June 2021
June has been an action packed month for Leicester class. We have been busy completing work based on our latest butterfly 'Unity in Diversity'. We had hoped to embrace the Olympic games in Tokyo, however with the delayed competition we had settled with using previous Olympics as our stimulus.
English
In English, we had used major events in previous Olympic games to create recounts, writing in the role of a sports journalist. We focused on using past tense verbs (recognising when to use past perfect or past progressive verbs) and prepositions to show cause. To make sure Mr Roberts recognised how old he actually was, we begun with an event before all of his class were even born - Christine Ohuruogu winning 400m gold at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. We moved onto the 2012 Olympics, recounting Usain Bolt setting the current Olympic record in the 100m final (all with his shoelace untied), before moving onto Team GB's very own Adam Peaty breaking his own world record to win gold in the 100m breaststroke at the 2016 Rio Olympics.
Maths
In mathematics, Leicester class had revisited learning from throughout the year to apply their understanding to solving problems. We covered a wide range of topics from counting backwards through negative numbers, to using known facts to solve increasingly difficult problems. For example, if I know 4 x 3 = 12 then I should be able to solve 400 x 3, or 40 x 30, or even 0.4 x 0.3.
R.E
In religious education, we looked at a world faith. We learned about the core beliefs of Hinduism and how their beliefs impact their lives. We discussed the core belief of Atman (the divine spark of Brahman that in inside all living things) and how people behave as a result. We also used the famous parable (the blind men and the elephant) to discuss how Hindus view or represent their belief in God/Brahman.
Science
In science, we have been researching how environments change. We identified that lots of change occurs naturally (tides, weather, availability of food sources) before highlighting the impact of humans on the environment. In order to make it meaningful, we discussed where the new building should be developed, as we need to replace the crumbling St Christopher's. Our choices where either the playground, or the field. In order to assess the impact of our choice, we visited forest school to identify any living things that may be affected by our choice. We also looked at current plans to develop the green belt (natural land surrounding London) and emphasised the impact urbanisation would have on the living things around us. We had a debate, highlighting the pros and cons of each choice, before deciding by majority vote, that we would be better off to lose a playground than to develop on the field.
CCCS
After becoming experts in arguing during our science topic, we also decided to have a debate for CCCS. We watched an interview from 2013 of a fresh faced Mayor of London, talking about the legacy of the London Olympics in 2012. We discussed whether we should just believe everything the Mayor was saying or whether we should scrutinise his account as everything seemed amazing. We discussed that some sources will be biased (I mean why would the man responsible for spending 9 billion pounds on the Olympics say it was a bad idea?) before looking at a range of sources to make up our own mind. Nearly ten years on from the 2012 Olympics; going back to a time when half the class where still waiting to be born; we identified that there is undeniable facts to support a legacy, although it is starting to fizzle out, with less and less people participating in sports since 2012.