Curriculum - Spring Term

Maths

We will continue to follow the Inspire Maths approach so children will be encouraged to use concrete resources, problem solving and reasoning.  We will also encourage children to talk in 'maths sentences' to develop their oracy skills and will continue daily maths meetings to help rehearse and embed other key maths skills such as number recognition and mental arithmetic.
We will begin by continuing the work on money which we started before Christmas. We will then move on to understanding and solving problems associated with length, mass and volume (get the children baking at home!). Towards the end of the spring term we will be moving onto bar graphs.

Literacy

We will be continuing with our Literacy and Language Programme. This term we will study the poems ‘Goodnight Stroud’ by Pie Corbett and ‘Last Night, I saw the City Breathing’ by Andrew Fusek Peters which have been chosen for their similar themes, strong imagery, rich vocabulary and use of powerful personification.  The children will complete a free verse poem about a classroom and school playground coming to life at night.  The Non-fiction section is linked to the ‘cities’ theme of poetry and explores persuasive writing.  Children will write a presentation persuading residents to agree to plans for building a football stadium.

After half-term we explore the work of the author Jeremy Strong, focusing on one of his short stories.  The children will be encouraged to use this and other examples of his work to find out about his style.  They will explore how he uses humour, pace and excitement and will write their own episode of This is NOT a Fairy Tale.  In the non-fiction week, children will write a short biography of Jeremy Strong for the back cover of one of his books.

Creative Curriculum

Our Cornerstones topic this term is Pharaohs. We will travel back 5000 years to the dusty realms of ancient Egypt, cruise along the Nile, entering a world of mysteries and curses, mummies and kings. Children will find out about life on the river’s fertile banks, discovering Egypt and its fascinating culture. They will unravel the secrets of ancient tombs, using historical sources and age-old artefacts and find out about powerful pharaohs and grandiose gods! 

Science

Properties and Changes of Materials (Part 2)

Before Christmas we increased our knowledge and understanding of the properties of various materials. Now we are going to investigate how they change. We will......

• Understand that some materials will dissolve in liquid to form a solution, and describe how to recover a substance from a solution
• Use knowledge of solids, liquids and gases to decide how mixtures might be separated, including through filtering, sieving and evaporating
• Give reasons, based on evidence from comparative and fair tests, for the particular uses of everyday materials, including metals, wood and plastic
• Demonstrate that dissolving, mixing and changes of state are reversible changes 
• Explain that some changes result in the formation of new materials, and that this kind of change is not usually reversible, including changes associated with burning and the action of acid on bicarbonate of soda.

Look out for children trying out some kitchen/ bathroom science at home!

Forces

After half term we will learn that unsupported objects fall towards the Earth because of the force of gravity acting between the Earth and the falling object. We will identify the effects of air resistance, water resistance and friction, that act between moving surfaces. We will recognise that some mechanisms, including levers, pulleys and gears, allow a smaller force to have a greater effect. We will do all of this whilst continuing to develop our skills as scientists.

Future Food project

Summer term is our Allotment topic