Week 2

Wish you were here

Starting the journey...

Meerkat Mail is a story of self-exploration, of believing that the grass is greener, of leaving home and coming back again… Our hero Sunny the meerkat lives with his extended family in the Kalahari Desert and is fed up with two things – the place where he lives and the people (or meerkats!) he lives with. It’s time to move on, so he packs his suitcase, writes a note and starts his search for a better place to eat his ice-creams.

This week we join Sunny on his search, along with a hungry jackal who is always close behind him, as he travels from one global family member to another. Needless to say, each place seems to have its own set of problems and Sunny finally arrives at the eternal message ‘there is no place like home’. 

Task One:

Watch and listen to the story. Pay close attention to the postcards that Sunny writes to his family.

Task Two

Pause the video to look at the postcards Sunny sends from each location – layout, language, text conventions e.g. brackets, and discuss the information they give about where he is and what his current relative is like.

Collect information under the headings:

• Where he is

• What he eats

• What the weather is like

• What he does

• What he likes and dislikes

Task Three

Make a timeline of where Sunny goes each day and plot his journey. Can you work out which way Sunny travels and see if you can find some of his relatives on a map?

Tuesday 2nd March

Pack Sunny’s suitcase: choose somewhere that you are familiar with or have visited and decide what will be useful for him to take with him.

Draw or write a list of objects which Sunny may need when travelling the world and visiting your chosen destination, e.g. torch; raincoat; tent etc

Task Two

When you have decided where you would like Sunny to go. Complete the travel writing frame below. You might need to do a little more research about your destination to make sure that you have included accurate information.

Task Three

Now work through the ppt below about writing postcards, before writing a postcard as Sunny from your chosen destination. There are some postcard templates to be used or you could design your own. Here is a checklist of what you will need to include.

Wednesday 3rd March

Today, I would like you to tell me the story. Using the picture map below (or you might like to draw your own as you go) can you verbally retell Meerkat Mail. In class we would use actions to help us remember what comes next and repeatedly practise it so that we could tell it by heart. I would like you to tell the story in the past tense, including story connectives, e.g. After that, The next day, Eventually etc.

Thursday 4th March - World Book Day

Meerkat Mail: Big Write

Our final Home School Big Write is a re-telling of Meerkat Mail. Take some time to plan out the story using the story map, your timeline, the character family tree and a story mountain plan.

The five parts are:

• Introduction/Beginning
  This is the introduction to the story and the main character, Sunny, as well as describing the setting where Sunny lives.
• Build up
  These are the events and rising tension that leads Sunny to make the decision to go off on a journey and visit his relatives. What do we know about Sunny's everyday life?
• Problem/Dilemma/Climax
  These are the relatives that Sunny stays with throughout the week and what he learns about them and they way they live. What problem or issue does Sunny have with each relative?
• Resolution
  What does Sunny come to realise by Saturday?
• Ending
  Where did Sunny end up? What lessons did he learn/come to realise?