UKS2 Hook Week -A Right Royal Week!
Category : Crew White 25/26
UKS2 Celebration of Learning
We were delighted to invite parents into school for our Art Exhibition, where children had the opportunity to proudly showcase their writing, art and DT (Design and Technology) skills. The hall was transformed into a gallery space, allowing families to walk around, admire the work and celebrate the creativity and effort that has gone into each piece.
The displayed work was beautifully framed to reflect our expeditionary learning, with a strong focus on understanding how we can help our planet survive. These frames helped bring together the children’s knowledge of sustainability, environmental responsibility and global care, giving real purpose and meaning to their creations.
The children were excited to talk confidently about their learning, explaining their ideas, techniques and the processes behind their work. From carefully crafted written pieces to imaginative artwork and thoughtfully designed DT projects, the gallery highlighted both creativity and skill development. It was wonderful to see the children take such pride in their achievements and to share this special experience with their families.
Hook Week – Tudor Crimes and Hans Holbein
Today marked the first day of our new expedition, and Crew White were fully immersed from the start. We travelled back to the Tudor period to begin building our historical knowledge and curiosity, asking big questions about what life was really like during this fascinating, and often brutal, time.
We were introduced to the intriguing figure of Hans Holbein the Younger, exploring how his portraits tell us so much about powerful people, status and life in Tudor England. The children were fascinated by how art can act as a historical source and reveal details that written records sometimes miss.
We also read about Tudor crime and punishment, discovering just how harsh and shocking the justice system could be. While some of the punishments were gruesome, this helped the children understand how fear and control were used to maintain order.
It was a gripping start to our expedition, sparking curiosity, thoughtful discussion and plenty of questions.
We are looking forward to our Tudor banquet on Thursday!
Dental Aid Visit
We were lucky to have a visit from Dental Aid today where we learned about keeping our teeth healthy.
The children asked lots of good and insightful questions.
Cutting, Measuring and Showing Courage in DT
In DT this week, Crew White stepped up to a real challenge: sawing and measuring wood at an angle. It was the kind of task that demanded precision, patience and a steady hand, and our crew absolutely rose to it.
There were moments of frustration, moments where pieces didn’t quite fit, and moments where starting again felt like the only option. But the crew showed real courage, sticking with the process and supporting one another to get it right.
By the end, they not only had neatly cut pieces of wood but also a new appreciation for how skilled carpenters and joiners truly are. It was a brilliant mix of resilience, teamwork and craftsmanship.
Reading Buddies Building Confidence
This week, our Reading Buddies programme has been in full swing, and it’s been brilliant to see. Our older, confident readers have been supporting younger students with their pre-reads, helping them practise tricky words, build fluency, and talk about the story before they meet it in class.
They’ve shown maturity, independence and genuine care in the way they guide and encourage their partners. The younger children have absolutely loved the one-to-one attention, and their confidence is growing every session.
It’s been a lovely reminder that reading isn’t just a skill, it’s something we share as a community.
Capturing the Tiger Cat (through Art)
This week, Crew White have been exploring the striking patterns and features of the Northern Tiger Cat through Art. After studying photographs and discussing what makes this elusive animal so unique, the children chose either to sketch the whole creature or zoom in on a single feature—most popular were those bold, expressive eyes.
Using oil pastels, our crew has layered colours, blended carefully, and experimented with texture to bring their artwork to life. The results are brilliant: vibrant close-ups full of detail and powerful full-body pieces that really captured the movement and markings of the tiger cat.
The class showed real focus, creativity, and pride in their work. We can’t wait to display these in our expedition products soon.
Crew White show courage
This week, Crew White have been learning about Carcroft School’s new character traits: courage, integrity, compassion, quality and craftmanship and respect. These form the foundations of what it is to be a positive member of our crew and our school. We were especially proud of Crew White’s courage this week as they embraced new challenges, shared their ideas openly, and supported one another with real determination.
We looked at what it means to be courageous and role played some examples of behaviours that you might see in our crew.
Oil pastels inspired by Frank Bowling
As part of the creation of our final product for our Expedition, ‘Lungs of The Earth’, Crew White have been exploring oil pastel techniques along with research the abstract artist, Frank Bowling. We used Google Classroom again to help develop independence and organisation. We look forward to sharing our final designs with you soon!
Using Blooket for retrieval practice
In Crew White this week, we have been using the quizzing tool Blooket to retrieve previous learning from our long term memory. The quiz included homophones, adaptations and features of the country we studied in Case Study 1: Geography, ‘Colombia’.
Over the week, our scores have improved from a class average of 72%, to midweek at 83% to finally the end of the week with a score of 90+%!
