.

Your challenge is to create a piece of work based on the Anglo-Saxons. You can choose how you present your work. It could be a poster, presentation, poem, story, piece of artwork, model, song etc.

You can watch Horrible Histories videos to help you as well as use online sources, when researching.

We look forward to seeing your photos/work on our homework blog.

Next Week’s Spellings for Y4

different

exercise

regular

complete

remember

sentence

separate

special

thought

weight

Please note that these spellings do not follow a set rule as they are from the end of Y4 spelling list. Some parents have informed us that they are still testing their children on their spellings. This is a great idea and we hugely encourage it. Feel free to email us children’s scores.

Thanks

Y4

Y4 Home Learning

The Y4 staff have enjoyed seeing children’s work on the school blog and on Purple Mash.

As it’s almost the weekend, we just wanted to remind you that children are not expected to complete home learning tasks over the weekend (unless they really want to!).

A reminder to those who haven’t been on Purple Mash/the school blog:

If you haven’t been on Purple Mash yet, please try your best to. There are lots of tasks, which have been set, which link to units we’d be covering if we were in school at this time.

Many thanks

Y4