In our new Design and Technology unit the children have been looking at creating a variety of pulley systems. They were introduced to fixed pulleys and tried to use the equipment to build a crate which could be moved by a fixed pulley (such as an elevator).
Category : Year 5/6
What a fantastic day we had in Year 6 at Sledmere house for our geography school trip! The sun was shining and it was a perfect setting to learn all about farming, food produce, plants, trees, and nature. A real highlight of the day was the ‘Deer Safari’ which allowed us to travel on a tractor wagon and get up close with hundreds of deer – some which were tiny babies and had only been born minutes before! We fed them and enjoyed watching them come up to the trailer to say hello.
We also saw a sheep being sheared, a first for many of our pupils – and learnt about how wool is such a versatile product that can be made into many various items and clothing.
All children also planted a broad bean in a hand-made plant pot to take home!
During our migration topic this term, Year 6 have been learning about how different groups of people have migrated to Britain for various reasons. The United Kingdom is so diverse and inclusive, made up of millions of people from all different backgrounds and beliefs. This week, we have been learning about citizens from the Caribbean who were encouraged to migrate and come work in Britain to help rebuild our country after WW2.
We took part in an online Zoom session with Floella Benjamin who spoke about her experiences as a migrant to Britain travelling from Trinidad and how sadly, back then, she faced lots of racism. It was a great opportunity to learn about the challenges migrants faced and how Britain has come a long way in treating everyone with the respect they deserve.
As Geographers, the Y5 students have been learning about how rivers are formed. They’ve explored UK rivers and world famous rivers but with us living in a city that is shaped by two rivers, The River Hull and The River Humber, we wanted to take our learning outside of the classroom to find out more.
We challenged our Y5 Geographers to identify how land is used beside the river at various points and how the function of the river changes as a result.
Our first stop was at the mouth of the RIver Hull!
We identified land use, talked about the changes in the area and the promotion of tourism. We created excellent sketch maps, working with our partner to label and identify significant human and physical features. We looked at flooding defence and the importance of the huge tidal barrier that can be seen near The Deep.
For the second part of the visit, we headed inland as we followed the course of the River Hull all the way to the outskirts of Driffield. Here we visited the Yorkshire Water Nature Reserve, Tophill Low. We learned about reservoirs, drains and fish gates here as well as rivers from our very knowledgable guide Richard. We asked fantastic questions as Richard helped us to complete our fieldwork tasks. This was such a contrasting setting to the urban mouth of the river, a tranquil rural beauty spot where tourism was also encouraged to help fund flood prevention in our area.
Richard told us that the enormous reservoirs at Tophill hold enough water to supply Hull for 90 days!
Being knee deep in the grasses, there was lots of talk about snakes! Richard showed us the skins of the snakes that live in the area but told us not to worry, as soon as they heard our footsteps (and voices) they would have scarpered and were not at all venomous!
Needless to say, after getting all of those ‘steps in’, we were shattered on the way back!
Over the last couple of weeks, Year 6 have been working collaboratively to run our very own bakery. We have applied lots of different areas of the maths curriculum we have mastered this year to this real-life project:
First we had to scale the recipes looking at ratio and proportion.
Then we had to calculate the costings for the ingredients and research which shops offered the best value by looking at unit conversions, comparisons, percentages and different deals.
Next, we looked at profit and loss and calculated how much money we would make and what we would need to sell the cupcakes for in order to not make a loss.
After that, we explored packaging and worked hard designing the nets for a single cupcake box and a double cupcake box. We had to draw accurately and use our knowledge of perimeter, area and volume.
We had to tackle some real-life baking problems, calculating cooking times and the mass. This required our knowledge of algebra, fractions and ratio.
We then got busy baking, following our recipes to create our delicious cupcakes.
We have made £198 profit in total across Year 6! Well done!
Year 6 have loved exploring Tinkercad and developing their 3D modelling skills in our computing lessons this week. The children have already grasped how to use the workplane grid for sizing references and how to modify their shapes colours. We have also practised using the duplicate tool and are now even able to hollow out shapes! Great practise ready for when we use our 3D printer in a few weeks time within our DT project.
-
- Exploring tinkercad
-
- Experimenting in adding 3D shapes
-
- Resizing and moving them
-
- Adding text
-
- Creating personlised name badges
-
- Playing with colour changing
On Friday, our school councillors and house captains had an exciting meeting with our local councillor – Councillor Henry. Our children had the opportunity to have their voices heard by the councillor about what they do within Christopher Pickering to support the school. Councillor Henry shared some useful tips about how we can work together with her to incorporate British Values (even more than we already do!) into our school.
After our meeting, our house captains took the pleasure of showing Councillor Henry around our school, gardens and playground. They took ownership and developed leadership with the help of our special visitor!
In our Rivers and Mountains topic, we have been learning all about where our water comes from and how to keep it healthy and clean. Today, the children created their own posters about river pollution! Here are some of the children’s amazing and creative posters!
In today’s lesson the children looked at different pilgrimages that occur throughout differing faiths. The children were able to compare the places and activities that occur and were able to explain how they were similar and different. Fatima was able to explain to the rest of the class about her pilgrimage to Mecca for the Islamic celebration Hajj. The children really enjoyed looking at similarities between Hajj and the Jewish pilgrimage to the Western Wall in Jerusalem.
In today’s PSHCE lesson, year 5 had a discussion about how to stay safe online and the positives and negatives of an online community. We played the ‘online safety’ game: Each child had three cards, one labelled ‘safe’, one ‘unsafe’ and one ‘I’m not sure’.
The teacher read out different statements and the children made decisions, using their cards to show the class their answer.
Some of the statements were both safe and unsafe depending on the context, so we used this opportunity to explain that being online can have good/bad/positive/negative consequences.
Easier statements:
- Sending a picture of yourself to your Mum/Dad/Gran
- Texting a happy emoji to your friend
- Sending someone an unkind message
- Snap chatting with someone you don’t know
- Watching a children’s TV programme online that a trusted adult has found for you
- Playing a puzzle game online and answering a message from somebody else playing who you don’t know
- Posting your phone number online so anybody can see it
- Joining in with something online that someone says is a secret
Harder statements:
- Playing a computer game with a 16-age limit
- Joining a social network about a favourite sport or hobby
- Sending a picture of yourself in your underwear
- Joking about someone’s appearance in a text
- Making your gaming username and personal details public
- Keeping an online ‘streak’ with a friend going for 200 days or more
- Posting a funny video of a cat playing the piano on Youtube
- Chatting live to an online gamer who has just joined in with your game
- Agreeing to have a private chat with someone online
Year 5 were able to share their thoughts and feelings on each statement; the lesson was extremely useful for the pupils to learn and adapt their knowledge of online safety.
