Our topic this term is, If Trees Could Talk. 

We will be looking at the world around us and exploring the globe using atlases. We will be focusing on the rain forests and becoming mini David Attenboroughs in our research! In science, we will be linking this work to plants and growth, as well as living things and food chains next term. In literacy, we will be using stories and films such as The Jungle Book and Up to link with our topic. Keep a close eye on this page to see some of our work across the curriculum. 

Holi Artwork

We learnt about Holi, the Hindu Festival of Colour. We used watered down paint and used straws to blow the paint in different directions. We showed how the Festival is celebrated when people throw paint at each other and remind each other how good triumphed over evil. 

Rainforest Artwork! 

To to fit with our topic of the Rainforest, we took a closer look at Henri Rousseau's 'The Jungle.' We then used collage materials to design our own rainforest. We chose photos from the Internet and added them to our artwork to add digital media. 

Pocahontas Setting Descriptions.

This week, we have been using Pocahontas in our Literacy work to improve our descriptive language. We have been describing the land Pocahontas lives in and loves. We have used a SCEM grid to collect ideas and today, we work extended similes and metaphors to describe Pocahontas' world. 

Visit from Mrs Basu.

Mrs Basu came to visit the school today to talk to us about the religion of Hinduism. She talked to us about the Gods, how import their worship is to them and even told us a story through dance! Then she dressed some of us up in a sari! 

PE Session with Barnes Wallis! 

Sycamore class were lucky enough today to be treated to a workshop from Miss Page at Barnes Wallis Academy. We had a pirate theme to the session and played Sharks and Jellyfish and then stole each other's loot in a treasure game! We all had a fantastic time and are looking forward to working with Barnes Wallis on exciting ventures in the future! 

African Drumming

Today we were treated to an African Drumming workshop with Andy! We learnt about the different types of drum, what they were made of and how to play them properly. We then learnt some rhythms from different countries around the world. It was a fantastic way to spend our morning! 

Tenses work in Literacy! 

This week, we have been working really hard on writing consistently in the same tense. Firstly, we drew pictures to help us to understand the difference between the past and the present tense and looked at why it was important to stay in the same tense! Some of us created stories using Rowntrees Randoms! We had a giggle at some of the strange stories we had written. 

Ukulele Music Sessions! 

This term, on a Wednesday morning, we will be learning how to play the ukulele! We were so excited when Tim arrived to give us our first lesson and we learnt the red chord and the yellow chord! We cannot wait to learn more tunes to play! 

Around the World in one Half Term Holiday! 

For the children's half term homework, they chose a country from a lucky dip pot and designed an information poster explaining its's climate, landmarks and culture. We have had some fantastic designs and we still haven't had them all back in yet. Our corridor display looks fantastic and the children have worked so hard on their posters! Well done Sycamore! 

The Layers of the Rainforest.

This week, we have learnt more about the different layers of the rainforest; the emergent layer, the canopy, the understory and the forest floor. We made mini scenes of each layer and discovered the types of trees, plants and animals that lived in each section. When we put them all together, we had our very own model rainforest! 

This week, we have been looking at a performance poem by Brian Moses called, Walking with my Iguana. We have practised and learnt it off by heart this week and finally got to perform it in Friday Mentions assembly this morning. We loved the poem and really enjoyed learning the rhythm and creating actions to go with it!

Have a watch of the video below to re-live the performance!

In Literacy, we have been using The Jungle Book to help us with our learning. This week, we have been writing letters and today, we wrote a letter to Mowgli to tell him whether we thought he should stay in the jungle, or go to the man village. We made a conscience corridor to mind map our ideas!

Rainforest Rain Music

This week, we have been looking at the different sounds we can make with our bodies to mimic the sounds in the rainforest! First, we looked at using our body parts, then we made our own rain sticks and created a performance from that! 

We made papier mâché globes in Sycamore class this week to help us to understand the location of the continents, equator and tropics! We ha to be very patient allowing them to dry and add lots of layers to make them strong! 

We have been using the film Up to help us with our sentence structure and grammar. We used lego this week to learn about the subject, object and verbs in a sentence. It was tricky to think of the most basic sentence to start us off...then we added different coloured bricks to become prepositions, adjectives, connectives and adverbs!