Week ending Friday 15th November

What a fantastic week of learning we have had this week! The children have been immersed in our learning particularly our Geography unit - Ethiopia. The children have come up with many brilliant questions that they would like to find out about Ethiopia and therefore we will try to cover as many of them throughout the term! 

In English this week, we have continued with our story of 'A Story Like the Wind' - the children have been extremely engaged with the text and have written some amazing setting descriptions using powerful verbs that bring the setting to life. Here is an incredible example of how the use of high quality vocabulary and sentence structure builds an image for the reader. 

Year 6 have begun their Forest School learning - this week 6S had a fantastic time and even created a band! The laughter and smiles from Forest school this week were contagious! Take a look at some of the pictures and videos of the fun the children had this week. 

 

Week ending Friday 8th November

The children returned to a busy week after a relaxing half term. From leading the school in a church service to sewing poppies, we've been extremely busy.

In Maths, we have continued our extended fractions topic, looking at mixed numbers and effective ways to add mixed numbers and recapping how to convert them into improper fractions. Next week, we will be subtracting mixed numbers and remembering how to multiply fractions by an integer.

In English, the children began the week by building plausible predictions about our new text. They were very excited to discover different items which gave them clues about the story line, making links to other texts that they have read. Once we read the first few pages, we were introduced to a storm that was picking up, whilst a small boat was out at sea. This led us to write some poems to describe a storm, in which we challenged the children to use some figurative language to create the most effective visualisations. The children blew us away with the poems that they created, using some fantastic metaphors and onomatopoeia to describe a storm.

In DT, the children have been refreshing and developing their sewing skills. They started by sewing poppies to add to our commemoratory cross, using a combination of running stitch, cross stitch and some children attempting an over stitch. They then began designing a stocking for their DT project this term. 

Week ending Friday 25th October

We had a fantastic end to term, a highlight being our trip to Temper Temper to complete our learning about the Ancient Maya. The children wowed the owners with their expansive knowledge of the Maya civilisation and were disgusted when they found out how much sugar was in one small piece of white chocolate. They made some impressive Maya masks out of chocolate and sweets, as well as some tasty truffles.

Week ending Friday 18th October

Year 6 have had a fantastic week - the children have been working incredibly hard with all their learning this week. 

In English this week, the children have written some fantastic balanced arguments about whether gorillas should be kept in captivity. They have used brilliant debate language, fronted adverbials and parenthesis to make it a cohesive and effective piece of writing. Take a read of some of our great pieces of work. 

In Maths this week, we have had a very exciting week! We have begun some new Year 6 learning - BODMAS. The children were able to explain that BODMAS is the order to complete operations when they have more than one in a number sentence. The children had a very exciting maths lesson on Tuesday where they took part in a BODMAS treasure hunt around the school. It was lovely to see how engaged all the children were and were able to use their knowledge of BODMAS to complete the hunt. They had to unscramble the letters and found out the secret word....mathematical! 

It is evident from our learning over the week that we have some passionate advocates for climate change, in our year group! We have all written a letter to Tom Tugendhat to explain what we know about climate change and what they can do as a local community to help support this. 

Week ending Friday 11th October

This week in Year 6, the children have been extremely busy and have got stuck into all aspects of their learning.

In English, the children have continued to develop their facts about gorillas in preparation for writing their debate and by the end of the week, they had written their opening paragraph. They have had to consider their use of formal language and cohesive devices when writing extended sentences. Despite finding it challenging to begin with, the children showed great perseverance and are now looking forward to completing their debate next week.

In Maths, the children have tackled different methods of long division, testing their number facts when writing down multiples of large 2-digit numbers (they particularly enjoyed testing and competing with Miss Clare and Miss Scott's speed at doing this). Next week, they will explore a new concept of solving calculations in the correct order (using BODMAS).

Our Art projects have begun to take shape this week, where the children have been combining their Geography learning and art skills used by the artist Jill Pelto to create their piece about Climate Change. The children showed great determinatio and concentration at drawing for an extended period of time to develop their ideas. We are really excited to see their finished pieces in a few weeks time.

