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This week we’ve started building some background knowledge about World War 2. We also put the main events into a timeline which took some great team work. Children had to consider days and months due to quite a few events happening in the same year. When we’d completed this, we used the timeline to help us create a knowledge organiser that highlights the key events and people.
One of our crew challenges this week was the human knot. Children had to work together to untangle themselves. It was good hearing some children taking a lead and helping to instruct their peers.
This week, we started looking at our new reading test linked to our expedition ‘The Lion and the Unicorn’.
We started off by discussing the front cover and what we could notice while ensuring we know the purpose, audience and genre of our text. We did this using a silent conversation where we had some questions to answer. However, before we started we ensured that we understood the expectations when moving around the room to keep each other safe.
In maths, we had the opportunity to play some boardgames which allowed us to practice some of our mental maths and timetables. In addition to this, we could practice sharing and turn taking which are important skills to develop.
We’ve had a lovely week back in school and we kicked the week off by spending time focusing on crew and building positive relationships. This will allow us to have a successful year.
Our guiding questions was ‘What does crew mean to me?’ and we’ve spent lots of time talking about the importance of crew. When we shared our thoughts today some of the things children said crew is a big family, happiness, supporting each other and holding each other to account.
On Wednesday we were lucky enough to take part in an escape box challenge. This required us to really put our heads together and use each other’s strengths to help us work out all the clues. The clues were maths linked and had problems solving elements. Even I had to get the odd clue to figure out the next step.
This week, our Crew Guiding Question was: How can crew be strengthened through acts of service?
We discussed what it meant to be part of a crew and how we could make this stronger by doing an act of service for others – something that would make them smile! 🙂 Following this, we decided that we were going to bake a tasty treat and create positive postcards to hand out to people around school that have done something kind that we are thankful for. This included the ladies in the office who work tirelessly to keep the school running, the ladies in the kitchen who prepare all our meals and some of the teachers who we feel helped us on a personal level.
We certainly felt like a solidified, happy crew once we had finished!
Today, Crew Hamill proved what fabulous artists they are by fully engaging themselves in a painting of either the Sun or the Moon. After researching the artist Andy Warhol, we used our inspiration to create images of the Sun or Moon in outer space. We used a variety of skills and tools in order to produce these including the use of varying brush strokes, dabbing of a sponge and flicking of a toothbrush to create different elements of our image.
To kick start our expedition, Upper Key Stage 2 were whisked off to the Milky Way within the amazing Wonderdome. We were able to fully immerse ourselves into our solar system, exploring each of the planets and learning in-depth information about the Sun, Earth and Moon. Matt, our space expert, was extremely knowledgable about all things space – past, present and future. We were able to discover that Earth is the only planet that humans can live on as it is in the habitable zone (also known as the Goldilocks zone) where the conditions – temperature, water and oxygen – are just right! We were also taught about the first astronauts to travel into space and land on the moon. Did you know there were THREE astronauts? Interestingly, it wasn’t just Neil Armstrong (the first man to step on the Moon) but it was also Buzz Aldrin, who walked on the Moon’s surface alongside Neil, and Michael Collins, who stayed in the space craft to keep it safe. We were excited to find out that there will be another attempt to travel to the Moon next year, with 4 new astronauts set to orbit the moon!
This week was all about getting to know our new Crew members and staff.
Learning new routines together and exploring our new setting.
Revisiting shapes in maths and having fun outside.
We have enjoyed reading the story of Monty the Manatee during our first few days back at school. The book is about a Manatee who is about to start school but the other children are very unkind to him. We have thought lots about what kindness looks like in our crew and how if we help each other we can achieve more.
We have also used the book in our reading and writing lessons. The children worked hard yesterday to order the story and match sentences to the pictures.
The children have also been working hard on some artwork which I can’t wait to share soon!
