11th July 2020

Dear Year 4, 

It is your last week of home learning before your long Summer holiday. It was absolutely wonderful to see all those that could make it to the transition session yesterday - we really hope you enjoyed being back at school again!

The last week's work is all based around the Americas. I think you will enjoy listening to some of the stories and having a go at some of the art! I look forward to hearing about the outcomes.

Have a great final week!

Mrs Yates and Mrs Simmonds 

4th July 2020

Dear Year 4, 

Welcome to another week of home learning. This week the topic is Europe so all your topic lessons will be linked to this. The English is based on an interesting film version of a traditional French fable or fairy tale. We have had feedback that some of the maths has proved a little tricky from last week so we have built in a catch up lesson in the hope that it helps your understanding.

We are really excited about seeing you all on transition day next Friday 10th July. It will be great to be together again, even at a socially acceptable distance! 

Have a good week and see you all very soon.

Mrs Yates and Mrs Simmonds 

26th June 2020

Dear Year 4, 

I do hope you are all well and enjoyed the sunshine! Here is your home learning for Week 5....time is flying by but not long until we see you all in school again for transition day.

The whole school is studying Asia this week. I hope you enjoy it and can't wait to see all the things you produce!

Have fun!

Mrs Yates and Mrs Simmonds

21st June 2020

Dear Year 4, 

I hope you are all well and ready for another week of home learning. We are trying a slightly new way of doing things for the next 4 weeks, as outlined by Mrs Martin in her newsletter. Each week we will study a continent. The whole school will work on the same activities for the "Topic" lessons. This means that if you have siblings at Merdon, you can work on the tasks together or as a whole family. We hope you find it more engaging and easier to manage this way. This week the continent in Africa!

We have also tried to make some virtual lessons for English this week led by myself or Mrs Simmonds. It will be interesting to see how they go!

I have some great news for you all - Mr Perkins has now qualified as a teacher and is off visiting schools in the hope of getting a job. We wish him all the best in his chosen career. He will be very missed but I am sure another school in Plymouth will be very pleased to have him! Have a great week and we look forward to seeing all your excellent work on Friday!

Best wishes, 

Mrs Yates and Mrs Simmonds

14th June 2020

Dear Year 4, 

This week we will continue to learn about the rainforests, focusing on the different layers of foliage within them. The English will use poetry to teach you these concepts and the Geography will look at the different animals that live in the different layers.

All maths worksheets can be found in the maths resources folder.

It is also REFUGEE WEEK! We have planned a few activities to help you to think and understand about refugees around the world. We really hope you take part in the Giant Dolls' House project and send us a photo of your completed room for us to display on the website next week.

Have a good week!

Best wishes, 

Mrs Yates, Mrs Simmonds and Mr Perkins

7th June 2020

Dear Year 4, 

I hope you had a lovely weekend, despite the change in weather! Here is your work for this week. There are just a few things to note:

- Empathy Day - Tuesday is "Empathy Day" nationally so we have chosen to recognise this with some special activities for you to do in English and topic time.

- Maths on Wednesday - you need to obtain the worksheet from the Resources folder on the website as you can no longer open it on the Whiterose website after a certain date. Other sheets are fine for the rest of this week. Next week they will all be in the resources folder on the website.

Have a good week!

Mrs Yates, Mrs Simmonds and Mr Perkins

31st May 2020

Dear Year 4, 

I do hope you have had a wonderful half term holiday. What amazing weather we have had!

Here is your learning for this week. We are starting a new topic "Rainforests!" which I think you will really enjoy. We will be using picture books, information books, websites and many other resources to learn all about the climate, animals and wildlife.

We are really looking forward to seeing all the wonderful, creative work you produce.

With love, 

Mrs Yates, Mrs Simmonds and Mr Perkins

17th May 2020

Dear Year 4, 

I hope you are all well. This is the last week of home learning before half term and we have a few different types of days planned.

On Thursday, we would have been having an "Outdoor Classroom" day in school so we have done our best to recreate this on your grid by giving you activities for each subject that can be done outside in your garden or at the park. I hope you have fun with this and look forward to hearing from some of you about it.

It is also Mental Health Awareness Week which we would have celebrated in school so on Friday we have planned some work based around the theme of kindness. 

Have a good week. I think it is going to be a hot one so get outside as much as you can and enjoy it!

Best wishes, 

Mrs Yates, Mrs Simmonds and Mr Perkins

10th May 2020

Dear Year 4, 

We hope you had a lovely long weekend and enjoyed celebrating VE Day last Friday. This week in your home learning we are starting a new RE topic on Sikhism which we hope you enjoy finding out about. We look forward to seeing some of your work, especially the ideas on how to make our school greener. They have been passed on to Miss Martin!

Love from, 

Mrs Yates, Mrs SImmonds and Mr Perkins

2nd May 2010

Dear Year 4, 

We hope this finds you all well and happy. Here is your home learning grid and resources for another week. You will notice the grid looks slightly different -  Friday is a Bank Holiday to celebrate VE Day (Victory in Europe Day when we celebrate the end of WW2). Although it is a holiday, we have included some activities to keep you busy if you would like to have a go at doing them.

