Weekly Class Updates
THE FINAL WEEK!
Friday 16th July 2021
This week, we have been writing about our experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic. Below are some extracts taken from our writing:
"At first I didn't think anything of it because, well, it was all the way in China (I'm half Chinese). Through February, there were more reports and the virus began to spread and enter the UK."
---Ishbel
"In March 2020, all schools closed because of a virus called corona virus (COVID-19). We all had to work from home and some people were in care provision."
---Isla
"For me it has not been the hardest but for the older generations it has been a struggle and some even sadly passed on. Many of my classmates thought of it as a holiday and some thought of it as a lockdown. The main priority was toilet paper in most of the shops around the UK was sold out in a matter of minutes."
---Liam
"Instead of high fiving, you had to elbow bump and even were masks if you were going somewhere, like a shop. After that, things started to calm down. School reopened and everything started to go back to normal so I feel a lot safer than in 2020. In 2020 I was really careful and scared of the virus. I do feel a lot safer than 2020 but I am still careful to this day."
---Rylan
"Lockdown has been hard, boring, but also a bit fun. I was scared, but after lockdown I was happy that I could go out again. I was also very happy that I could see all my friends from school."
---Kian
"Now it might be almost over but we need to take the last stride and then we are free. I am so excited to go places again."
---George D
Friday 18th June 2021
Willow weaving
Friday 11th June 2021
What an eventful first week back! Willow have been right back into the flow of things, working hard as ever in maths on fractions and decimals. We have also began working on our Talk for Writing fiction text, based on a losing/finding structure. We are looking forward to developing out ideas further in the coming weeks.
Most excitingly, we were fortunate to take part in a forest school on Tuesday afternoon. This involved lots of fun things, exploring the nature and British wildlife around out school. We took part in an orienteering challange around the school field and playground in which a map was followed to find letters, which could then be unscrambled to spell out the names of some native British animals. We then took part in building a rope bridge and rope swing, and making dream-catchers and magic wands from twigs and other accessories. Lots of fun in the sun!
Friday 28th May 2021
And so we've made it to the end of another half term! Does that mean we take it easy? Not in Willow! It's been full steam ahead in maths with our work on fractions continuing. This week we have worked on adding, subtracting, multiplying and dividing fractions. This has required a lot of thinking and figuring out what each operation requires. We have also blasted through our Talk for Writing work and have finished up out final write of our discussion texts. YouTube vs. Netflix, dressage vs. showjumping, and masks vs. no masks in primary schools are just some of the discussions that have been written. What discussion skills can you use over half term to help you reach decisions?
In history, we were able to create our final Viking board games using our plans from last week. We had some very creative designs and great incorporations of Viking history into the gameplay. Take a look at some photos below.
Willow have also been climbing Mount Everest throughout May, having to reach over 58000 steps to raise money for their end of year party, organised by parents. This only included steps going upwards so it has been no easy feat! However, we can confirm that Willow have done it! Well done Willow! We're sure this will make your party even more amazing! Have a look at some of the class putting in some work during break time to rack up those steps for the final push towards the summit.
Friday 21st May 2021
During this very wet week in Willow, we have been focusing on fractions in maths! We have been comparing and ordering fractions by comparing their denominators and their numerators. This involves lots of times table knowledge and our previous learning of common factors and common multiples in order to convert fractions. It also involved lots of talk about pizza slices so don't be surprised if all of us in Willow are craving pizza this weekend!
Talk for writing has seen the start of our new model text: Does The Land of Folio Really Exist? This is a discussion text and we have already started to generate our own discussion text ideas. We have discussed a few of these as a class, with people sharing their differing viewpoints and coming up with reasons for and against. We have finished off the week by writing the first drafts of our opening paragraphs, and will be leading up to our final write at the end of next week.
In RE, we got our creative juices flowing by writing songs about Jesus and the type of king he is. Take a look at some of these below!
Friday 14th May 2021
Well done to Willow for tackling some complicated topics in maths this week! We started off with finding common factors and common multiples, including the highest common factor and lowest common multiple. We then moved on to identifying prime numbers and their properties, using part whole models to find prime factors. Next, we looked at square and cube numbers, finishing off with order of operations to help us solve calculations with multiple steps. Phew! What a week!
In Talk for Writing, we managed to complete our final versions of our portal stories. Some of the portals the class thought up were ones which did the following:
- turned you into a pigeon
- took you to a beach island
- took you into the game 'Minecraft'
- took you to a land of cats
- took you to a chocolate factory
- took you forward or back in time
- took you to the underworld
We think we have some future authors in our midst with these very creative tales!
During history, we compared the legal systems of modern day Britain, Anglo-Saxon Britain and Viking Britain. There were some very interesting and sometimes gruesome punishments! What do you think of a duel to settle a dispute? Or being outlawed from your community for committing certain crimes?
RE involved us looking into the kind of king Jesus was. Laila wrote:
"A good king is someone who believes in his people. Jesus was a kind, giving man that never gave up. He gave hope and was ready to be crucified for the freedom of his people."
