Reading helps us to better understand the world in which we live

Today I spent the morning with Mrs Ibbotson, our Reading Leader, looking at our Reading Strategy in action. It was a pleasure to see children so engaged in their Reading lessons across Year 2 to Year 6, whereby we spotted pupils practising their reading aloud, in order to develop their fluency so that they can then better understand their text. They were engaging in texts which would support them to better answer their guiding question for their current expedition. In some classes, the children were answering questions about the text and their Teachers were checking their understanding using protocols such as whip around and cold call. I particularly loved being in Crew Boswell, where they were being challenged by Mr B to further develop their oracy skills by providing a detailed response when asked a question. This session really made my day, to hear our pupils articulating their ideas with such elegance. Finally, I loved seeing so much collaboration in nearly every class including lots of paired reading and supporting one another to answer questions. Another lovely morning where I left feeling proud of what we are achieving together as a school.

Dodgeball tournament 9/3/22

Today we took the Y1/2 to a dodgeball tournament at Campsmount, what a pleasure the children were! They had such an amazing time and it was great to see the children being competitive.

Reading in Crew MI

Today in reading we played a quick game where we matched different words to their definition. Children worked well in partners to do this. We also thought about the word class of each word. From here we introduced our new vocabulary for the day (conservation) and unpicked the word together. We then read our text focussing on fluency and expression. We used a read around the robin, an echo read, a chorus read and then we read with our partner. Our fluency is really improving. Children then helped me to unpick some questions on the board looking at different question types and how we go about answering each question. I was super impressed with the amount of information children had remembered. Children are now ready to answer comprehension questions independently tomorrow.

LKS2 independent writing planning (7.3.22)📝

Today, LKS2 started planning their independent writing plot points, based on the book The Polar Bear Explorers Club. Today, we drew what we thought would happen in the plot point and then we acted it out. After completing that, we then looked through the different lenses to be able to jot down vocabulary ready to use in our independent writing. We can’t wait to write and read them!

Crew MI designers!

Crew MI started case study three today in their expedition learning. Today we thought more about our final product and how we want this to look. We started our first draft designing our photo frame. We thought about the measurements needed and angles of each corner. We also thought about decorations we may add to our designs. Towards the end of the lesson we all took part in a gallery walk where we had a look at everyone else’s work. We thought about if the designs were fit for purpose and if measurements would work. We offered some critique around praises, notices and wonders. We will be building on this tomorrow.

BBK – Animals in danger

This morning we’re researching animals that are in danger to build our background knowledge. We are focusing on fluency skills to really ensure we understand what we are reading. I praise how some children are rereading our text to double check we are understanding what we are reading.

Now we understand a little more about animals in danger, we are creating our own BBK poster.

Evolution – how have birds changed over time?

During Science, the crew had an opportunity to explore the evolution of birds beak to further understand why plants and animals have to evolve so they can survive. The children wrote a hypothesis about which beak they thought would be better before experimenting with different beak types. They really enjoyed this and most children were able to articulate why birds beaks have had to evolve over time.