Year 6 - Summer 1 - Week 6

Date: 27th May 2022 @ 12:39pm

We are now at the end of our penultimate half-term in Year 6!

In Collective Worship this week, Reverend Anne visited the children to remind them of St. Peter’s Uganda project with St. Peter’s school in Kalule. It is hard to believe that the last time some of our teachers and friends of the school visited was when this class were in Year 4, but we were able to recall some of the activities we did in school and why we have our Christian monthly value of ‘Koinonia’. Anne talked about some of the highlights of the project since it started and also provided some updates on what has happened since. This Collective Worship was a great opportunity to emphasise the importance of kindness in the community and to have gratitude for what we have in our school.

‘RSE Week’ has brought us lots of new information, questions and certainly some (possibly  awkward) laughter along the way! On Monday, as a whole class we recapped on our RSE lessons from last year and recalled the changes our bodies will go through during puberty; however as we discussed these in our gender groups last year, this week we were able to learn about and have empathy for what the opposite gender will experience. This created lots of questions from the children, which were easily explained through the brilliant ‘Kay’s Anatomy’ book by Adam Kay. (Please note: as per message sent to parent, the relevant chapters of this book can be found on Google Classroom.) Throughout the rest of the week, we discussed peer pressure and consent; personal hygiene and where you can go for support. The children participated in these lessons with great enthusiasm and maturity; we are very proud of how they conducted themselves and were relieved to hear on Monday that the first lesson wasn’t as awkward as they thought it might be!

To supplement our RSE learning – and to help address the insecurities that some of us have mentioned over the year – Dr Smith also visited us on Wednesday morning to discuss dental hygiene and help dispel some misconceptions we have about our teeth. The children had lots of questions and we are very grateful that he could give up his time to help alleviate some anxieties. 

In Maths, we continued with our ‘theme park’ project. Now that our parks have been constructed, we have had to calculate the running costs and then – from there – decide on our entrance admission fees to ensure we make a profit. The children have continued to enjoy this project and we can’t wait to see their pitches and presentations in the first week back after half-term.

As computer scientists, we have enjoyed more coding practice this week. On Monday, we explored the game, Crossy Roads, thinking carefully about its features and what makes it a good game. Later in the week, we were then introduced to the iOs app, Hopscotch to allow us to explore some of our STAR vocabulary: event, command, loop, random and range. We were then able to apply our knowledge by using the app to start creating our own version of Crossy Roads.

In preparation for our Jubilee celebrations, a significant part of our week has been taken up with our DT project: cooking and baking ‘the best of British’! Following BBC Good Food recipes, we made shortbread, sausage rolls, coronation chicken and cucumber sandwiches for a special picnic on Friday afternoon to mark the 70th anniversary of the accession of Queen Elizabeth II on 6 February 1952.

In addition to our picnic preparation, we also saw the return of TSP’s Got Talent as part of our celebrations. On Friday morning, we had our Y6 talent show…and it was incredible! We laughed, we cried, we sat there open-mouthed at just how talented our peers are – it really was an amazing show! The children then voted for our two favourites, who later performed in front of the whole school and even the Royal Family! It was a great way to end our half-term. A special 'well done' to our two finalists and a huge 'congratulations' to a very worth winner. We are all so proud!

We hope everyone has a fantastic, week-long break. The SATs now seem like a distant memory but we hope the children have a well-earned rest after what has been a truly ‘packed’ six weeks!

See you all in a week!