February: Valentines slipper/teddy party

Our blue star children organised a very relaxing end-of-term party for us today where we watched a film in our slippers, accompanied by our favourite teddies. They provided us with some delicious healthy snacks: fruit-kebabs and popcorn. Thanks blue star children - what a lovely way to wind down at the end of a term in which we've all worked so hard!

February: Historical Mock Trials

Ghana Class had great fun putting their parents on trial today. Accused of crimes ranging from pickpocketing and drunkeness to witchcraft and murder, the parents faced judgement from representatives of various time periods: Romans, Anglo-Saxons, Tudors, Georgians and Victorians. Our presiding adjudicator, His Right Honourable Judge Fraser, took advice from the jury and pronounced sentences for each of the accused. Including flogging, workhouse, hard labour, transportation, crucifixion, fines, mutilation, hanging and branding (along with a bit of public humiliation in the stocks), parents went home well-punished! Great work Ghana Class - you have shown just how much you have learnt this term about crime and punishment through the ages. We can't  wait to start comparing this with our modern day legal system next term!

February: Victorian Prisoners

This week, we have been studying crime and punishment in the Victorian era. In order to better understand the experiences of Victorian prisoners, we carried out our own version of hard labour prison tasks. In groups we undertook the futile tasks of picking oakum, walking the treadwheel, exercising in isolation and performing shot drill. All of this was done in ABSOLUTE SILENCE with no communication whatsoever permitted by our prison wardens. We knew that failure would result in us missing out on our daily meal of gruel and bread. After only 30 minutes of hard labour, our legs and arms ached, our fingers and eyes were tired and we were beginning to feel bored, lonely and depressed. Back in class, we used our experience to empathise with prisoners who would have carried out these tasks for days, weeks or even months. The Victorians believed that silence and isolation would give the prioners time to contemplate their crimes and that physically hard, pointless tasks would be a fitting punishment and a deterrent for future crimes. We considered the effects that the prolonged removal of all communication would have had on the mental health of the convicts. Please ask us about how it feels to be a Victorian prisoner.

November: Mouldy bread experiment results.

After a few days, our bread began to bloom! We noticed lots of differences between the types of moulds developing depending on the conditions the bread were kept in. Some moulds were orange and gooey (where the bread was kept warm or very damp), some were bluey-green and furry (where the bread was in the light and drier) and some were even black  (where the bread was kept in a darkened drawer). The toasted bread and the bread in the fridge didn't develop any mould at all, while the bread in the drawer developed a small amount of mould much later than the bread in the light; this confirmed our predictions that mould does not like cool / dry / dark environments. Therefore, we now know that the fridge is the best place for sandwiches!

We carried out an extra experiment where we put two slices of bread into bags: one slice was touched just by Mrs Scott, while the other slice was handled by all 30 members of Ghana Class. Just look at the results! This is good evidence that we should always wash our hands before handling food and that food should be handled as little as possible before serving.

November: Mouldy bread experiment!

This week, Ghana Class have been studying microrganisms and testing which conditions are best for growing mould. We have worked in pairs with 2 slices of bread each and we have chosen which variables to alter; some of us are testing damp v dry, some light v dark, some cool v warm, some air-tight v open to the air. We have even toasted some bread to see if this has an effect. Which bread do you think will go mouldy first? Stay posted to find out the rancid results...

November: Woodlouse Choice Chamber

This week we designed and built our own woodlice choice chambers in order to carry out an investigation exploring which habitat woodlice prefer. We decided to contrast damp with dry and bright with dark. Once we had located and collected our woodlice (which was harder than we expected) we gently placed them in the box and recorded their behaviour at regular intervals. We will use our data to create science reports next week. Can you guess what our hypothesis was? And do you think our experiment proved it correct?

October: School Beat visit - Internet safety

Our local School Beat Officer visited Year 6 to remind us about keeping ourselves safe and protected when using technology both at home and at school. We listened to a presentation and were given some scenarios to discuss. It is hugely important that our generation is equipped with the tools, knowledge and confidence we need to deal with this constantly growing issue so please ask us about what we learnt!

Autumn Term: Alive! What makes living things unique?

This term, Y6 will be immersing ourselves in science; we will be learning about evolution and inheritance, debating whether the creation theory and evolution theory are conflicting or complementary and examining animal adaptation and the formation of fossils. We  will be exploring living things and their habitats and designing and building our own woodlouse 'choice-chambers'! We will describe how living things are classified and exploring the human body in more detail. We will learn how  to maintain healthy and safe lifestyles. Our writing will encompass biographies on Charles Darwin, science reports, explanations of the circulatory system and  healthy living leaflets. Please ask us about what we have learnt...

September - Countries week

Ghana spent the first week and a half of term this year studying the country after which we are named. We learnt about the geography of Ghana by studying maps, considering land-use, placing and naming major cities and rivers, applying symbols and keys and using 6-figure grid references to improve the accuracy of our map-work. Through maths, we studied line graphs and bar charts to investigate the climate in Ghana and identify links between temperature and rainfall. We explored ‘a day in the life’ of a Ghanaian child alongside viewing many pictures of Mrs Scott’s and Mrs Baggus’s trip to Ghana in 2015 – this lead to lots of group discussion considering the similarities and differences between life for children in Ghana and children in the UK. We finished our learning by examining the symbolic meanings of Kente cloth, a traditional Ghanaian fabric. We designed and created our own Kente weavings using traditional weaving patterns, colours, geometric shapes, tassels and cord to make our creations as authentic as possible.