Year 6 Curriculum Projects

Year 6 Project - Darwin's Delights

Ship Ahoy! We're off on an exciting journey with Charles Darwin and his crew on the HMS Beagle. 

During this project the children will investigate a range of animal specimens, describing the characteristics of the creatures, and labelling their body parts using software. They will use a range of non-fiction books to investigate adaptation, natural selection, variation and inheritance. After examining letters and journal entries written by Darwin, Year 6 will write their own examples. They will collect natural items and discover what plants live around the school. Year 6 will retrace Darwin's steps using maps and create sketchbooks to record the plants, flowers and trees. Using maps and globes they will plan an expedition. What will the weather be like and what physical and man-made features might we encounter? 

At the end of the project Year 6 will think about why the Galapagos Islands developed such diverse animal life, and why they might be under threat. The children will also think about what Darwin would have worked on if he were alive today. How would he use our technology?

Help your child prepare for their project

Charles Darwin was a world-renowned naturalist, geologist and physicist, and Year 6 are going to follow in his footsteps. Why not collect samples of plant life from your garden and see if your can identify them? You could make detailed sketches of the plants you find, just like Darwin. Alternatively, visit Darwin's former home, Down House (near Orpington) where you can learn about Darwin's life and work. 

Innovate Challenge - Morphing animation

Art and Design - Creating sketchbooks; Observational drawing

Computing - Online research; Morphing animations; Computer networks

Geography - Maps; Geographical similarities and differences; Islands of the World

History - Significant individuals; Charles Darwin, Mary Anning

Science - Evolution and inheritance; Living things and their habitats; Working scientifically

Science Investigations - How have eyes evolved? How many worms are underground? Where do wild plants grow best? Why do bird have different beaks? Why is holly prickly?

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Year 6 Key Information

 

 

In Year 6 PE lessons are timetabled for Monday (outdoor) and Tuesday (indoor) every week.

Spellings Tests will take place every Friday.

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English

Next week we will be;

• Continuing to draft paragraphs for a report about the Galapagos Islands
• Revising the spelling of a range of homophones
• Using inference and summary skills in reading

Maths

Next week we will be;

• Interpreting pie charts
• Using percentages with pie charts
• Calculating the mean as an average

Additional Information 

Exciting news: On 18th May we will be interviewing the author of our class text 'Darwin's Dragons' via Zoom! 

This week's homework is;

• Children should continue to read for a minimum of 10 minutes every night and we ask that they read to an adult at least twice a week. Please use your child's reading record book to record a comment each time you hear your child read.  
• This week's spellings, which are a range of homophones, have been loaded to Spelling Shed: EdShed Web Game - Spelling Shed and MathShed
• Maths Whizz has been focused on Statistics. This is to consolidate our latest unit of work. This is an optional task and children are encouraged to complete a minimum of 3 progressions over the week. Go to https://www.whizz.com/login/   

Dear Parents/Carers

If you were unable to access the Maidstone District Transition Meeting on 28th April, a link to the recording of the meeting can be found below:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HYk3dOnuU0I&feature=youtu.be

Each week, we will be posting handy tips to support your child with their transition to secondary school.  We hope you find these useful:

Week 4:

• You may wish to access your Secondary school’s website. It will be a good opportunity for you to have a look at the policies, practices and procedures such as timings, uniform and behaviour expectations etc.  Hopefully your child’s Secondary school will be arranging an event for you to be able to ask questions; perhaps you could start to think about any queries you may have?  Talk through the information your son/daughter has found out – do they have anything that they are really excited about, or a little worried about?

Weeks 2 and 3:

• Ask who else is going to the same school and encourage friendships – these may not be the children your child usually socialises with, but it is always good to have a familiar face in the first few weeks. Remind your child that they will make new friends when they start their new school.#
• If you haven’t already done so, think about how you can help your child to be more independent: at home, do they put clothes away/ complete simple jobs like making their own bed or sandwiches/ make hot drinks etc? Do they get their own bag ready for school? If they have homework, do they need reminding to complete it?  If they have started back to any clubs outside school, do they get themselves ready/organised? 

• In school, your son/daughter will be starting to think about their journey to and from school.  If they are going to be traveling by Public Transport, download the Arriva app (or relevant equivalent) and encourage him/her to be more to become familiar with it.  If they are going to be walking, start practising now.   Can they use Google earth to plot their journey?  Can they read a train timetable?  Do they know what to do if they miss their bus/train?  What happens if they miss their stop? What will happen if they can’t get on the bus because it is full?  Start to discuss these scenarios giving reassurance and encouragement throughout.  

Week 1:

• Over the Easter holidays, and as lockdown hopefully continues to ease, you may want to start allowing your son/daughter to be more independent.  Can they walk to the shops alone? Make their own orders at (outside?!) cafes?

 

 

 

What a memorable experience dissecting a lamb's heart was!  We were able to investigate the four chambers of the heart and the arteries and veins.  It was fascinating!

We also made artificial blood, representing the main components: red blood cells, white blood cells, plasma and platelets.

When it's raining outside and you still want to get your body moving, why not try your hand at speed stacking?  Year 6 are quite the masters at this sport!

Our Indoor PE session this week allowed us to learn a new game where we could refine our co-ordination and agility skills!  

Following their research in Science and their persuasive writing lessons in English, Year 6 have been using the Chromebooks to create their own anti-smoking adverts.  

This term we have written various non-chronological reports about The Heart, its function and how to keep your heart healthy.  Great work Year 6!

This week in PE, we took part in Boccia and Curling working in small teams to perfect our aim and accuracy skills.  

Year 6 have been perfecting their sending and receiving skills in tag rugby.  Here they are practising the 'pop' and 'spin' pass down the line in a race against the clock.  Great work Year 6!

This week we have been investigating algorithms to see if they are accurate and efficient. Here we are following a pre-written algorithm to order a set of numbers. 

Our Children In Need non-uniform day.

When it's raining outside, Zumba is relocated to the classroom.  Here we are dancing away and busting some groovy moves! 🕺👯‍♂️🕺🏽

This afternoon, Year 6 spent their DT and computing lesson evaluating the home pages of different websites.  We were investigating features such as headers, logos and navigational links. This will then help us to design our own websites. Watch this space for our creations!

We are rather proud of our finished websites.  To create these, we first completed our own header drawings in Art and then uploaded these to the Chromebooks before inserting them into Google Sites.  Linked to our own interests or hobbies, our websites cover a range of topics.  The Year 6 children will be able to show parents and carers their websites by logging into Google Classroom. We hope you like them!