Brackenhill Primary School

Science – Evolution and Inheritance.

This half term we have been finding out about Evolution and Inheritance.  As part of our work, we have looked at how scientists know about animals that are extinct and have been for many years.  We found out about fossils and explored lots of different fossils in class.  We discovered that fossils are made over millions of years.  If an animal or plant dies in just the right conditions, over many years a fossil can form.  We had a go at making our own fossils in class and then wrote a brief explanation of what happens.

The children made some observations about their fossils after they had been left for a few days:

The sweets have made an indentation on the bread. (Madeeha)

The sweets have made a mould. (Nina)

The sweets have got smaller. (Hassan)

They’ve shrunk!  (Lara)

It smells!  (Rowan Class)                                                                     

Our topic this half term has been S.O.S.  We have been learning about the doomed maiden voyage of the HMS Titanic in 1912.  We have written a newspaper report about what happened when the ship sank, a diary report as one of the passengers on board and written a discussion about whether the Titanic II (due to set sail in 2020) is a good idea.  We then went on to explore the work of maritime artist Edward Moran and created out own paintings of the Titanic using his style.

Groovy Greeks

In History, we have been finding out all about the Ancient Greeks.  We explored their music (we created our own Greek instruments), their pottery and also used iBook to create our own presentations which included hyperlinks and codes to find out more information from the internet.

To infinity and beyond!

During British Science Week this year, our theme was Space.  Year 6 found out all about Pluto and contributed to our school Science Lab with non-chronological reports all about Pluto.  During the week, we also had the opportunity to visit the Planetarium in school where we found out more about Pluto as well as Space.

We explored the value of different digits in numbers.  We used place value counters to show how different numbers are made up and what the value of each digit actually is.

In Science, we have been looking at light.  We explored how light reflects and also how it bend during refraction.  We found out that when light travels from air into another transparent medium like water it refracts or bends.  We looked at the life of Percy Shaw (the inventor of the Cats Eye) and wrote an information text about Shaw’s life in which we explained how the Cats Eye works using reflection.

As part of our ‘The Journey begins…’ topic we explored Africa and its art.  We researched African Mud cloths and looked at how people in Africa use these to write messages.  We explored mixing colours to create our own cloths.

As part of our PSHCE work, we were visited by The Children Society, a charity that raises awareness about drugs.  During our session we found out about different drugs and the harmful effects they can have.  We talked about the impact drugs could have on our lives as we grow up and also had the opportunity to ask questions.

To start off our ancient Egypt topic, we all took part in an Egyptian morning to help us to understand life in ancient Egyptian times.  Our ancient Egypt experience consisted of five stations: Hieroglyphics, culture, famous monuments, mummification and climate. We took part in activities and research to help us find out more and we used this in our ancient Egyptian non-chronological reports later in the topic.