Friday 26 January 2024

Dear Parents,

We hope you had a lovely week and we hope you are enjoying our new class pages in our fabulous newsletter. Year 4 children are continuing to work really hard on their multiplication and division lessons in maths and year 3 have started to learn all about length and perimeter. In English, we have been analysing non-chronological reports and will be writing our own about Chinese New Year. In guided reading, we kept to the theme of Ancient China and we read, discussed and compared two different stories from another culture. In art, we discovered all about Willow plates and designed our own.

As you may have noticed, we are taking part in cross country in PE. Next week, if your child would like to bring in a second pair of (old) trainers to change into, specifically for cross country then please feel free to send them in.  🏃

Lots going on in the next few weeks!

Buy books, change lives
Want to support our school?
Buy books through LoveReading and LoveReading4Kids and we get  25% of the cover price to buy more books!

The LoveReading family — LoveReading, LoveReading4Kids and
LoveReading4Schools — exists because reading matters, and books change lives.
We know that reading for pleasure, and improving reading standards, has a huge
impact on our children’s wellbeing, academic achievements, and future success.
Alongside that, we also know that the current funding crisis has resulted in
devastating cuts to budgets in our schools, which is why LoveReading is redressing
that shortfall through creating an online bookstore with social purpose.


How it works:
● When you buy any book from LoveReading or LoveReading4Kids, 25% of the
cover price will be given to a school of your choice, such as us!
● Book prices are competitive with at least 10% off the RRP
● After you’ve searched for the books you’d like to buy (after reading reviews
and accessing opening extracts of highly recommended titles), at checkout,
you’ll be able to search for your school, by adding your school name or
postcode, and you allocate that money to us. It will even tell you how much
your purchase has donated to us!
● We can then spend our allocated funds on LoveReading4Kids to get more
books in our classrooms and library.

LoveReading has a huge selection of books for all ages, across all genres, at
competitive prices, so make LoveReading and LoveReading4Kids your go-to
bookshops to give our school the chance to access more books.

Sounds like a win-win situation - you get great books, while we get funds for great
books to encourage even more reading for pleasure in our children..
Like we said at the start, reading matters and books change lives - buying books
through LoveReading will ensure that continues to happen for students at our
school, and future generations.
Thank you for your ongoing support!
www.lovereading.co.uk
www.lovereading4kids.co.uk

Storytelling Week
Storytelling week runs from 27th January - 4th February and we will be taking part in various activities at school to celebrate this, including meeting up in our houses to share stories and listening to our adults share a story with us too. Please feel free to join in! It would be great to hear about stories you have been sharing at home. Also, feel free to share any photos of you reading in different places. 


DATES FOR YOUR DIARY
Wednesday 14th February - PTA Coin Run
Friday 16th February - Break for half term
Monday 26th February - Back to School

Year 3/4  Homework Tasks - Due Thursday 25th January
Must Do
  • Reading: Remember 15-20 minutes everyday is super important. The children will have taken their Reading record home for parents to comment in. These will be collected by teachers and checked regularly. Please bring your homework books back to school when you are finished so that we can check them. Thank you.
  • Spelling Frame
    This week the children will be set tests based on spelling rules. The rules that they will be focusing on can be found on Spelling Frame. Your child has their login details glued into their Reading diaries. This week we would like the children to focus on: 
    Spelling Rule 4 - Part 1 of looking at prefixes.
HOMEWORK PAGES

Year 3
English  - Page 28 + 29
Maths  - Page 14 + 15


Year 4 
English - Page 27
Maths  - Page 40 + 41

  • Accelerated Reader - when you have finished your book, you can take a quiz at school. Remember that you need 3 100% scores to move up a level
  • Times table practice - next week we are learning our 4 times tables including division facts. Please practice these on TTRS.

Can Do

  • Continue logging on to TTRS and Sumdog - your logins are stuck in the front cover of your Reading Records.
  • Maths - Year 4 will be completing their statutory Multiplication Tables Check in June this year. To this end, please can you ensure your child is regularly accessing and practicing these at: https://mathsframe.co.uk/en/resources/resource/477/Multiplication-Tables-Check
  • This activity exactly mirrors the 'Multiplication Tables Check' that will be given to children at the end of Year 4. They are tested on their multiplication tables up to 12 x 12. There are twenty-five questions and children have six seconds to answer each question and three seconds between questions. The questions are generated randomly using the same rules as the 'Multiplication Tables Check'.
  • With Storytelling Week coming up, it would be great to hear about the stories you share at home. What is your favourite story and why? Who do you share these with? When do you share a story? Anywhere different?
Have a lovely weekend,
Mrs. Hurley, Mr. Greenfield & Miss Harvey 💚

Friday 19 January 2024

Year 3/4 Blogpost 19.01.24

Dear Parents,
We hope you had a wonderful week. It flew by! The children are continuing to work really hard on their multiplication and division lessons in maths. It is great to see all their hard work in learning their times tables now paying off. In English, we are writing our own Chinese creation myth based on Pan Gu. Ask your child to retell the story to you.

