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Dear Parents,

At school we often learn through something called ‘Mantle of the Expert’. The children in Hedgehog Class know it as ‘our story.’ Just before school closed, the children were the expert team: The Fairy Tale Fixers. They had been solving problems for different clients: they rescued Jack, who had got stuck at the top of the clouds and kidnapped by a giant; and they helped some goats to get across the river without upsetting the troll. They had been really enjoying this, so I thought we could try and continue it.

The day before school closed, the children met Mr. McGregor. A pesky something had been stealing and nibbling his prize carrots! He wanted our help to catch it. After talking to Mr. McGregor, he agreed NOT to make it into a pie (the children suspect this might be Peter Rabbit).

Please work though these slides, reading out the ‘story’ which is written in bold and discussing your child’s ideas with them. This week’s compulsory tasks are detailed within the story. The aim is to put the tasks in context and to make them part of the story.

You do not have to do all of this at once! You can pause the story after the first task and come back to it another day.

Please keep in touch via whaddonteachers@gmail.com as usual.

Enjoy the story!

Miss Nash

Today you will need:�* pencils, pens and paper

* junk modelling, cardboard or anything you can build with

* a ruler, possibly, or something to help you with straight lines

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Mr McGregor’s Problem: Chapter 1

‘Mr McGregor was sitting on an old wooden bench in his garden. The sun was shining down, warming his back. He sighed happily. His garden was beautiful - his hard work digging, planting, watering and caring for his plants had paid off. Mr McGregor smiled as he looked out over his garden.’

Fairy Tale Fixers Job 1: Create a map of Mr McGregor’s garden. Look at the next slide for ideas. You could use paper or card, with pens or pencils. You could create a garden using a ‘paint’ programme online… it’s up to you!

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Creating a map of McGregor’s Garden:

How many raised beds does he have?

What vegetables is he growing?

Does he have any fruit trees, maybe even a small orchard?

Is there a green house and/or a shed?

Is the garden surrounded by a fence or perhaps a wall?

Are there any flowerbeds?

Where is Mr McGregor’s bench?

When your garden map is ready, read on!

Year 1 children: Present your work carefully. Think about where the rabbit got into the garden and mark this on the map. You could even try a key for your map, with a grown-ups help.�

Reception children: Think carefully about the vegetables and other plants you will put in the garden. What colours do they need to be?

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‘Mr McGregor stretched and got up. He needed to go and pull up his prize carrots for the County Fair tomorrow. He walked over to the carrot patch and gasped in horror. What had happened?!

As Mr McGregor looked down, there in the soil he saw two small paw prints. He carried on looking and found three other clues.’

Fairy Tale Fixers Job 2: Draw, paint, or recreated and photograph the scene of the crime with the paw prints and the clues. What does the carrot patch look like? What has Mr McGregor seen?

Then write sentences to say what has happened, for example: ‘The carrots have been dug up’�Reception: 1, 2 or 3 sentences with spaces in between�Year 1: 3 sentences with spaces, full stops and capital letters. Challenge - use ‘and’ to join two ideas.

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‘By this point, Mr McGregor was very upset. “My carrots!” he wailed loudly, “my beautiful, prize-winning carrots!”

Mr McGregor knew what had to be done. If he was going to find out who did this, he’d need a CCTV camera.’

Fairy Tale Fixers’ Job 3: design and/or make a CCTV camera for the story. You could just draw a careful design, or you could make it out of junk modelling, paper, cardboard or wood. Can you get it set up somewhere in your house, or your garden?

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