The Chronicle

This week in art the children have started creating silhouettes of images linked to the First World War in a thematic link to Junior 6’s focus from the end of last term. They began by cutting out their soldiers, landscapes, or other silhouettes, from black card. Once they are completed, they will start layering crepe paper with PVA glue to build up the coloured background. The finished pieces of artwork will resemble a stained-glass window that will catch the light beautifully, and act as a reminder to all the astounding things we learned about the Great War last term. Junior 6 have worked so hard this week and we can’t wait to see the finished product!

This week in Science, Junior 5 have started their new topic: Amazing Changes. They have been curious whilst exploring which materials are reversible and irreversible, asking questions and discussing new ideas. This week they conducted a balloon experiment, using vinegar and bicarbonate of soda to see how far a balloon would inflate and whether adding more bicarbonate of soda would increase how far the balloon would inflate. The children were enthusiastic when watching the balloons inflate and to discover the answer to the investigation; that adding more bicarbonate of soda didn’t make a distinguishable difference but that when a larger amount of vinegar was added the inflation of the balloon increased.

This week Junior 4 have practised their touch-typing skills, getting ready for their much-awaited competition against Crescent School. They’ve been perfecting their Qwertyuiops and strengthening their finger speed, in preparation for typing as many words as possible in a small amount of time! As a warmup for this computer-based competition, the two schools have also met on the rugby pitch and netball court. It was lovely to see everyone competing with such a wonderful attitude and great sportsmanship. Keep up the great work, Junior 4!

This week Junior 3H have been investigating forces, in particular Push and Pull. The classroom was turned into a Tug of War contest as the pupils tried to pull their way to success. This topic has been a super way of learning about all sorts of Forces, including magnetic materials and the way in which North and South poles behave. In other areas, we have considered our favourite ‘bar modelling’ to assist with division – our bar models now beautifully drawn, with each ‘box’, ‘group’ or ‘shared between’ being represented with increasing precision. The class is never so quiet as when 20 children are focused and concentrating on accurate maths skills.

In a more noisy moment…..we have also been thinking about the dialogue between our two Egyptian characters, Amasis the Pharaoh and Rhodopis, our Egyptian Cinderella. All the children had great fun thinking about what the characters might say to each other. Hilarity ensued and the sound of happy laughter rang through the upstairs corridors! Bravo Junior 3H.

In Junior 2 this week we continued to study China; the children were creative and had lots of fun creating The Great Wall of China using Lego. We looked at Cherry Blossom trees in Art, and the children created beautiful paintings. In Maths, we investigated money and how many ways we can make amounts. We finished the week learning about Chinese New Year and making some vegetable spring rolls.

The weather this week seems to match our Science topic – Polar Places! This week we looked at where the Arctic is and how it is different to the Antarctic. We discovered there are no penguins in the north, but there are polar bears, arctic foxes, arctic rabbits and many more! We learnt lots of new facts about these animals, including that polar bears can smell food from over a mile away and that their fur isn’t white, it’s see-through - fascinating! We continued to develop our knowledge of the countries of the UK by learning the four capital cities that belong to England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. In History we finished our Viking longboats, as an example of a very early mode of transport that helped the Vikings to invade other countries and trade goods.

This week in Reception we have been finding out about Chinese New Year! We read the traditional story of how the animal zodiac years were created and loved finding out what year they were born in and if they showed the personality traits. We also used the Virtual Reality headsets to explore around China during the lantern festivals and wandered through a bamboo forest.

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