“I am the Good Shepherd; I know my own and my own know me”. John 10:14"
Today, KS1 and KS2 held a Black History Assembly. Each class completed study of an inspirational person from the local area.
Year 1 - Adelaide Louise Estelle Hall
Year 2 – Mary Seacole
Year 3 – Fanny Eaton
Year 4 – Dr John Alcindor
Year 5 – Ellen and William Craft
Year 6 – Gandhi
We were very lucky to have author Natasha Farrant join us for this morning's assembly and for a workshop with our class. We loved having the opportunity to ask her questions and to write creatively. Thank you Natasha!
We loved our trip to 'The LookOut' in Hyde Park. Here, we learned about the habitats in London and how we can look after them in a more sustainable way.
We had the opportunity to learn about 'microplastics' with a company called Hydrasyst, whose aim is to remove microplastics from water. We loved getting hands on to learn about the danger of microplastics, how they end up in our water and the danger they can do to animals and humans when consumed. We even had the chance to experience VR to look at how the world might look in years to come if this problem is not dealt with.
After our learning about refugees in our class text 'The Boy at the Back of the Class', it was very clear that some individuals have their human rights taken away from them. We studied the Human Declaration of Human Rights, but agreed that the language in it was very difficult for a child to understand. We simplified the language in the UDHR, aiming to make it accessible to the year 1 and 2 children. We then shared our book with the younger children in our school. We were confidently able to explain what a human right is and explain these 30 basic human rights to the children.
To celebrate International Day, we all came to school dressed in outfits linked to the country we come from, have links to or have been studying as part of International Week.
We have been learning about Brazil as part of 'International Week'. Here are some examples of the projects we have completed as part of our homework.
After learning about the Amazon Rainforest as part of Laudato Si week, we came up with our top tips on how to save the rainforest. Year 4 have also very proudly sponsored their own orangutan, which is one of the rainforest's most endangered animals!
We have been learning to write haiku poems in English. A haiku poem is a traditional Japanese poem, consisting of three lines.The first and third lines must have 5 syllables, while the middle line must have 7.
We had lots of fun coming up with these riddles. Can you guess which animals they are about?
We have been learning all about the Amazon Rainforest in Brazil as part of Laudato Si week and International Week. During this Now Press Play, we left the city with our aunt, Carmen, to stay with our older brother, Miguel, who lived near the Amazon rainforest. On our journey through the rainforest, we met a friendly Amazonian girl, Tatui, who gave us an insight into how the indigenous people live. We learned all about Amazonian tribes, the beauty of the rainforest and the damage that is being done to the landscape. Thankfully, we managed to save the trees and the 'hope plant', which might be able to provide a cure for an illness.
We have been learning all about Northern Ireland in Geography. Here are some examples of the home learning research projects we completed at the beginning of our topic!
Well done to the year 3 and year 4 pupils taking part in the Skittleball competition at Sacred Heart Secondary School. Year 3 played a total of 6 games. They won 4 and lost 2 of their games. A massive well done to them all. They showed great sportsmanship and got better and better as the tournament progressed. Well done to the year 4 team who finished top of their group. They drew their first game and won the other 3. They then played against the winners of the other group where the game finished in a draw. Both teams did exceptionally well and were fantastic representatives for the Good Shepherd.
We had an amazing day at Tudor World in Stratford-upon-Avon as part of our learning about the Tudors and Shakespeare.
Overall, a great day was had and the children were amazing. They are a credit to our school!
In today's science lesson on sound, we were learning about the difference between pitch and volume. Miss Howard brought a variety of instruments to play for us, including her voice. We discussed whether the instrument made a high or low pitch, and a loud or quiet sound. We learned how we can change the pitch and volume of an instrument and the science behind how this change happens. Thank you to Miss Howard for joining us!
Here are our wonderful costumes from World Book Day on 4th March! We took part in a live lesson called 'Using Your Imagination'. We took inspiration from Nadia Shireen and created our own 'imagination maps'.
We planned and coded scripts to make each Sphero provide a reading depending on the level of light -or luminosity. We designed matrix animations to show the different levels. We used torches to provide a very bright light level.
Well done to everybody who completed a Tudor project over the half term. I was so impressed to see such a variety of projects and such creativity. It is wonderful to see such enthusiasm for learning throughout year 4. Thank you to both children and parents for taking the time to complete these!
We have been exploring our new book in literacy, 'The Lost Happy Endings'. So far, we have been introduced to Jub, a little girl who delivers the happy endings of fairytales to children at bed time each night. Here are some examples of our role on the wall activity, in which we explored her character in depth.
Our topic in science this term is 'sound'. In today's lesson, we created string telephones to help us to understand how sound is created and how it travels. We learned that sound can travel through solids, liquids and gases!
