Autumn 2
Autumn 2
The children have settled so well into Key Stage 2, and have amazed us with how inspired they have been by the topics we have covered.
Please do keep posting to dojo anything your child does at home – we love to see the links they have made within their learning.
History and Geography (Opening Worlds): Cradles of Civilisation and Mountains
This term, we will use the Opening Worlds curriculum to explore the topics of Cradles of Civilisation and Mountains.
Cradles of Civilisation, children will learn all about how the Mesopotamian people learned how to use rivers to support farming, creating and building waterways to water plants and utilise river water. They will discover how their civilisation grew, and as their skills in farming developed, also how the Mesopotamians were able to become self-sufficient, and were able to trade their produce. Children will then be learning about how other ancient civilisations developed around rivers, and how they learned to communicate using writing.
Mountains, children will learn what mountains are, as well as the mountain ranges in the United Kingdom. They will think about why people live on mountains and what it is like to live in a mountainous region.
Vocabulary -
Cradles of Civilisation – tablets, summer, Tigris, Euphrates, Mesopotamia, fertile crescent, trade, weaving, herding, ziggurat, cuneiform, Gilgamesh, epic, Assyria, Indus Valley, Shang, nomadic, cradle, bronze, altar, sacrifices, decipher, sculptures, mythical, decorative
Mountains – hill, mountain, Ben Nevis, mountainous regions. Himalayas, Mount Everest, peak, slopes, terraces, summit, Alps, Andes, terraced farming, Cairngorms, trek, valleys, Lake District, Pennines, Yorkshire Dales, Brecon Beacons, Snowdonia, above sea level, temperature
English
Model text – The Manor House
Independent short burst writing allows the children to apply skills they learn and proudly share.
Model text – The Manor House (Pie Corbett) – Tale of Fear. Using the model text, children will develop their writing skills to become effective writers and create a structured, atmospheric suspense story.
Through learning the story, children will explore the plot, settings, characters and how they can use this information to infer and understand. They will build on their previous vocabulary learned. Children will learn about fronted adverbials and how changing them creates new ideas. They will also continue to develop their use of expanded noun phrases, verbs and commas in a list within their writing. Children will use drama to show different emotions and will learn how to use these emotions in their writing. We will discuss and describe different settings such as abandoned places, swamps and graveyards and share feelings they might experience if they were to visit these places.
Bedrock will continue to be used in school to improve children’s vocabulary knowledge. Children will be given opportunities in class to complete sessions with the opportunity for them to complete additional lessons at home.
Maths: Addition and Subtraction and Geometry (shape)
We will be continuing to compare objects and numbers and also ordering numbers. We will be developing our addition and subtraction through problem-solving and reasoning skills. We will be developing our understanding of both 2D and 3D shapes using patterns.
We will continue to do weekly number and lightening where children will be recording their scores independently, enabling them to track and be proud of their own progress.
Vocabulary - ones, tens, hundreds, thousands, place value, digit, value, amount, compare, more than, less than, equal, ascending, descending, rounding, nearest, total, method, trial, error, systematic, pattern, shape, cuboid, cone, cylinder, pyramid, sphere, cube
Science: Nutrition and diet, food waste and rocks
Nutrition and diet - children will learn about the five food groups and the importance of having a balanced diet. They will be comparing the diets of animals and humans.
Food waste – children will be learning about food waste and how it can be reduced.
Rocks – children will have an enquiry question “How can we identify and sort rocks based on their physical properties?” Children will be identifying, grouping and classifying rocks based on their simple properties.
Vocabulary – carbohydrate, protein, dairy product, fat, sugar, food waste, landfill, compost, texture, crystals, grains. Layers.
Other Curriculum Areas
Computing – Programming: Scratch
Children will be exploring the programme ‘scratch’. Over the term, the children will be storytelling using the programme using repetition (a loop) and animation. Lastly, they will programme a game explaining the action and algorithm behind it.
Vocabulary – scratch, algorithm, animation, application, code, coding, debug, decompose, interface, game, loop, predict, program, remixing code, repetition code, review, sprite, tinker.
French – French adjectives for colour, size and shape
Children will show understanding by correctly identifying a described shape, drawing it in the air or pointing at the board. They will describe some shapes in their work using language of colour, size or shape. They will recognise cognates (a cognate is a word that is the same in both French and English). Children will learn to use please and thank you in French and listen carefully to instructions. They will listen and then select the correct decoration according to its colour. They will use software to produce artwork in the style of Matisse.
Vocabulary - c’est de quelle couleur ? (what colour is it?), les couleurs (the colours), vrai ou faux (true or false), petit (small), grand (big).
PSHE / RSE – Health and Wellbeing
This term we will be focusing on ‘Health and Well-being’ by looking at the understanding of a healthy lifestyle, dental health and ways we can plan a healthy lifestyle through food and exercise. We will be learning a range of relaxation exercises and the positive impacts these have on our bodies. We will be looking at our own identities and personal strengths and writing Kenning-style poems based on ourselves. We will be building our resilience by identifying problems and breaking them into smaller goals to overcome them.
Vocabulary - exercise, energy, balance, intake, diet, balanced, food group, teeth, healthy, feeling, balance, relax, group, identity, belonging, alone, lonely, hero, power, strengths, stretch, barriers, strategy.
Physical Education – Hockey and Dance
Hockey (outdoors) – We will be focussing on how to use a hockey stick and ball, learning skills such as control of the ball and correct technique, as well as basic passing, attack and defence skills.
Dance (indoors) – we will be creating movements and linking these together to perform a dance at a SOKE competition.
Vocabulary – pass, attack, defend, movement, link, sequence, Timing, control, dribble, cross over, reverse stick, long barrier, push pass
Art – Prehistoric art
Children will be introduced to cave art and reflect upon the purpose of drawings before working on developing their sense of proportion in drawing. Children will draw charcoal pictures to create tones and textures. Children will then experiment with colours and create their own paint using spices and objects found on a nature walk. Children will apply their painting skills to re-create a prehistoric animal picture. Finally, children will work on a collaborative class piece of prehistoric inspired art, creating hand prints on a textured background.
Vocabulary – cave artists, charcoal, geometric shapes, iron age, line drawings, native, prehistoric, proportions, stone age, texture, tone
Religion and World Views – Where do our morals come from
Children will learn what morals are and how people learn between right and wrong. Children will evaluate the importance of religious guidance to some Christians and Jewish people and will explore how people remember moral guidance and how they apply it to daily life. Children will analyse religious and non-religious guidance and be given the opportunity to express and justify their own opinions about their personal moral code.
Vocabulary – commandment, covenant, golden rule, mitzvoth, morals, observance, precept, restrictive
Music – Creating compositions in response to an animation (Theme: Mountains)
Children will verbalise how music makes them feel. They will create actions or movements appropriate to different pieces of music. They will create a range of sounds and compose and notate a short melody to accompany a story.
Vocabulary – influence, listen, dynamics, timbre, pitch, repeated rhythm, pattern, notation, ensemble, compose.
Links to Learning sites
Bedrock - https://app.bedrocklearning.org/
TT Rockstars - https://ttrockstars.com/
Useful Dates:
Tuesday 31st October – Start of Autumn 2
Tuesday 31st October – Halloween disco
Monday 6th November – Consultation evening
Wednesday 8th November - Consultation evening
Monday 13th to Friday 17th November - Anti-bullying week
Friday 17th November – Children in need day
Thursday 7th December - Christmas jumper day
Thursday 7th December - Christmas disco
Tuesday 12th December – Parent/Carer engagement 2.30pm until 3pm
Tuesday 19th December - Christmas lunch
Wednesday 20th December – End of term