Week ending Friday 4th October

It has been a fantastic week in Year 6. There have been many exciting learning opportunities throughout the week, from Science to PE to English.

On Wednesday, the children had the privilege of being invited to attend a sports event at Tonbridge School, which was led by their students and staff. The children took part in a variety of sports, including hockey, cricket and athletics. The children particularly enjoyed hockey, leading them to request our School Council to look into starting a school hockey team. Year 6 represented Bishop Chavasse brilliantly and many of the staff commented on their positive behaviour and attitude towards new activities and skills.

In English, we have continued reading King Kong and begun to learn about how to write a balanced argument. We are extremely enthusiastic towards our debate topic: Should gorillas be held in captivity? The children finished the week by having a whole class debate, in which they presented their opinions and arguments, using the language that you would find within a written balanced argument. 

In Science, the children have been using plant taxonomy to group different plants. They have looked at monocots, dicots, conifers, ginkgos, ferns and moss. They were very excited to be introduced to a stick insect, continuing their learning about animal classification.

Week ending Friday 27th September

The children have been fully immersed into their English this week, planning and then writing their own dilemma narrative, using the skills that they have learnt from our text King Kong and some other example texts that we have explored. They are now experts at including relative clauses and fronted adverbials in their writing. Our focus within this piece of extended writing has been to show how a character is feeling or acting through powerful verbs (show not tell). Miss Scott and Miss Clare are extremely proud of the writing that they have produced. Next week, we will be beginning to look at balanced arguments.

 

In Maths, the children have been recapping and extending their learning on factors and multiples. They have also explored rules of divisibility - how many can they remember at home? Next week, we will be exploring multiplication and division methods, ensuring we have self-checking strategies. 

The children are thoroughly enjoying our History topic: The Ancient Maya and this week learnt about where the civilisation was and when Lord Shield Jaguar ruled. They became very confident at identifying on different maps where the civilisation was, using geographical language to describe it, as well as learning about the language that they spoke.

In RE, the children were extremely resilient when delving into the debate about Science and Religion. We explored scientific theories about creation and discussed whether they complimented or contrasted that of Genesis 1. 

Week ending Friday 20th September 2024

We had a busy start to this week, getting stuck into our Music and PE lessons. In Music, we started to learn our Harvest song (Lord of the Harvest) and continued to develop our knowledge of notation and rhythm. We thoroughly enjoyed getting to use the keyboards, identifying ways to recognise different notes and using them to compose some simple melodic bars.

For our PE sessions this term, we are very lucky to have a cricket coach to teach us different skills for the sport. This week, we learnt how to do an over-arm bowl and next week, will put this into a game situation.

In Maths, we have started exploring the 4 operations, starting with addition this week, and will be furthering our subtraction skills and revisiting factors and multiples next week.  

In English, we're really enjoying our text "King Kong" and have been exploring ways to effectively plan our own dilemmas, using the skills that Anthony Brown uses in his novel. Our grammar focus throughout the week has been relative clauses and modal verbs.  

Week ending Friday 6th September 2024

It has been lovely to welcome the children back to school, this week. Our new Year 6 cohort have settled in well and have shown us they are ready for a positive year ahead. 

This week we have focused on expectations in and out of the classroom and what their year ahead will look like. With both Miss Clare and Miss Scott, the children have created a class charter, a set of classroom expectations, to follow and they have signed this as an agreement that they will follow these rules to have a happy, positive final year at primary school. 

In RE this week, we have written class prayers and created a poster relating to our year groups fruit of the spirit: gentleness and self-control. 

In English, we have started to introduce them to our new text 'King Kong' by Anthony Browne. The children have predicted what the text will be about and have written a simile poem based on a picture of the gorilla in the book. 

We are looking forward to meeting all the parents at meet the teacher presentation evening on Thursday 12th September where we will discuss all things year 6 including homework, swimming and PE sessions.