Keep up to date with all the latest news happening in school at the moment.

• Tennis

  Fri 25 Mar 2022 Mrs McCue

  Saturn are learning to play tennis. We started with throwing and catching before moving on to using a racket. Now we are trying to hit the ball over the net. It is really hard but great fun.

  

• Dissecting Daffodils

  Wed 23 Mar 2022 Mrs Mustard

  This week in Science, Neptune have been learning the scientific names for the parts of a flower. They were given a daffodil to carefully dissect and then had to label each of the parts. Very impressive!

  

• Jupiter's Zoo Trip!

  Wed 23 Mar 2022 Miss Cant

  Yesterday Jupiter had an excellent day visiting Northumberland Zoo. We have been learning all about animals in our topic so we enjoyed seeing some in real life and sharing what we already knew whilst finding out new things too! We got to learn more information about meerkats just like Sunny from our class book. We even met some minibeasts like Albert the giant snail and got to see what they felt like. 

  

• Red Nose Day!

  Fri 18 Mar 2022 Miss Tweedy

  We have had a fantastic day supporting Comic Relief on Red Nose Day. Thank you and well done to all those who donated!

  

• Making eCharms!

  Fri 18 Mar 2022 Miss Tweedy

  Earth has worked extremely hard (and had lots of fun) designing, creating and programming eCharms. We have had to think very carefully on what we wanted the eCharm to do and how we were going to make it work using our programming skills. Big thank you to Mrs Dodds for helping us create these amazing prototypes!

  

• Green Trees Schools Award Project

  Fri 18 Mar 2022 Mrs Evered

  Venus have been working on the 'Finding a View' challenge.  We explored the woods from different viewpoints.  What would a bird's eye view be like?  Or a bug's eye view?  We took photos of the interesting viewpoints that we discovered.

  

• Drawing Shapes

  Fri 18 Mar 2022 Mrs McCue

  In Saturn, we have used compasses, protractors, and rulers to draw shapes. We used protractors to measure the angles of our shape. Mrs McCue challenged us to investigate the internal angles of different shapes. We made some interesting discoveries.

  

• Green Tree School's Award Project

  Thu 17 Mar 2022 Miss Bainbridge

  During forest school sessions, Year 6 have been completing a project towards the Green Tree School’s Platinum award! Mercury’s theme was woodland perspectives and how wildlife, trees, plants and nature can all look different if we look at them from a range of angles.  This project interlinked well with Mercury’s art topic of photography, so the children were able to experiment and capture different perspectives using a range of tools.

  Activity 1 – Pre-visit

  To start the project off Mercury had to think about what different wildlife would live in the woods at Washingwell School. Birds, ladybirds, spiders, hedgehogs, squirrels to name a few. We then compared the animals view of the woods and discussed the differences.

  “Birds fly high in the sky, so they would be looking down over the top of the trees.” – LT

  “Squirrels scurry fast, both on the ground and climb up trees so they would get a different view depending on where they were. Sometimes they would be looking up from the ground and other times they could see far in the distance if high in the trees.” – HH

  “Birds get an aerial view of the woods which is why it’s called a bird’s eye view.” – CD

  “Ladybirds are really small and are often found on leaves. Everything would appear massive!” – HC

   

  Activity 2 – Visiting the woods

  Next, we went out to the woods and were asked to sketch 4 different perspectives: 1 from a bird’s eye view; 1 from a bug’s view; 1 close-up shot and 1 capturing the woods from afar. Examples of these perspectives were shown to the us and we were able to think and sketch our own ideas too. As we walked around the woods, some of us had climbed up trees and were sitting on a branch sketching what a bird’s eye view would look like, some were lying on the grass and drawing each blade and others were sketching what flowers would look like from underneath them, as if we were the tiniest of insects climbing the stems.

   

  Activity 3 – Taking photographs

  After we had sketched the different perspectives, we then used cameras to capture the different perspectives and had to make them come alive! Everyone explored the woods capturing a range of photos, some close-ups using the macro setting, using our photography skills and knowledge too, eye-level shots, some used the trees and branches to frame their long shots and some lay on their back and took photos of the canopy from below. Mercury certainly have some aspiring, creative photographers in class!

  Back in the classroom, we printed out our photos and compared and discussed the different views we had captured. There was a great discussion by SR and SD about how intimidated a ladybird would feel if they were crawling on the ground and a human walked past and how large a footprint would be! The most popular view was the ‘bug’s view because everything appeared so large and it fascinated the class as how the woodland can look very different if you are a small insect. HH and LS commented on small insects’ safety and although they can scurry underneath large twigs, they are at risk of being harmed because they are so small.

   

  Activity 4 – Creating our own composition

  Mercury then reviewed our photographs and decided which one we liked the best, what features we liked and disliked and what effect it created. Once we had chosen our favourite photograph, we then made our own composition. As a class we discussed how a perspective can be created into a piece of art. We used a range of media including: paints, watercolours, chalk and pencils. After completing our composition, we then evaluated and reviewed our work. We commented on why we choose this particular perspective and what made it our favourite. We compared our work with classmates and discussed the different media used. Some of us choose watercolours to enhance the painting, as some parts needed the lightest splash of colour, whereas others used chalk and shading to deepen the different shades of the bark in the trees. Some choose not to add colour and wanted to show the outline of the perspective without adding colour.

   

  Sharing our woodland perspectives

  To end our project, we had the pleasure of sharing our work with the Year 3 class, Earth who also took part in a woodland project. We discussed the different woodland perspectives and by simply changing your view or angle, objects and landscapes can look very different. We shared our photographs as well as our compositions and discussed our favourites and asked Year 3 for their feedback on our work.

  We also got the chance to listen and look at the wonderful work Year 3 completed too, all about the wildlife and their habitats.

  

• Fantastic Narratives!

  Thu 17 Mar 2022 Miss Cant

  Jupiter have written their own narrative based on the story We Are Going On A Lion Hunt. They picked their own animal and obstacles, created a story map and then have written their own story. Look at their amazing work! 

  

• Super story maps

  Thu 17 Mar 2022 Mrs Mustard

  Today in Literacy, Neptune have been creating story maps for the opening chapter of the Iron Man. This is a new skill for many of us and we had great fun creating them!