Autumn 2 

World War 2

Year 6 loved receiving their winter books in our final week. They immediately got stuck in and read the first chapter straight away!

To celebrate Christmas, Year 6 learned and performed some Christmas carols and songs for an audience of their parents and grandparents. They particularly enjoyed learning ‘Rocking around the Christmas tree’ and ‘Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer’ which they performed with Makaton.

Year 6 had been learning about the Charleston dance in PE and creating their own routine.

As part of their DT learning, Year 6 designed and assembled their own phone cases using felt. Many had never done any sewing before and did their best to learn 4 new stitches: running stitch, backstitch, whip stitch and blanket stitch. All the children really enjoyed this project!

Year 6 was visited by professional artist Darrell Wakelam to create some 3-dimensional artwork themed around their reading books of Skellig by David Almond and Clockwork by Philip Pullman. They loved the opportunity to work collaboratively on their artwork.

As part of their learning about the Second World War, Yew 6 looked at the artwork of Henry Moore. Henry Moore was a painter and sculptor who lived through both world wars. His experiences are reflected in his artwork, and the children tried to reflect this in their own artwork. They used pastels, charcoal, chalk and wax crayons to create artwork with a range of perspectives and compositions.

In PE this half term, Year 6 have been learning how to play Tag Rugby. They have worked on their passing, evasion, communication and tactics skills. They found working with rugby balls a new challenge but were quickly able to master passing backwards and ‘tackling’ using the tags.

This year for the Christmas Fair Year 6 decided they wanted to do something for the pets in our lives so they made Christmas themed dog treats. The biscuits were cut into festive shapes then packaged up ready to sell. We hope all the lucky dogs who receive them enjoy them this Christmas! 

On Tuesday 2nd December, two teams of Year 6 children competed in the annual Sports Hall Athletics tournament at The Polesworth School against other local schools. The children took part in a number of track and field events in which individual and team scores were collected together in order to produce a team score for each school, or in our case each class. Although we didn’t progress into the final this year, the children all enjoyed taking part in the event. It was also a valuable opportunity for them to experience the facilities at The Polesworth School and to gain an insight into what they will be able to do when they move up into Year 7.

While learning about seasonal fruits and vegetables, Year 6 gathered their own apples and pears from the school orchard and then used them to make apple crumble! They were also able to taste the crumble in the afternoon.

As part of their PE learning this half term, Year 6 looked at team-building and outdoor adventurous activities. They enjoyed working together to create solutions for different problems and competing as part of a team.

Year 6 visited Twycross Zoo as part of their science theme of ‘Evolution’. They have been learning about how different animals have adapted and changed over the course of thousands of years to better suit their environments. During the trip, they were able to look at many different animals and were able to spot numerous adaptations and could explain how these helped them to survive in the wild.

During the visit, the children also participated in a workshop which demonstrated how different animals had changed over hundreds of thousands of years. They were able to match prehistoric animals to their modern-day ancestors and even explain why these changes might have helped them to survive.

The children were fantastic during the entire trip, representing Birchwood brilliantly!

This half term, Yew 6 have been learning about Charles Darwin and his theories of evolution and natural selection. As part of this learning, they have learned about how animals and plants have adapted to their environments over generations. They have also looked at human evolution and the ways in which we have evolved from our ancestors.