Monarchs (Year 6)

Welcome to Year 6

Our class is called Monarchs and we are taught by Miss Abbott. Miss Bourne is our teaching assistant.

PE

Monarchs have PE lessons on Tuesdays and Thursdays. They are taught by a PE specialist teacher, Mr Milbourn. Children will need to wear their PE kit to school on Tuesdays and Thursdays and will remain in them all day. In the autumn term, Thursday's PE lesson is swimming. Please ensure that they have the correct kit so that they can successfully participate. 

Library

Children in Monarchs will have the opportunity to visit the school library every Wednesday. They will be able to choose a book to take home to read. If they need to change a book, please ensure that they have it in school on a Wednesday.

Home Learning

Give Me Ten - Children are expected to read for at least ten minutes every day and should record this in their reading record. Children should bring their reading record to school every day. In year 6, children are not expected to always read to an adult, however a parent/carer will need to sign their reading record to show that they have read at home. We hope to see lots of children becoming Reading Champions this year! 

Maths Magicians - There are a number of key mathematical facts that children should know and remember. These are, of course, taught in school but it is essential that children practise them at home too. You can find out which facts your child is currently working on by checking their maths record book. This is also where you should record their daily practice. Children's maths record books should be brought to school every day. Children will be quizzed on their maths facts every Friday. As they progress through the different stages of facts, children have the opportunity to earn rewards and work towards becoming Maths Magicians!

Times Tables - Times tables (and the associated division facts) are a vital part of mathematical knowledge and understanding. It is crucial that your child practises these skills at home by logging onto the Times Table Rockstars website daily, for at least ten minutes.

Handwriting - Using www.letterjoin.co.uk, your child can practise their handwriting at home. There are desktop and tablet login details that can be found by clicking on the writing star at the top of the page.

Spelling - In school, we will teach the children spelling patterns and rules. At home, we would like the focus to be on learning and practising the Year 5 and 6 statutory spellings (you can find these by clicking on the spelling star at the top of this page)

English and maths - Children have English and maths written tasks to complete each week. The pages to be completed in their CGP books can be seen below. Home learning is set every Friday and should be handed in the following Wednesday.

Summer 2 Update (July 2024)

I have loved teaching Monarchs this year and this half term the children have continued to amaze me and make me proud as they show our learning powers and values in abundance. The children have demonstrated self-belief, taking to the stage in front of the whole school, as well as parents and carers, in their school production. Climbing walls and kayaks were conquered on our end of year trip and this required the children to show immense resilience, getting back up and trying again when their fears took over. Curiosity has been displayed in lessons time and time again; the thoughtful questions asked by the children often prompt further learning and inspire more discussion. Respect for others is so very important and Monarchs have shown maturity in transition lessons this half term in particular - they have acknowledged other people's opinions, thoughts and feelings about moving onto secondary school and always responded in considered, respectful ways. There are many reasons why I've loved teaching Monarchs this year, but the kindness they show one another daily is one of the most fantastic things to witness. I am sure that the special friendships they have made and maintained during their time at Margaret Wix will continue to blossom even as they move to new schools.

I cannot allow this opportunity to pass by without congratulating Monarchs once again on their wonderful SATs results. We are all so incredibly proud of their success and the progress that they have made this year is outstanding. The children have grown hugely over the past year, academically, socially and emotionally, and they should be delighted with all of their achievements.

In English this half term, the children put everything they have learned into practice in one final piece of extended writing based upon a picture book: 'Night of the Gargoyles' by Eve Bunting. It is a dark, brooding picture book full of figurative language and imagery and, after exploring the text in detail, including taking on the roles of gargoyles in a drama activity, children were tasked with writing a more detailed version of the story. They created menacing atmospheres through their carefully chosen language and developed tension in their story through varied sentence structure. I was on the edge of my seat reading these final narratives!

