The Movement of The Earth

1st October 2024Laura Hamill

To kick start Case Study 1, we looked at the movement of Earth in relation to the Sun and Moon. We did a lot of research by watching and interactive video that gave us quiz questions throughout, testing that we were paying attention and taking in all of the facts. We then came together as a crew to make a video that detailed everything we learned. Our main facts were:

  • The Earth moves in two different ways: 1. It rotates on its axis. 2. It orbits around the Sun.
  • It takes the Earth 24 hours (1 day) to rotate fully on its axis.
  • It takes the Earth 365 and a quarter days (1 year) to orbit the Sun. 
  • When we are facing towards the sun, we get day time.
  • When we are facing away from the sun, we get night time. 
  • The Sun appears to move across the sky but it doesn’t. 
  • The Sun stays where it is and Earth’s rotation makes it disappear.

You can see our video by scanning this QR code:

Ordering numbers to 10,000

26th September 2024Laura Hamill

To consolidate our learning on ordering numbers to 10,000, we each became a 4-digit number! To begin with, we were able to choose any 4-digit number we liked but then we were given specific criteria for our numbers. For example, each digit had to have a different value. We then had to order ourselves from smallest to biggest or biggest to smallest, depending on the instruction we were given. We worked really hard to make sure that the value of the person to one side of us was bigger than us and the value of the person to the other side was smaller. We used our maths vocabulary to have a conversation about why we should be in a certain position. For example, “My tens column has a higher value so I have to bie bigger.” Shoutout to Jenson who was able to become the teacher during this lesson and instruct people where they should be going and why! To end our lesson, we were given four 4-digit numbers that we had to order from smallest to biggest on a whiteboard. Miss was very excited when we all managed to complete this independently!

Building Background Knowledge – Movement of the Planets

24th September 2024Laura Hamill

Today, we began building our background knowledge on our solar system and how the planet within it orbit (move around) the Sun. We worked in mini crews to make notes as we watched videos that detailed each of the 8 planets and how they each orbit the Sun. Every time we watched something new, we changed the colour of our pen to build upon the knowledge we had already gained from the previous video. We are going to use this knowledge to write a paragraph of what we now know about how the planets move in our next expedition lesson.

Ordering 4 digit numbers

24th September 2024Laura Hamill

Today, Crew Hamill used their place value knowledge to begin ordering 4 digit numbers to 10,000. We used our place value arrow cards to build our numbers so that we could visually see the numbers we were working with. We then began following the steps needed to decide which order they should go in, whether they be in ascending order (smallest to biggest) or descending order (biggest to smallest). We started by looking at the column with the highest value (our thousands) and then working down the columns until we found the digit that would help us decide whether the numbers were bigger or smaller. We were then able to apply this knowledge to some fluency questions in our books.

Dodgeball

24th September 2024Laura Hamill

Crew Hamill have been developing their dodgeball skills over the last few weeks, focusing on the basic skills needed in order to successfully play a game of dodgeball in two teams. Today, we developed our skills further by working on our deflection – using one dodgeball to block a second that is being thrown towards us. We began by working in 3s with one person throwing the ball to a second person who was to deflect it towards the third person. We then put these skills to the test during some mini games. One person in each team had a ‘golden ball’ which they were not allowed to drop. Their role was to deflect any balls that came towards them. BUT, they had to be really careful because if they dropped their golden ball, they were OUT! We cannot wait to develop these skills further in our next PE session!

Collective and Partitive Nouns

17th September 2024Laura Hamill

Today, Crew Hamill took part in a range of activities in mini crews to consolidate our learning on collective nouns (that are used for a group) and partitive nouns (that are used to tell us how much of something we have). We began by playing one of our favourite games – corners – in which we went to a side of the room depending on whether the noun we were showed was collective or partitive. Following this, we worked in mini crews to organise a list of nouns into groups – one group of collective nouns and one group of partitive nouns. Our next activity was to match up the collective or partitive noun to the single noun it belonged to (e.g. flock of -> sheep). We then completed a kahoot! quiz which assessed our learning and completed an exit ticket to independently demonstrate what we had learned and could remember.

Common and Proper Nouns

17th September 2024Laura Hamill

To consolidate our learning on common and proper nouns, Crew Hamill took part in a practical grammar lesson. We began by playing corners. Miss Hamill showed us a selection of nouns on the board and we had to decide whether they were a common (general) noun or a proper (specific) noun that needed a capital letter. Once we had done this, we recapped looking at these nouns within a sentence and how we would decide which was which. Miss Hamill had disguised the capital letters to make it that little bit more tricky for us but we were able to work in mini crews to underline proper nouns and circle common nouns within the same sentence. We then took part in a kahoot! quiz to assess how much we had remembered.

Estimating numbers to 10000

17th September 2024Laura Hamill

To consolidate our learning, Crew Hamill took part in a practical lesson in which we became a number line to 10,000 in order to deepen our understanding on how to estimate numbers on a number line. We began by each being a different number, starting with our start and end numbers (0 and 10,000) and adding in the interval half way (5000) and half way again (2500 and 7500). Remaining children were then given a number between 0 and 10,000 and had to decide where they would place themselves along the line, thinking carefully about which of our interval numbers they would stand between and which one they would be closer to based on the value of their number. Once we had done this, we then worked in mini crews to mark on different interval values on number lines to 10,000 and placed a range of numbers where we estimated they belonged onto each line.