Great work Willow!
Friday 7th May 2021
This week we have introduced Kipp Time in English and maths. This gives us an extra slot in the day to refresh our memories on key facts. In English Kipp Time, we started by looking into semi-colons, making an information page in our books to help us understand their purpose and when to use them (see images below). Maths Kipp Time was kicked off with some work on multiples, including common multiples and the highest common multiple. Again, fact pages were created with examples to help us remember the key information.
In maths, we delved into long division again to see what we could recall. Although it was pretty complicated, Willow did really well and managed to divide some huge numbers using this method!
Our Talk for Writing wall is becoming more and more packed with examples of work and words we've "magpied" as we work our way up to our independent write. See below for the whole class write hung on our washing line!
Friday 30th April 2021
Willow have been working hard on a variety of key maths information this week. This includes finding the mean of a group of numbers, understanding negative numbers, and even rounding to the 100,000!
In Talk for Writing, we have developed our original ideas by looking more closely at the model test "Elf Road". We have learned different writing techniques, such as alliteration, and used the knowledge to edit and redraft the original Elf Road story. Following this, we were able to brainstorm more ideas for our own innovation of a portal tale, coming up with lots of interesting ideas that we will eventually incorporate into our final write up.
In History, we have enjoyed learning more about the Vikings. We constructed timelines in our books with key dates of the Viking era, including the arrival of Vikings in England and the crowning of certain kings. We look forward to adventuring even deeper into the land of the Vikings as the half term progresses!
Friday 23rd April 2021
Welcome back again Willow! This week kicked off with an exciting day of history dress-up. It was great to see everybody in their costumes and to hear all of the interesting facts that came with them! Us teachers certainly learned a lot! This half-term Year 6 will be focusing on the Vikings, as well as reading the novel "Viking Boy" as a class. We have already discovered a lot about the Vikings and can't wait to see what else will be in store as we journey through the rest of of the half-term.
We have also began our new Talk for Writing focus of portal stories. We have had a lot of creative and exciting ideas for portals and what magical lands they may take us to during our cold writes. How we develop and build upon these ideas will be interesting to see over the coming weeks!
In maths, we have learned about circles, including radius, diameter and circumference. We have built open these circle facts and combined them with our knowledge of fractions and percentages to analyse data presented in pie charts. Year 6 has worked very hard after the well-earned two week rest and it is showing in their work.
Well done Willow!
Friday 26th March 2021
Following on from our visit last term, Year 6 were lucky enough to be invited to a live video chat with the Anne Frank Trust. The guest speaker, Eva Schloss, is the step-daughter or Otto Frank (Anne Frank's father). Eva retold her experiences of the Holocaust and the treatment she and her family received during the Nazis' persecution of Jews in WWII. It was extraodinary to hear Eva's experiences of going into hiding for years, being separated from her family, and her time spent at Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp.
It was extremely thought provoking to listen to Eva's opinions of discrimination and persecution today, and the messages of what we can do to change that. Eva also mentioned the importance of fighting for what you believe in, fighting for good and the importance of protests in freedom of speech. Year 6 made notes during the talk, and the discussion which followed with the class was very interesting.
Read more in this week's news letter.
Friday 19th March 2021
This week year 6 have been exploring angles even further by looking at calculating missing angles in various polygons. This has required focus and perseverance, calculating missing interior and exterior angles from triangles up to decagons!
We have also continued working on our Talk for Writing by delving into details in different types of machines we could invent, such as the parent, brother, or sister pleaser machine. Have a look at the image below to see some of the ideas we came up with for our machines. Would you agree with these aspects of the pleaser machines? Would you add something extra that would please your parent, brother or sister?
In science, we have started looking into genetics and adaptation. We created colourful tables to match the animal with their habitat, alongside an explanation of their features and why it has been beneficial to adapt those features in the environment they live in. We also had good fun imagining animals living in different habitats and why they would not be suitably adapted to these environments, such as a dolphin living in a desert or a camel living in a coral reef!
Friday 12th March 2021
Welcome back Willow! There has been a real buzz around school this week, and the energy in Year 6 has been electric! It has been a very positive week since returning on Monday, with the class very much settled into our new routine. The children have found a flow with our procedures old and new, both inside and outside of class. It feels safe, clean and we are all delighted to be back in each other’s company.
We have continued with our school curriculum at an admirable pace, and are having regular PSHCE lessons to help rebuild and strengthen important aspects of children’s personal and social development. In Maths, we have had fun learning about angles and using protractors to measure and draw angles. We are also working hard in Talk for Writing, learning our model text "The Teacher Pleaser Machine" and beginning to identify aspects which can be used to help us write our own individual explanation texts.
We are all really looking forward to the rest of the year after a tumultuous start. Hopefully it will be smoother sailing from here on out!