In maths, we saw the culmination of our enterprise project. The children worked incredibly hard, in their small groups, to create viable businesses selling everything from books and 3D printed toys to candy floss and fizzy drinks. There was also the opportunity to throw wet sponges at teachers which seemed ti attract quite a lot of attention! Together, Monarchs raised over £300 which has paid for their leavers’ party - that’s real-life maths in action! We also entered two teams in the Year Six Herts Maths Challenge and, out of over 200 schools, had two to twenty finishes. Hailey, Alyssa, Dorothy and Isabella came 13th and Mikhail, Allie, Jayden and Thomas came 8th. What a brilliant achievement! 

Science and PSHE lessons this half term have linked together as they have centred on the changes that happen as we grow. The children impressed me with the maturity shown when recapping learning from year 5 about puberty and how best to look after ourselves physically and emotionally during this time, as well as when we learned about reproduction and how babies grow and are born. In addition, we have discussed self-image and how what we see of celebrities or of people online is not always a true reflection of the person. Also, we learned about the pressures that may come as we move on to secondary school regarding our relationships with others. The children were able to think about potential difficulties and also come up with possible solutions.

Geography lessons have involved learning about Britain's National Parks. The children enjoyed finding out about these protected landscapes that include some of our country's most scenic and wild places. The children learned about the importance of conserving the 15 parks to ensure that wildlife and cultural heritage is protected for years to come and also reflected on the importance of their own cultural heritage in the context of this. This tied in nicely with our work during International Week - it was wonderful to hear the children learning about each other's heritages and seeing them dressed in their beautiful colours and clothes.

Monarchs have been learning about 'les vêtements' (clothes) during our French lessons. They have learned how to name a number of items of clothing, describe them using colours and create full sentences to explain what they wear to school/when the weather is good/when it is cold. We also explored the negative form and learned how to say what we do not wear. The addition of using adjectives to describe the colours of our clothes provided an interesting learning point as we found that the spelling of the colours changed depending on whether the noun being used was masculine or feminine. Adjectival agreement is not something we have to consider in English so this provided a new challenge for many of us.

RE lessons have continued to focus on Islam and whether belief in Akhirah (life after death) encourages Muslims to lead good lives. We spent time reflecting on our own personal beliefs and identified similarities and differences between us all. Regardless of faith, we noted that we all endeavour to lead good lives and our school learning powers and values help us to do this too. 

In DT, the children were involved in making food for our volunteers afternoon tea party. The children baked cakes and cookies which involved following a recipe closely, measuring ingredients accurately and using a variety of implements to combine ingredients and ensure they were successfully cooked and decorated. Children then took part in the afternoon tea party, serving our volunteers and thanking them for supporting the school this year.

In PE this half term, the children have loved completitng a leadership unit of work which has involved a variety of team games. Mr Milbourn has reported that he has been impressed with the class' ability to work together and support each other. Of course, sports day was a highlight for many: the children performed brilliantly amassing a huge number of points for their houses. We saw great sportsmanship with the children encouraging each other too, which was fantastic and helped to make it a great day. A number of children also took part in the District Sports Athletics Competition this half term. The children represented the school brilliantly in each event and we even came away with a few podium finishes: Thomas came 2nd in the boys 600m, Duchess came 2nd in the girls 100m, and Anna, Isabella, Duchess and Rose came 1st in the girls 4x100m relay earning a trophy for Margaret Wix. We are all so proud! We’ve also finished the year off with Bikeability - cycling proficiency training that ensures children are confident and competent cyclists on the roads.

Of course, we enjoyed a fantastic few days away in Lee Valley at Herts Young Mariners for our residential trip. This was an awesome experience and the children enjoyed kayaking, climbing, archery, raft building and bellboating. Despite a few rain showers, Monarchs threw themselves into every activity and ensured that they got the most out of the experience. I loved seeing the smiles on faces as children tried new things, conquered fears, spent time with their friends and just had the most wonderful time. It was a pleasure to accompany your children on this trip, where they hopefully made lasting memories.

