We’ve had such a fantastic Spring term, bursting with curiosity, mystery and creativity. Below is just a little glimpse of the brilliant work we’ve been doing.

Alma

Alma is a mesmerising story about a little girl who is curious and innocent, with a touch of mischievousness. She comes across a menacing shop window and, on closer inspection, notices a doll that looks identical to her. Determined to have the doll for herself, she enters the shop — where her future changes forever.

We have used this story as inspiration to write our own ‘Alma’ narratives, filled with suspense and mystery. We then shared our stories with Sycamore Class, who were an excellent audience. To build anticipation, we created missing posters for Alma and displayed them around the school before our readings.

For a fabulous finish, we designed and made our own miniature peg dolls in DT, which we then hid around the school for Sycamore Class to find. The children have absolutely loved our learning journey based around Alma.

Reading our stories:

Designing and making our dolls:

Science

Throughout our Science unit on Evolution, we have focused on three key themes: adaptation, inheritance and natural selection. We have explored Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution and carried out an experiment inspired by his investigation into the different types of finches found on the Galápagos Islands.

History

In History, we have learnt about the life of Queen Victoria, including her childhood, how she became heir to the throne, and her journey as Queen of England. We then moved on to the Industrial Revolution and explored how it transformed Britain. The Victorian era was a key period for new inventions, so we worked in groups to sort a list of 30 different inventions. First, we organised them into pre‑Victorian, Victorian and post‑Victorian categories, and then we ordered each group chronologically. Following this, in groups the children researched what life was like for children during the Victorian period. They created posters and PowerPoints presented that they shared with the class. 

Maths

Our Maths learning has been largely focused on number and place value. The children have learnt the value of digits in 8‑digit numbers, and we have ordered and compared these numbers using number lines to support our understanding of rounding to any power of 10. We also completed our unit on calculating the area and perimeter of triangles and parallelograms, applying these skills to solve problems. After this, we moved on to reading and plotting coordinates in all four quadrants, as well as translating and reflecting shapes across the x‑ and y‑axes. We rocked Number Day, celebrating by dressing up and playing math games.

Forest Schools

Our leadership, teamwork, exploration and risk‑taking skills continue to grow and strengthen during our Forest School sessions.

 

Art 

Our Art learning this term has been inspired by the famous Victorian designer William Morris. We have explored his techniques and distinctive style, focusing particularly on printing. This linked perfectly with our recent Arts Week, when we were lucky enough to work with a local artist to create our own printing blocks and designs.