Welcome to Year 6 – Diamond Class!

SATs Meeting 2024 Year 6 Meet the Teacher 2023

Summer Of '24

For those children who will be heading to Brine Leas in September, the Head of Year 7, Mr Mottram, is uploading helpful weekly videos introducing himself and high-school life. We will be watching these in class, but if you wish to access the videos from home as well, you can find them at the bottom of Mr Mottram's information page here.

Maths
This term, we shall be consolidating what we have already learned about place value, the four operations, fractions, decimals, statistics and geometry before tackling the areas of ratio and algebra. During this Summer term, through the consistent cycle of assessment and revision, we will endeavour to prepare the children as much as possible for the SAT's tests that will occur the week commencing 13th May. In many ways, this will be child-led, focusing on the areas that cause the greatest amount of difficulty in order to boost fluency and confidence across all areas and across all of the children.

English
In our writing lessons, the children will be inspired by 'Sky Chasers' by Emma Carroll. Year 6 will write an atmospheric short story narrative about a mysterious object from either a first person or third person perspective, before continuing their tale with a narrative around the theme of a hot air balloon adventure. The focus of these narratives will be to firstly write cohesively so their stories makes sense (cohesion is king!) and to distinguish between the language of speech and the language of narration, choosing vocabulary carefully in order to manipulate the reader's opinion of a character, place or situation.

We shall learn spellings and read for pleasure, every day, and will have regular handwriting practice until the children have developed a joined clear handwriting style.

The Mayans (History & Geography)
By adhering to our History Golden Threads: Leaders, Invasion, Innovation, Communication & Religion (as well as our Geography threads: Location, Human Features, Physical Features, Economy and Climate), the children will continue to explore the region of Mexico and its Central American neighbours to discover all they can about the society which dominated the region from 250 – 900 AD. The children will learn about their architecture, their religion, their language and their economy, comparing these with the concurrent societies of Britain – namely the Romano-Celtic Britons and the Anglo-Saxons.

Science
In Science, the children will be learning about the classification of animal species according to the work of Carl Linnaeus. This will begin by allowing the class to classify organisms into broad categories such as animals, plants, fungi and micro-organisms such as bacteria. This will then develop into the areas of vertebrates vs invertebrates, and to the familiar classes of mammal, bird, amphibian, fish and reptile – creating branching key diagrams to help with a species' classification. We will then give plants a similar treatment; categorising these in terms of flowering and non-flowering; deciduous vs coniferous; ferns and mosses etc.
The children will also be completing a workshop on Charles Darwin and his theory of evolution by natural selection with external providers, ZooLab.
In the second half of the term, we will move on to researching the relationship between diet, exercise, drugs, lifestyle and health – seeing what effect various nutrients and activities have on our circulatory systems and muscles.

Creative
Our Art topic this term will focus on the medium of sculpture and 'making memories'. This unit teaches pupils to create expressive sculptures and reflect on artistic decisions. The class will learn to represent memories through art, using various materials and techniques, and develop skills in planning, making, and evaluating 3D sculptures in order to create a personal memory box about their time in primary school.

RE
This term, we will be researching, discussing and thinking about the concept of the afterlife. We will start by revising the conceptions raised within Christianity, Islam and Hinduism, before moving on to non-religious beliefs about life after death. We will consider how differing accounts about the afterlife affect how people live their lives, and the children will have the opportunity to consider, debate and write about their own views on the matter.

Computing
In Computing, the children will be creating their own text-based adventure game which allows the player to choose how the story unfolds. The class will use their knowledge of flowcharts to help map out their story and how the variables change with each choice made by the player. They will then design and write their game, before sampling each other's creations and reviewing them.

We look forward to an exciting new term.

Mr Blenkiron

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