Friday 11th December 2020
Even with it being the penultimate week before the Christmas holidays, Willow have been working harder than ever! In maths, we have been learning how to convert fractions into decimals so that we can order and compare them. This meant we had to build on our previous knowledge of common factors and common multiples, as well as long and short division! It's a good job we've been practising our timestables! Phew!
In Talk for Writing, we have been analysing a discussion text, which we debated in class. We have then started to come up with our own discussion texts, creating a toolkit to write our own discussion and planning out paragraphs. We will be working on this more next week!
Friday 4th December 2020
With the beginning of advent came the beginning of the festive activities in Willow! The children created paper snowflakes to decorate the windows and were able to take part in a virtual messy church via YouTube live. We created Christingles for the live streamed Christingle service, as well as angels made from books! Very messy and very fun!
A Christmas goody-bag will be sent home on the last day of term containing the angel and other seasonal crafts.
We have also been learning about the decimal number system in maths, as well as other types of number systems used around the world. Can you remember what some of these are?
Friday 20th November 2020
This week we had a visit from The Anne Frank Trust. We learned about Anne Frank's family and their time spent in the annex during World War II. We also learned about discrimination, prejudice and stereotypes, not just for Jews in the war but in today's society too. We discussed gender stereotypes and challenged our own opinions about what men and women should or shouldn't do.
Leading on from this, members of our class created and delivered a PowerPoint for collective worship to the whole school! You can see images of the slides below. We also created this week's school newsletter so make sure to take a look for more information on this topic.
Friday 13th November 2020
Welcome back Year 6!
It was great to have Year 6 back in school on a week which marked Remembrance Day. We spent time in class researching the fallen soldiers of Barwick, creating posters on each soldier and their life. These have been attached to lamp posts around the village so why not take a walk to learn about some of our village heroes!
On Wednesday 11/11, we took a walk up to the Barwick war memorial to lay our crosses and poppies at the eleventh hour, paying our respects with a 2 minute silence alongside the rest of the country.
Lest we forget.
Friday 6th November 2020
Remote Learning Update
Well done to Year 6 for getting so involved in remote learning this week, despite your absence from school. It has been a pleasure engaging with you all on Teams, and I have no doubt that organising your days at home around remote learning will stand you in good stead for high school.
Check out some screenshots from our Class Zone on Teams below!
Remote Learning Communication on Teams
Friday 16th October 2020
What a week of persuasion!
I think we have a class full of future politicians, activists and master advertisers on our hands! We have continued the innovation stage of our Talk for Writing journey, with a focus on being persuasive by giving reasons, explanations and evidence.
Check out our maps below:
Friday 9th October 2020
This week in Year 6, we rounded up the first leg of our Talk for Writing journey by spending time learning how to effectively edit and redraft our final pieces. We chose sections of our 'hot write' to edit and improve, focusing on elements we might add, remove, move or substitute. We then learned some important elements of UKS2 grammar and spent time applying these into our writing.
On Tuesday, we visited All Saints Church as part of the virtual Harvest Service. The children were keen to share some of their prayers on the website. You can find these below:
Dear Father God,
Thank you for this festival, when we can celebrate the harvest and feed the mouths of the hungry. Thank you for our nutritional, healthy crops and for the opportunities we have to share meals with our loved ones. Thank you for taking care of the ill in these difficult times and for making our world a tiny bit safer every day.
Amen
~Lyra
Dear Lord,
We thank you for all of the fruit and vegetables.
Help us to remember that someone is always less fortunate than us.
Bless those who grow all our food.
Amen
~ Samantha
Dear Lord,
We thank you for our lives as they raise us.
We thank you for our sins as they humble us.
Thank you for the harvest and the food we eat.
Amen
~Mia
Friday 2nd October 2020
What a week! Year 6 have been making great strides this week, as we have continued our Talk for Writing journey, exploring the writing of dilemmas, resolutions and endings in our work on Mystery Stories. We have seen lots of excellent work in the independent writing the class completed on Friday.
In maths, we have revisited the children’s knowledge of written division, moving on from short division into long division. The enthusiasm shown to learning a tricky new skill has been a joy to behold! We’ll be developing the children’s knowledge of long division next week, and are already looking forward seeing how the class gets on!
Friday 25th September 2020
This week, Year 6 have absolutely blown us away with their work ethic and enthusiasm to learn. We have continued our Talk for Writing journey into the 'boxing up' phase, editing and planning our mystery stories in great depth.
In maths, we have explored three of the four operations: addition, subtraction and multiplication. The reasoning and problem solving skills demonstrated in the classroom have been absolutely out of this world! Onto next week, when we begin to unpick short division and, of course, the dreaded long division!
Friday 18th September 2020
This week, we continued onto the next stage of our Talk for Writing adventures, beginning to retell the story 'Alien Landing' by Pie Corbett. As part of the imitation phase, we focused on performing the story as a reader, with the inclusion of some actions to help us memorise and dramatise the text. The next phase of our learning will involve retelling the story in the form of a story map. Keep an eye on this page to see our incredible story maps next week!
Talk For Writing: Imitation