Today we had a talk from members of our local police about the importance of being aware around strangers. We learned lots of new things and gained some helpful tips. We loved having the opportunity to ask them questions.
Our Good Shepherd Junior Wildcats A and B teams took part in a borough football competition at Power League, South Africa Rd. Lots of other schools were there to play against.
Both of our teams had their moments: Our B team had a fantastic 2-0 win over Wendell Park during the group stages and our A team managed to reach the quarter-finals where they narrowly lost to St. Johns in extra time.
Mr Davis was very happy with the teamwork and positive attitude both teams showed throughout the tournament.
Some examples of our story maps which we will use to write our adventure stories. Where will our objects take us?
In preparation for our adventure stories, we brought in an ordinary object which will take us on a journey to an imaginary world. This is just like the green ship that Alice and her brother had found in our class text which took the children on journeys all over the world.
We have been learning about settlements in geography. For homework, we were asked to research a settlement in the world that we didn't know much about and find out how it differs from settlements here in the UK. Here are some examples of the projects that were completed.
We have been learning to calculate long division equations using a variety of methods.
Year 4 tested out Sphero’s ambient light sensor today. We noticed that these were used in modern cars to turn on headlights automatically when it gets dark.
They coded Sphero to react to the lights being turned on, making Sphero move, speak and light up when the luminosity rose above a certain level.
Our Spheroraptors made their final escapes today, making the most of a power failure in Jurassic Park to leave through their enclosure’s open gate. We coded our Spheros to reverse and change direction when they collided with the enclosure wall until they eventually got out. There were also some great dinosaur matrix animations!
Year 4 started using Times Tables Rock Stars today. They were racing each other in online tables races! Every child can access this app at home using the login details they were given today.
In today's Now Press Play, we took on the role of Thalia's cousin. Thalia required regular dialysis. When there was a power cut due to anti-coal protestors at the power plant, we had to create an electrical circuit out of materials we could find in our home to create a torch. We then used our torches to journey to the power plant, where we found the source of the problem. Thankfully, we fixed the problem before the generators at the hospital ran out.
We have been learning about electricity in science. Here, you can see us creating our own electrical circuits. We needed wires, batteries, a bulb and a switch to create our circuits. In the end, we were able to explain how electricity flows through our homes and around the country.
This half term, we are studying the book 'The Green Ship' by Quentin Blake. Here, we took on the role of Alice and her brother who came across an 'astonishing' discovery.
We then explored the character of Mrs. Tredegar through a role on the wall activity.
As our DT project this term, we built Viking longships. We followed four stages in order to create them:
We really enjoyed our Anglo-Saxon’s and Viking’s drama workshop. Throughout the day, we participated in various role-play activities, games and quizzes linked to our topic.
Our topic in art this term was 'light'. In our lessons, we studied the paintings 'Supper at Emmaus' by Carravaggio and 'The Milkmaid' by Vermeer in great detail. We learned how artists create form and tone in a painting to create a 3D effect, focusing on where the light hits an object.
We began by sketching different objects, working from dark to light to show shade, shadow and highlights. We then experimented with colour, creating the colours yellow ochre and burnt sienna. Our final piece was a still life painting. We created our underpainting in yellow ochre, then painted our still life on top.
Year 4 have started their Jurassic Code project. Their objective is to code a Sphero robot to escape from it’s enclosure through the gate carelessly left open by Owen Grady.
They started by looking around the enclosure and coming up with some pseudocode (a plain language description of the block code they will be programming in). They then began coding in block code and tested it out with the Spheros in the hall.
There were plenty of bugs to remove, so next lesson we will refine our scripts…
We have been learning to show multiplication in lots of different ways!
In today's guided reading session, the main character Laura was in a predicament. She had to decide whether or not to leave her home on Bryher island for a better life. In two groups, we came up with reasons for and against Laura leaving Bryher. Grace took on the role of Laura, listening to these reasons carefully. Thankfully, she decided to stay!
After several lessons of research, planning, coding, testing and debugging our educational games were ready for Year 3 children to play and review. I was proud of the class and how much they achieved; everyone ended up with a game that worked and tested Year 3’s maths skills!
In English, we are studying the myth 'Beowulf' by Rob Lloyd Jones.
In today's lesson, we worked in groups to come up with our own myths. Each group had a monster who needed defeating, a hero, a king or queen and a narrator. We worked hard to built tension throughout our performance.
We had some very interesting show and tell in year 4 this week.
Sammy brought in a book called 'The Girl who Talked to Trees'. The book was written by his aunt who is an author. The book has been dedicated to Sammy and his brother Victor.