We find ourselves in very exciting times as a number of new things are being introduced to our school. Our re-vamped newsletter this week sees the inclusions of photos of what each class has been doing during the week.

As you may have noticed, we are taking part in Cross Country in PE. Next week, if your child would like to bring in a second pair of (old) trainers to change into, specifically for Cross Country then please feel free to send them in.  🏃

Lots going on in the next few weeks!

DATES FOR YOUR DIARY
Thursday 25th January 2:30 - Meet and Greet Mrs Wood
Wednesday 14th February - PTA Coin Run
Friday 16th February - Break for half term
Monday 26th February - Back to School

Year 3/4  Homework Tasks - Due Thursday 25th January
Must Do
  • Reading: Remember 15-20 minutes everyday is super important. The children will have taken their Reading record home for parents to comment in. These will be collected by teachers and checked regularly. Please bring your homework books back to school when you are finished so that we can check them. Thank you.
  • Spelling Frame
    This week the children will be set tests based on spelling rules. The rules that they will be focusing on can be found on Spelling Frame. Your child has their login details glued into their Reading diaries. This week we would like the children to focus on: 
    Spelling Rule 3 - The /ʌ/ sound spelt ou (e.g. couple, touch... etc.)
HOMEWORK PAGES

Year 3
English 
Page 34-35
Maths 
Page 8

Year 4 
English 
Page 28

Maths 
Page 29

  • Accelerated Reader - when you are finished your book your teacher can change it for you. As soon as you are ready you can take a quiz at school. Remember that you need 3 100% scores to move up a level
  • Times table practice - next week we are learning our 3 times tables including division facts. Please practice these on TTRS.

Can Do

  • Continue logging on to TTRS and Sumdog - your logins are stuck in the front cover of your Reading Records.
  • Maths - Year 4 will be completing their statutory Multiplication Tables Check in June this year. To this end, please can you ensure your child is regularly accessing and practicing these at: https://mathsframe.co.uk/en/resources/resource/477/Multiplication-Tables-Check
  • This activity exactly mirrors the 'Multiplication Tables Check' that will be given to children at the end of Year 4. They are tested on their multiplication tables up to 12 x 12. There are twenty-five questions and children have six seconds to answer each question and three seconds between questions. The questions are generated randomly using the same rules as the 'Multiplication Tables Check'.
Have a lovely weekend,
Mrs Hurley, Mr Greenfield & Miss Harvey 💚

Friday 12 January 2024

Year 3/4 Blogpost 12.1.24

 Dear Parents,

Welcome to 2024 and a new term at Down Hall Primary School. We hope that you all had a wonderful festive break and are now ready to settle in to the Spring term.
This term, we are all looking forward to getting stuck in to our new project, The Shang Dynasty and China. We will be learning all about the history of the Shang Dynasty in China and what China looks like today.

Year 4 Multiplication Tables Check
Do you have a child in year 4 at primary school? If so, your child will be participating in the multiplication tables check (MTC) in June. The purpose of the check is to determine whether your child can fluently recall their times tables up to 12, which is essential for future success in mathematics. It will also help your child’s school to identify if your child may need additional support. For more information, please click on the link below:

Spare Footwear for PE
This term in PE, the children will be doing Cross Country. As a result, we ask that if possible, your children bring in a spare set of trainers/football boots that they can wear during the Cross Country sessions.

Year 3/4  Homework Tasks - Due Thursday 19th January
Homework Pages
Year 3 - English everybody Pg 78
Maths - everybody Pg 18
Year 4 - English everybody Pg 78
Maths everybody Pg 18

Spelling Frame
From this week, the children will now be set tests based on spelling rules. The rules that they will be focusing on can be found on Spelling Frame. Your child has their login details glued into their Reading Diaries. This week we would like the children to focus on: 
Spelling Rule 2- The /ɪ/ sound spelt y elsewhere than at the end of words (e.g. gym, myth... etc.)
  • Reading: Remember 15-20 minutes at least 3 times a week is super important. You will have taken your Reading Record home for your parents to comment on. These will be collected by teachers and checked from time to time. Please make sure you bring your book back when you are finished and your teacher can change it for you. As soon as you are ready you can take a quiz at school. Remember that you need 3x 100% scores to move up a level.
  • Times table practice - this week we are looking at 2s, 5s and 10s. Please practice these as we do in school.
Can Do
  • Continue logging on to TTRS, Sumdog - your logins are stuck in the front cover of your Reading Records.
  • Please can you practice telling the time on an analogue clock.
As always, we are available to speak to at the end of the school day. Just give us a nod and come down and see us!

Have a great weekend.
Lots of love from
Mrs Hurley, Miss Harvey & Mr Greenfield