Year 6 have been very engaged with their Literacy work this week. We have been exploring the visual text 'The Piano' and as part of our learning, we have been creating dialogue between characters. We found this quite tricky at first and had to use our acting skills to help us imagine what a character may be doing whilst speaking, Our top tips for writing dialogue are:

- inverted commas around what has been said

- punctuation before closing speech

- description and action

- dialogue should build tension and/ or move the story on in someway.

Our next step is to apply all our new grammar learning when writing our own flashback narratives!

Thursday 11th November

Year 6 were given the task to create a life size human body including internal organs that were drawn to scale and placed in the  correct position.

We discovered organs that we had never heard of and their function in keeping us well and healthy! We then used our new learning to accurately label and identify what is happening inside our bodies. Ask us about our organs: we are quite the experts now!

Thursday 14th October

Bikeability (written by Lois)

This week, Year 6 have been learning how to safely cycle on the road through the programme Bikability. Our instructors David, Mervyn and Nick started the week by asking us all to cycle on the MUGA to check that we were able to cycle before they took us on the road.

In each session, we have learnt how to do the following: stop u-turns, hand signalling, stopping safely and checking behind you for hazards, to make sure no cars are coming when cycling around corners.

Here are some quotes from the children:

‘Really fun and epic! I just can’t wait for it to start when I get to school.’ Jacques and Rory

‘David makes the learning really fun for us’ Soren

‘You learn so much in just a week. I feel really ready for cycling to secondary school.’ Lois

On Monday, Year 6 visited St Albans Fire Station to take part in Crucial Crew, which is an event run by the local Emergency Services. The children took part brilliantly in a range of activities which presented them with scenarios, hazards and challenges they may face in the wider world.

Sessions included: 

- fire safety in the home

- water safety

- drugs and alcohol education

- mental health and wellbeing

The activities were very thought provoking and all of the adults leading the sessions were very impressed by Year 6's participation and questioning. 

On Wednesday, the children had the opportunity to put their bike reading skills to the test, ahead of Bikeability, which begins a week on Monday. All of the children showed great resilience, enthusiasm and determination.  

Please remember that it is our first swimming session tomorrow afternoon!

What a busy and successful week Year 6 have had! Mrs Ferrari and Mrs Edwards have been so impressed by the effort and enthusiasm shown in all of the lessons by the children.

Our whole class reading text 'Boy in the Tower' is leaving us with many questions at the moment and a sense of unease that something very dramatic is about to happen. We have all kinds of theories about what could happen and about the potential involvement of a deadly plant in the destruction of the city. We cannot wait to read the next chapter each afternoon.

In Art we have begun to explore the work of Gustav Klimt (an Austrian symbolist painter) and we are beginning to experiment with patterns, textures and shapes ahead of creating our own impression of his work. 

Next week we are going to be writing our own stories of hope based on the book 'Wisp'. Our audience for our writing are Year 3 and we cannot wait to share our completed stories with them. 

Year 6 have had a very busy start to the term!

We have started our new book in English that is called ‘Boy in the Tower’. So far it has proven to be a fascinating read because the author keeps giving us hints to suggest that something is about to go wrong. We are currently trying to work out who the mysterious Bluchers are and what they have been doing in the city. Ask us all about it: we are really enjoying the story and love to share our thoughts.

We are also really enjoying our new Literacy topic, which is based around a book called ‘Wisp – a Story of Hope’. It is about a little boy called Idris who has grown up in a refugee camp. Next week we are going to use Idris’ story to inspire us to write a tale of hope of our own.

Zones of Regulation have been a huge focus for us this week and we have had some very interesting and mature discussions where we have reflected on our own behaviour, the behaviour of others and how it can affect us.