Write like a poet – British Library
Today, Year 3 had a visitor from the British Library. We learnt a lot about the British Library like what they do, how they are different to a “normal” library and where they are based. Luckily for us, they have a base in Boston Spa!
The British Library have a copy of every single book, newspaper, magazine or even leaflet that has been published in Britain. They want to keep a record of all of these so that in years to come, people can look back and see what things were like over the years.
We read a poem – I Don’t Like Poetry by Joshua Siegel – and picked apart the vocabulary. We discussed what we liked and disliked about it. Then it was our turn to write our own poems. It can be quite tricky just to sit down and write a poem so we played lots of games to help us generate some ideas.
Some of us wrote about our day, our emotions, a hobby we like or just something random! The children really enjoyed it and were desperate to share their writing at the end.
Help at home by playing the word association game. Start with ‘apple’ and see what word the other person can think of that links to it and continue for as long as you can.
Topic – Art History – Paul Klee and Leonardo DaVinci
This week our Year 1s have been learning about the history of Leonardo DaVinci and Paul Klee. They all took part into some research, finding out where Leonardo DaVinci and Paul Klee were born, when they were born and even what their famous artwork is called.
They worked really hard on this and really impressed us with their researching skills. They even looked at a map to see the countries where they were from!
DT – Cooking and Banana sandwiches
This week in school our Year 1s have been learning about cooking and how to safely be in a kitchen. They learnt how to make banana sandwiches and they all did an amazing job. The children were really sensible, safe and made sure to support each other. The end results looked delicious!
Each pupil had a go and even got to sample their own food once they had made it. I think it’s fair to say they really enjoyed their first taste of cooking in school!
Writing: The Dream Giver
Over the last couple of weeks, we’ve been planning and writing a narrative based on the beginning of this short film – The Dream Giver.
We learnt how to write using prepositional phrases to help set the scene.
…above me…
…on the windowsill…
…inside the golden eggs…
We learnt to write similes to help build the narrative in the reader’s minds.
The stars twinkled like diamonds.
The ballerina danced as elegantly as a swan.
I flew as quietly as a mouse.
The children did an amazing job at writing their narratives! We were so impressed with their ideas. They shared them with Year 5 and Year 5 were too.
Here are a few of the narratives for you to have a read:
Help at home by discussing your child’s narrative and what similes they used.
PE: gymnastics
This half term, we have been developing our gymnastics skills. We’ve been exploring jumps, balances and putting together sequences of movements.
Help at home: Our personal best challenge is to balance on one leg. Give this a try at home. Remember to look at something still to help you keep your balance. Can you beat your previous time?
Reading and Writing – Not Now Bernard!
In our Reading and writing lessons this week we have been learning how to put what we have read on to its feet in real life. The children have channelled their inner actors and actresses, by acting out scenes from our story Not Now Bernard! They have done really well with this, sharing some great ideas, laughs and most importantly they all supported each other in the classroom making it happy and healthy place to learn.
Science- Materials and objects.
In this lesson the children learnt about objects and materials. They explored different materials, discussed the different properties of them and then looked at objects made from those different materials.
Once they had a clear understanding of the properties of different materials, they then looked at how certain objects can be the same but be made from different materials. They then took part in an experiment identifying and classifying different objects. Following that, they then labelled each object with its material.
Art: Soap carving
This week, we started our soap carving. The children were very excited to get going. They created a design, which was inspired by the sculptures of Henry Moore and Barbara Hepworth. Afterwards, we learnt how to use spoons, paper clips and a wet paper towel to create shape, form and texture in our soap. We were really focussed and created some brilliant sculptures.
Some parents even came in to help!
Help at home – talk to your child about the visual and tactile elements of art. How did they create texture? How did they use form and shape?
RE drop down morning
This morning Year 5 looked back over our RE learning that we have done in KS2 so far. We first discussed what are the main world religions and when they originated. We discussed which religions were monotheistic and which are polytheistic.
Then we focussed on Christianity for the rest of the morning. We made fact files about Christianity on cubes. We found the making of the cubes a little tricky but we showed great perseverance.
Afterwards, we discussed different denominations of Christianity focussing particularly on Catholics and Protestants. We completed a RIC and was able to confidently discuss the differences.
Finally, we looked at Christian festivals, focussing on Holy Week. This is the most important week for Christians. We completed a table describing each day and which significant events happened on each day.
I was very impressed with how much information the children had retained.
Help at home by discussing different religions and what they have learnt. The BBC bitesize website has some excellent videos.
Anti Bullying Day – Odd socks day.
This week in school our wonderful Year 1s have been learning about bullying. We came in wearing odd socks to symbolise that everyone is unique and that being different doesn’t matter. The children spent the day learning about what bullying is, how to stop it, how to help others and how to move forward if you are or if you see someone being bullied. This was learnt through the acronym S.T.O.P. This stands for Several Times On Purpose. They also learnt that S.T.O.P isn’t just there for us to identify what bullying is but it also works as a solution: Start Telling Other People. Overall, or Year 1s did an amazing job on this and really impressed us all with their caring and supportive manners.
