English

This week you will be re-telling and writing the famous New Zealand story.

Monday 25th January 2021

Let's start our week off by listening to the fantastic story from New Zealand.  Click on the links below.

You will notice that the birds in the story have very different names.  These are all pronounced in the video and in the voice recordings below. 

There is also a video to watch that is New Zealand birds got talent. See if the birds in  the story star in the show. 

After you have listened to the stories talk to an adult about why the characters refused to help.  What would you have done? 

Below is a printed version of the story.  We know this is a lot of text to read but we would like you to scan the words to find any contractions.  Highlight the contractions with a light colour.

What is a contraction?

A contracted word (or contraction) is a short word created by putting two words together and dropping one or more of the letters. These letters are replaced with an apostrophe, which shows where the letters would be if the words were written in full. 

Some examples of contracted words:

• don’t (do not)
• didn’t (did not)
• isn’t (is not)
• mustn’t (must not)
• they’re (they are)
• I’ll (I will)

Tuesday 26th January 2021

It might be a good idea to remind yourself of the story so choose one of the videos or the text of How Kiwi Lost its Wings. 

Can you have a go at joining in with some of the story?  There are lots of repeats throughout the story and although some of the bird names are tricky you may surprise yourself at how easy it is to remember some parts of the story.

Now that you know the story a little better we need to focus on contractions.  Can you remember what a contraction is?  Can you describe what it is to an adult?  Go back and have a look at Monday's learning if you find it tricky. 

Today we would like you to use contractions in some sentences.  To warm up can you sort the words into contraction and non-contraction?

Now using the sheet below or drawing your own birds from the story, write some sentences using the contractions.  Miss Salter has done one as an example. 

Wednesday 27th January 2021

Today you will plan your story of How Kiwi Lost its Wings using a story hill, pictures and key words. 

A story hill has a beginning, middle and end.  On the sheet you also have a box for characters and a box for key words. 

You need to include all the characters in the story.  You need to make sure these are correctly spelled. I have put mine in the order that they appear in the story to help me when I re-tell it..  

The key words are the words I know I will be using in my story. These are also words that I might find tricky to spell.  Having the characters and the key words on the plan help me when it comes to writing my own story.

The story hill is hard work but helps you because you can then see the order when writing your story.

You plot the main parts of the story in order onto the story hill in the beginning, middle and end section.

Here is Miss Salter's example.  You can write notes or full sentences but do not write the whole story on the plan.  It is a plan!  You can draw pictures to help you.

Thursday 29th January 2021

Today is the big day where you do a long piece of writing. Make sure that you try your best and take plenty of breaks. 
 

First write a nice clear title. 
 

Next get your story hill. You will need this for the whole of your writing as it will help you get the right order of the story. If you didn’t manage to complete yours, use Miss Salter’s.

How will you start your story?
Once upon a time... 

A very long time ago...

One day...

Long long ago...

There was a time when...

Now retell your story using your best story language.  Use full stops, capital letters, common exception words and paragraphs (chunks of writing)