We dedicated a large portion of our time this half term to rehearsing the songs, dances and scenes for our end of year production, 'Matilda',  and I am sure that you will agree that the children's hard work paid off - what a show it was! The wonderful thing about performances like this is that it often gives children the chance to shine in new ways. There were a number of pupils who surprised me with the confidence shown in being in the spotlight - something that they had often shied away from previously - and they actually made me well up. We were made to laugh out loud during the show with the impeccable comedy timing of some children. Others gave me goosebumps with their beautiful singing, especially the soloists who showed immense courage in stepping forward to sing alone. The dancing was fantastic and I noticed members of the audience couldn't resist joining with the actions and clapping too. The children also had a hand in making props and Marcus, Ed and Jack did an amazing job ensuring that these, the backdrops and the music were all perfect; the show wouldn't have been complete without this. There was a real buzz in the air and that was created by the children and the brilliant performances they gave - I couldn't have asked for anything more and I hope that the memories of the show remain with the children for a long time to come!

Of course, as the year comes to an end, especially in year 6, it can be a sad time for the children as they leave our lovely school community. The leavers' assembly on Thursday will give them an opportunity to share some of their memories from their time at Margaret Wix and I'm sure will result in a few tears too. However, the assembly will also give us the chance to celebrate the awesome young people that we have had the pleasure of working with and have seen accomplish a great deal academically, socially and emotionally. The leavers' party is something we are all excited for and it will give this fantastic group the chance to celebrate their successes together in a fun-filled evening (6-8pm on Thursday). The end of the year is also full of traditions such as signing shirts and this will happen on the morning of Friday 19th July so please make sure that your child is wearing a clean white school shirt and has a permanent marker pen/fabric pen with them. 

I cannot emphasise enough what a pleasure it has been to teach your children this year. They are a credit to you with their positive attitudes, kindness, determination to succeed and more! Thank you parents and carers for your support this year; helping your children to reach their full potential really is a team effort. I am sure that each and every one of them will go on to achieve amazing things at secondary school and I cannot wait to hear about it. Please do keep in touch!

Wishing you all a wonderful summer,

Miss Abbott 

Summer 1 Update (May 2024)

The first half of the summer term seems to have whizzed by! Time and time again, Monarchs have made us incredibly proud as they have shown kindness and respect to others, displayed curiosity in their learning and demonstrated increasing self-belief and resilience when taking on challenges, particularly whilst tackling SATs this month. We are all so proud of how Monarchs faced SATs week with such determination to succeed and used the tests as an opportunity to show off everything that they have learned throughout KS2. The end of SATs week saw the children receiving their leavers hoodies and enjoying a slice of cake as a reward for their efforts. 

English and maths lessons this half term predominantly involved recapping much of this year's learning in order to prepare the children for their SATs tests. It was important to have a good understanding of grammar and arithmetic, in particular, in order to feel as confident as possible. We focused on areas that we know are frequently tested, including lots of work on fractions, decimals and percentages. Monarchs impressed us with their determination to succeed throughout.

Since completing SATs, Monarchs have begun a unit of work on financial maths, including role-playing running a household for a month, deciding how to spend a £2000 income. It was interesting to see most children being quite frugal and avoiding spending too much on things they did not need... I wonder whether they'll keep that sensible attitude when they actually have money burning a hole in their pockets! Of course, the highlight of our maths work has been beginning our young enterprise project during which the children have started to develop their own small businesses. We are looking forward to continuing this after half term as we hope to raise lots of money to put towards our leavers' party at the end of the year.

In science, this half term, we have been learning about the circulatory system. So far, children have learned that the heart is a muscle that works as a pump forcing blood around the body. We learned about the properties of blood and even 'made our own', using items such as food colouring, Cheerios and mini-marshmallows to represent the different components. The children discovered that our circulatory system ensures that organs around our body are supplied with necessary nutrients and oxygen and found out that our heart works at a faster rate (recorded as beats per minute) when exercising. 

History lessons have been focused on the British empire. We learned why Britain wanted an empire and used our geography skills to find and label the countries that were part of the empire on a world map. I was especially impressed by Monarchs as we learned about the Transatlantic Slave Trade and the part the British Empire played in this. The children discussed their feelings of upset, anger and disappointment in learning that, as well as invading and colonising almost a quarter of the Earth's population, we were responsible for enslaving millions of African people over a course of approximately 300 years. The children were pleased to learn that countries regained independence and now Britain is part of a much friendlier group of countries - the Commonwealth - that work together towards shared goals.