Very impressively, Bella has also written and illustrated her own book called 'The Dewflower' which we all enjoyed listening to!
Thank you both Sammy and Bella for sharing!
In today's now press play, we took on the role of Freja, a Viking child who travelled across the North Sea on a longship to invade, raid and look for a better life in England.
The theme for this year’s Anti-Bullying week is ‘One Kind Word’. In today’s circle time, we defined bullying and talked about what the emotional effects of bullying are on a person. We looked at different scenario cards and thought about which words we could use in that situation to make a person feel better! We then looked at some scenarios where people showed kindness and discussed the wider impact of showing kindness and respect in this way.
Over this week, we plan to think about how we can spread kindness using our words and continue this into our everyday lives in the future.
In today’s workshop, we learned all about Africa, in particular about the animals and how animals were hunted in the past. We used games and role-play to learn about the different types of animals that can be found in Africa. We learned a dance called ‘The Coming of Age’ and sang the song ‘In the Jungle’.
Linking with our topic 'spatial sense', we went on a geography field trip to observe and record how Hammersmith has changed over time. We began the day in the classroom, where we studied maps of Hammersmith from 1863, 1915, 1954 and now. We noted the changes that had occurred over time and discussed why these changes had happened. We then took a trip to the river Thames in Hammersmith and learned all about the history of the area. Lastly, we studied a picture of the area from the past and then drew a field sketch of what it looks like today. We were surprised to realise how much had changed!
We have been learning about Moses and the Exodus in religion. Here, using Now Press Play, we are taking on the role of a slave who lived through the ten plagues in Egypt and was freed by Moses. In the end, we were preparing for our extremely difficult journey through the desert to Midian, the land that God had promised us.
National Poetry Day took place on Thursday 7th October. Prior to this, we learned the poem ‘Instructions for Growing Poetry’ by Tony Mitton, putting actions to the poem which was performed in assembly.
On the day, we took part in an online interactive workshop which involved creating our own witches’ spells based on the witches in Macbeth. We all wrote our own poems, using what we had learned in the workshop. Some children also wrote their own poems at home or brought in one of their favourites to share with the class!
Antoni, Grace, Ferdy, Austin and Henry receiving their Pogo Level 1 Certificate for jumping for 30 seconds. Leo receiving his Level 2 Certificate for jumping for 3 minutes! Well done!
We have been studying the aftermath of Duncan’s murder and examining how Macbeth has changed from the valiant warrior we met in the beginning of the play. In many scenes, we have transformed into directors, deciding on stage directions for the play. We have realised that directing a show is much more difficult than we first anticipated
We have been learning about spatial sense in Geography this half term. We have studied the globe and how lines of latitude and longitude help us to locate places on a map. Here, we are researching our local area, finding out which facilities nearby are useful to us. In our final lesson, we will be studying old maps and photographs of Askew road, discussing how and why it has changed over the years.
We have been enjoying our weekly music lessons with Miss Howard. This half term, we have been learning about music from long ago and how it was not written down. Through games, songs and chants we have realised how difficult that must have been for the composers!
We have now completed Macbeth’s diary entry, which told the story of the events leading up to and the night of Duncan’s murder. Our diary entries took us five days to complete:
Today, our school parliament elections took place. We had to decide which of the four departments we wanted to join and prepare a small manifesto to share with our class. We then voted for a class member to represent us in each department. Best of luck to all of the candidates that took part!
We have been studying the human body in science. Through experimentation with eggs, coke and vinegar, we have examined the effect that a sugary or acidic diet has on our teeth. We have also learned about the digestive system in detail, studying how food moves through our bodies. We used food bags and tights to show the movement of food through the digestive system, explaining what happened at each stage of digestion.
We have been learning about number and place value in maths. In year 4, we learn about numbers as large as 10,000. The use of dienes blocks, number counters, number flippers and place value charts help us to see number in lots of different ways.
We have been studying the play ‘Macbeth’ by William Shakespeare. Through role play, we have gained an insight into the characters thoughts, feelings and intentions in the play. This week, we are building up to write Macbeth's diary entry, thinking about the events that happened leading up to and on the night of Duncan's murder.
Each week, we take part in a collective worship. We light a candle and gather together to pray. We talk about the theme of the week, listen to a gospel reading and respond to it with relevant thoughts and ideas. Our collective worships are completely led by the children.
The A-life mental health and wellbeing workshop came to visit this term. In the workshop, we learned practical ways to keep fit and healthy and discovered strategies to keep calm using the acronym 'GET CALM'. Can you remember what each letter stood for?
Get Giving
Get Connecting
Get Active
Get Learning
Get Mindful
We had another top secret meeting at the end of last term. What do you think they might have been doing?
Keep practising your tables so you can join Club 144 too!
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