D&T Day January 2022

As part of our topic ‘The Greatest Show’, we designed and created our very own fairground rides.  In order to do this, we first had to learn about different types of mechanisms - levers, gears and pulleys.  We read about them, watched a video, tested different mechanisms and created our own pulley systems.  We then worked in groups to design our rides and to select our resources, before building them.

This morning, Year 4 took part in a circus skills workshop.  The class were so excited to

learn each of the new skills and impressed both us and the expert with how well they did!  We learnt how to use a variety of equipment, including: diablos, stilts, pedal boards, juggling balls, spinning plates, pois and flower sticks.  It was a fantastic way to conclude our topic ‘The Greatest Show’.

To celebrate the International Day of Languages, we learnt about and practised our flamenco dancing. We also learnt a song and wrote books for KS1 children, to teach the question ‘¿Como te llamas?’.

On Monday, we used Lego kits to build and code different Lego models! We had lots of fun and got to race some of our models in the hall in the afternoon. We learnt about algorithms and coding whilst having lots of fun building. 

We have been lucky enough to work with Matt Buckingham today to learn all about being an author and an illustrator! He spoke to us about how he comes up with his ideas, what he uses as inspiration and how he takes that initial idea through a journey to get to the final story. He shared with us how he uses a sketch book to capture his ideas and develop these over time. We then had a go at creating our own illustrations from blobs - it was great fun!

Who knew that learning about fractions could be so much fun! We have learnt that we would rather have a sixth of pizza rather than a tenth. We have linked all this learning to our pizza making this morning! 

Year 4 used their shields to practise the different Roman army formations.  We practised; ‘The Turtle’, ‘The Wedge’, ‘The Repel Cavalry’ and ‘The Orb’.