Our RE lessons this term have allowed us to revisit previous learning about the five pillars of Islam as we reflected on the the question: does Akhirah (life after death) help Muslims to lead good lives? We were lucky enough to be joined by Mikhail's mum who helped us to understand how Muslims live by the five pillars every day. She talked to us about her belief in paradise, showed us prayer mats and photographs of her and Mikhail during pilgrimage. Upon reflection, we found that, despite members of our class following different religions (or none at all), there were many similarities between between our personal beliefs in what living a good life looks like and what motivates us to try to do good each day.

We have continued to enjoy French lessons in Monarchs, learning how to describe our homes this half term. We found out how to ask someone where they live and also how to respond when asked. We now know the names of ten different rooms found in homes and can say which we do and do not have. The children particularly enjoyed a catchy song, 'Ou habites tu?', which helped them to remember how to say if they live in a house or flat and whereabouts it is located.

In computing, we have enjoyed using micro:bits this half term. We have learned that micro:bits are input, process, output devices that can be programmed. We found out how to write algorithms that caused the micro:bits to perform a range of functions including: lighting up in different patterns, displaying text, acting as a compass and more. We have also been learning about online safety, including how quickly information can be shared online. We were shocked to see just how far our Facebook post travelled in 24 hours, reaching Australia, Hong Kong, Canada and more! This really helped us to see how important it is to consider our online footprint and think carefully before posting or interacting with anything online.

Relationships has been the focus of PSHE lessons this half term. The children have engaged in meaningful discussions about mental health and identifying causes of anxiety as well as sources of support. Children learned how to deal with conflict, builds assertiveness skills and identify their own strengths and strategies for building self-esteem and resilience.

In art lessons, Mrs Campbell-Pugh was impressed with Monarchs' turtle sketches that built upon skills previously taught through artist studies. The children then explored varied techniques using water colours to add colour to their artwork. The finished paintings were later displayed and sold in our art exhibition in order to raise awareness and money for sea life conservation.

This half term's DT project involved children designing and creating their own playground structures. Monarchs made their structures using a range of materials such as wood, cardboard and stone. The children learned to safely use a variety of tools, including coping saws, bench hooks and glue guns, in order to produce their structures. Finally, they made a range of landscape features to enhance their apparatus.

Mr Milbourn has enjoyed teaching the children athletics in PE lessons this half term. Monarchs have perfected their sprinting technique, learned how to successfully pass a baton in a relay, and found out how important it is to pace themselves during a long-distance race. The children have developed their abilities in field events too, tackling their tricky triple jump and high jump with great determination. We are looking forward to some of our pupils putting these skills into practice as they compete in the district sports athletics competition next half term.

Monarchs have enjoyed the expert music tuition of Mr Mitchell again this half term, using games to help understand rhythmic notation as well as continuing to enjoy the opportunity to play a variety of instruments. I was so proud and impressed of their improvised work during the spring music concert and am excited to see what our talented musicians produce in the summer.

Finally, Monarchs finished the half term by auditioning for our end of year production and finding out their roles. Mrs Gibbs and I were impressed by children who pushed themselves out of their comfort zones, read lines clearly and who confidently sang in front of their peers. There were even a few people who had already begun to learn the script by heart! Well done to all pupils who auditioned - putting yourself forward for something is not always easy, but the growing self-belief that you showed during the process was excellent and made us look forward to getting stuck into putting the production together next half term. It's going to be great!

Thank you parents and carers for your continued support this half term; together we can help your child reach their full potential. We hope that you have a restful and well-deserved break over half term. Well done for all your hard work, Monarchs; we look forward to seeing you again on Tuesday 4th June.

Kind regards,

Miss Abbott

Spring 2 Update (March 2024)

The second half of the spring term has been jam-packed - we have managed to fit so much learning into such a short few weeks! This half term has required a lot of hard work as we head towards SATs, including a week of mock tests during which the children tried their best to show off everything that they have learned so far. All children have made improvements since the autumn term, but every child will be bringing a letter home detailing a few key areas that we would welcome your support with over the Easter holidays. As well as the links on the letter, the 'Five a Day' SATs revision booklet I made for the children (that most of you received at parent consultations or your child recently brought home) will help them to rehearse key skills. In working together, we are sure that we can give the children the best possible chance of reaching their full potential.