We continue the maths with Whiterose with an opportunity for a catch up lesson if necessary. Please scroll DOWN to week 2 resources (Whiterose have rearranged the format!) and NOT Summer Term Week 2 (w/c 27th April).

We are loving seeing all the work you are sending in so thank you all for that and keep it coming!

Best wishes to you all, 

Mrs Yates, Mrs Simmonds and Mr Perkins

24th April 2020

Dear Year 4 and Parents, 

I hope you had a good week of homelearning! Here are a few notes about maths next week...

Having trialled Whiterose this week, we have tweaked the plan slightly in order to try to best meet the needs of the children to support them to make the best progress in their learning.

When the grid and resources are uploaded onto the website, you will notice the Whiterose lessons are alternate days. This is for a few reasons:

• This enables us to add extra support and consolidation work for children who are finding the concepts tricky. This may be helpful now that we are back on the Year 4 curriculum.
• Many children enjoyed using the CPG books and this varies the lessons more so that the children do not become disengaged with the repetition.

Next week, just like this week, you will need to click on the link. This will take you to Summer Term Week 2 (w/c 27^th April). Do NOT do these lessons! Scroll up to the pink tab entitled “Week 1” then follow the lesson we have indicated on the grid. These are:

Monday – Lesson 1 “Recognising tenths and hundredths”

Wednesday – Lesson 3 “Tenths on a place value grid”

Friday – lesson 5 “Dividing 1 digit by 10”

Thank you to all those children who have sent work to us. It is lovely to see how you are getting along.

Have a great weekend!

Best wishes,

Mrs Yates, Mr Perkins and Mrs Simmonds

17th April 2020

Hello Year 4 children and parents, 

We hope you had a good Easter and are managing to enjoy this beautiful weather. It's now the Summer Term, so time to carry on with your learning at home!

The home learning continues on the grid as before Easter. There are however a few changes. Notice we have added the days of the week as we would like you to follow the grid in order rather than select what you would like. Some of the activities have resources to help you. These can be found in the respective stars under the grid each week. They do not have to be printed so do adapt or change as necessary.

• Maths- we will be following the White Rose lessons online. Click on the link on the grid each day and follow instructions to the correct week/lesson. We are starting at week one from Year 3 deliberately as this revises the knowledge you need before starting the Year 4 syllabus next week. As some of you may find this quite easy, we have provided an extra challenge for you each day! You do not have to print out the worksheets - you can simply write the answers in your book.
• English- We are starting our new text "Danny Champion of the World" by Roald Dahl. Mrs Simmonds and I will be reading you chapters each day via a You Tube channel (link will be on the grid) and then there will be activities to follow. Spellings will be on Spelling Shed with some activities to reinforce. A relevant resources stars under the grid.
• Science/Topic/Creative- We are starting our new Science topic of Habitats which will be three lessons each week for this half term and then we will select other subjects from the curriculum for the other two days.

On the grid some work is in red-this we would like you to send us so that we can see how you are getting on. Africa South, please send your work to africasouth@merdonschool.co.uk and Africa North, please send your work to africanorth@merdonschool.co.uk.

Keep in touch, work hard and have fun!

Mrs Yates, Mrs Simmonds and Mr Perkins

3rd April 2020

Dear Parents and Year 4, 

Mrs Simmonds, Mr Perkins and I are busy getting your learning ready for after the Easter holiday and wanted to give you a little advance warning- we will be using the book "Danny Champion of the World" by Roald Dahl for our English lessons. We have found a youtube reading of the whole book, chapter by chapter but you may want to try to get hold of a copy as an Easter present to make activities easier to complete next half term.

Thank you to all those that have sent photos and messages about your home learning so far. 

Have a wonderful Easter!

Love from Mrs Yates, Mrs Simmonds and Mr Perkins

29th March 2020

Dear Year 4, 

We hope you have had a lovely weekend in the sunshine!

Here is your learning grid for Week 2 of learning from home. I do hope it is all going well. We have added in some spelling shed activities and words to learn on the website. Mr Perkins has added some great Australia topic lessons and I have included some interesting Science websites and activities for you as this is what we would be doing in class this week. We would love to see some of your work if you would like to email it to the school.

Have a good week and work hard!

With love from the Year 4 team

26th March 2020

Dear Year 4, 

I do hope you are coping alright with being at home and your home learning. I wonder how your parents are doing too! Mrs Simmonds and I are busy planning your home learning for next week but in the meantime I thought I would tell you about a great website that has many different ideas on in case we have not given you enough to do. There is maths and English but also some lovely creative ideas and topic work too that you may enjoy and may help your parents if they are unsure how else to support you.

https://www.twinkl.co.uk/home-learning-hub

All your parents need to do is sign up (it is free at the moment) and then you can click on the 7-9 age group and a whole day of activities opens up. The activities are changed each day so you will never get bored!

We are greatly missing you and send all our best to you all.

With love, 

Mrs Yates and Mrs Simmonds