We have been spending as much time outside as possible while the weather is still nice!
There have been so many beautiful moments of crew: sharing, working as a team, positive communication, and words of encouragement and support. We have been collecting leaves, creating assault courses, helping each other to tidy… we even found a twig that looked like a spider so sang ‘Incy Wincy Spider’!
We have been looking at the story ‘The Gruffalo’ in our writing sessions this week. We have talked about the features he has and how we can show them using different shapes and colours. We then used a step-by-step guide to help us. Once we were finished, we then told Miss McGlone everything we had included in our drawings to create The Gruffalo.
We had the best time building a boat and going fishing with Miss Evans!
We have been working with the PE coaches on our football skills. We have listened carefully to their instructions and we have started to recall information from one week to the next so that we can build on and improve our skills weekly.
We have been looking at the story ‘The Everywhere Bear’ during our writing lessons, and it has inspired us to draw our own bears. We followed a step-by-step guide to help us use the correct shapes, and when we were done we told Miss McGlone all about the features of our bear, which she then added on as labels.
We have really been enjoying spending time outside in the Autumn sunshine, especially when we decided to set up our very own Potion Shop! We worked together as a crew, all with very different roles – making the potions, selling the potions and requesting more stock when we ran out, and buying the potions. It was lovely to hear such positive, kind, and polite language from everyone, and see leadership skills in action.
We have been putting our pre-writing skills to the test as we have been tracing our names, using a starting dot on each letter to help us with the correct letter formation.
Crew McGlone are FANTASTIC at remembering all the correct steps to show that they are ready to write: BBC, TNT, 6 feet, 2 hands. They have really blown me away with how well they are working on their ‘pinch parrot’ to perfect their pencil grip! The children have also been learning about the specific handwriting lines: top broken, top solid, bottom solid, bottom broken, as well as looking at how we start writing at the top of the page and we write from left to right. Lots of things to remember, but using our writing wall to look at the Widgits of each skill really helps us!
This afternoon, we celebrated those learners who are aiming high! Crew White students selected several names of those children that they believed were going above and beyond this week and then we held a secret vote to give postcards to them. Well done you three!
In Crew White, we know that children don’t all learn in exactly the same way. Throughout our classroom, we have lots of simple tools and routines that children can use to help them become more confident and independent learners.
Children can use help cards when they need adult support and brain-break cards when they need a short reset. Personal journals give children a space to organise their thoughts, while movement and fidget resources are available when to help with concentration.
We use visual timetables and timers to make the day and learning clear and predictable. Instructions are broken into manageable steps where needed, and we make sure children have enough thinking and processing time before being expected to respond.
We also regularly revisit previous learning, helping children remember what they have learned and make connections between different lessons. In Maths, helpsheets with key concepts are in their books for them to refer to throughout lessons and there are a number of maths games that we have played which children are encouraged to go back to when they have finished their learning.
Classroom resources are clearly labelled to support with independence and children are encouraged to use the zones of regulation check-in at least every morning and afternoon to support them to notice how they are feeling and why.
An important part of Year 6 is learning what helps you to learn. We want children to become increasingly confident at recognising what they need, choosing the right support and getting themselves ready to learn.
You’ll see some examples in the photos of the different strategies and resources we use every day in Crew White.
Here’s a selection of beautiful work from across the XP Trust!
To read about other stories from across the XP Trust, visit xptrust.org.
]The bog baby @ Norton Infants
Year 4 English Quizzers @ Norton Juniors
Year 11 History: Living under Nazi rule @ XP East
Write to us at [email protected] – we want to hear about it, write about it and celebrate it!
