Year 6 have had fun exploring the beginning of Romeo & Juliet through drama this week. They used freeze frames to capture parts of The Prologue in Shakespeare’s tragic play and even had a go at translating the tricky language into the modern day. Children will be reporting on the action of Act 1 Scene 1 over the coming weeks and producing informative newspaper reports.
October is Black History Month, and Year 6 have enjoyed researching key individuals for this year’s theme ‘Saluting Our Sisters’ which honours the achievements of black women. Children created brilliant presentations showcasing the notable achievements and contributions made by some incredible black British women such as: Betty Campbell, Kadeena Cox and Malorie Blackman. As well as this, children had lots of fun following along to an African dance tutorial!
Have a look at the wonderful writing taking place in Year 6, proudly displayed on our classroom walls! Year 6 have published their diary entries based on our text ‘Goodnight Mister Tom’. They have used lots of features of the success criteria we constructed together, including: emotive language, thoughts and feelings and rhetorical questions. Everyone demonstrated fantastic grit and determination with their writing stamina – some children wrote six whole pages! As well as this, lots of concentration was shown in order to ensure the beautiful, joined-up handwriting you can see. Children independently edited and improved their work using green pen in their books and then, using teamwork, paired edited before writing up in neat. It’s great to see so many of our QH crowns being applied – well done all!
Year 6 have been learning how to classify animals based on their characteristics. This week they played a game of animal ‘Guess Who’. Using key technical vocabulary children were able to guess each other’s chosen animals by asking a series of questions. There were some excellent questions being asked like, ‘Is your animal a vertebrate?’ and ‘Is your animal cold-blooded?’ We were equally impressed by our year sixes knowledge of a range of species of animals – some budding zoologists in the making!
Year 6 have been enjoying their steel pan drumming lessons.
Steel pan drums are thought to have originated from West African drums. They were developed in the Caribbean country of Trinidad and Tobago during the 20th century and are the national instrument. The surface of the metal is hammered out into a series of dents which each produce different sounds when hit by the beaters.
Steel pans come in all different sizes and can produce different notes depending on the size of the drum. They are often played in an ensemble called a steel band and are an integral part of Caribbean music. Have a look at the drums which our year sixes have been playing! This week they have been using lots of concentration when learning how to play different scales.
This week, Year 6 demonstrated excellent problem solving skills and used trial and improvement to find a solution when taking part in our whole school maths investigation – ‘Frogs’! Children were able to think strategically and work very systematically, whilst also developing their own recording system.
Our amazing teaching team have been painting self-portraits after school today for our Colours of Queen’s Hill art project. They’ll be going on display in the main entrance next week.
The Colours of Queen’s Hill is a wonderful art project for our whole-school community, where everyone will be creating their own self-portrait to celebrate individuality and diversity, inspired by the work of artist Angélica Dass.
Year 6 have had a fantastic start to the year and have quickly settled into life as role models to the rest of the school! This week, children have been taking part in our whole school Art project, ‘The Colours of Queen’s Hill’, inspired by Angélica Dass and the Humanae Project which celebrates the diverse beauty of human skin. Using only blue, yellow, red and white, children experimented and mixed their unique skin tones. We have had excellent, mature conversations in class around identity too. We cannot wait to see the self portraits they produce!
We would like to wish our year sixes the best of luck as they move on from Queen’s Hill today. Here are some pictures from the end of their water fight this afternoon – Mr Cross and Mr Hann even got involved too!
Year 6 had a wonderful morning in the sunshine at the Orchard today. They were able to fix the tree labels they made last year directly onto the steel mesh of the tree guards using zip ties through pre-drilled holes. They also participated in a ‘hands on’ conservation work activity making bee hotels and signs to welcome the bees! Children then had a tour of the site and were given some background information on the conservation work that has been going on in the park. Thank you to the volunteers who facilitated the visit, the children had a really great time and it was a lovely way to complete the project started by last year’s Year 6 children who planted the trees in the Summer term of 2022!