Since February half term, in English lessons, Monarchs have enjoyed exploring a range of texts and completing writing in different genres. Our Book Week text, 'The Tin Forest', provided us with opportunities to write about sustainability. Through the beautiful illustrations, we considered what our world could become and wrote descriptively about dull, grey, polluted settings and our wishes for them to be transformed into vibrant, luscious lands.  Following this, we moved on to learning how to write discussion texts. We explored a range of books about refugees and asylum seekers including 'The Island' and 'The Arrival'. The children were able to use emotive language to manipulate the bias of the reader and ensure they were on the refugee's side. They then showed great sensitivity when writing discussion texts based on this topic; the children had to write using a formal tone, from different perspectives, before including their own point of view. I have been so impressed with the oracy skills that have been showcased during this unit of learning too, as children have sensitively talked about the topics of refugees, conflict, migration and displacement, showing our learning power of respect for others at all times. We have focused on listening to and building on others ideas as well as giving reasons for our opinions and it has been clear that Monarchs have been trying hard to do this in our class discussions.

We have continued to work hard in maths this half term, tackling a range of topics. We learned how to multiply and divide fractions, calculate ratios and proportions, work out the volume of 3D shapes and convert metric units of measure. Once again, I have been impressed by the resilience shown by the children as they tackled tricky, new content. Some of this learning gave them opportunities to revise previously taught concepts too, increasing the children's confidence in key areas.

In science, our topic this half term was 'electricity'. During this, we recapped learning from previous years regarding how to make and draw simple circuits, using the correct scientific symbols. We have loved the practical elements of this unit of work, and have persevered when we came across broken bulbs or missing batteries that could have set us back! We have investigated the impact of more or fewer batteries in a circuit on the brightness of bulbs and loudness of buzzers and we loved making a human circuit and seeing how the electrons passed around our circle to light up our energy stick.

Our geography topic this term has seen us learning about Fair Trade. We discovered one of the oldest trading routes in the world: the Silk Road. We compared this to modern trade in which commodities are regularly imported and exported by container ships. It was interesting, and somewhat surprising, to find out some of our our most popular imports, included toys and games from China, and some of our most popular exports included Scottish salmon! Comparing the lives of two banana farmers in St Lucia enabled us to learn about Fair Trade - we were shocked to find out that many farmers only receive 10% of what their product sells for in the UK. We felt this was unfair and so were pleased to find out about the work of Fair Trade foundation. We spotted their logo on a number of products and want to keep an eye out for this when we shop in the future.

In computing, this half term, we have learned about spreadsheets and how they can be used to perform calculations with large amounts of data. We began focusing on using cell references to multiply, divide, add or subtract data, before moving onto more complex functions such as finding the average of a data set. As our skills improved, we looked at larger data sets and eventually managed to plan a party using a spreadsheet, working out the costings per person.

Our RE lessons this half term focused on Christianity and we have been trying to answer the question: 'Is Christianity still a strong religion 2000 years after Jesus was alive?' During this unit of work, we have found out about Christian celebrations, teachings and places of worship and reflected on how Christians are sometimes treated by others. It is always pleasing to hear the children thoughtfully share their own ideas and respectfully make comparisons to their own beliefs and experiences during these lessons.

This half term's PSHE topic was 'Healthy Me'. We have learned about the risks and effects of alcohol and drugs on our bodies and considered the pressure to take part in anti-social behaviour, for example by joining a gang. I was extremely impressed with the considered discussion and thoughtfulness surrounding these mature themes.

Music lessons this half term have seen the children showing great skill on a range of instruments in Mr Mitchell's lessons. They have been working to keep a beat and have had opportunities to improvise too.

In PE, the children have developed their understanding of tennis and hockey skills and games with Mr Tate. They have learned the rules of the games as well as practising their forehand, backhand, passing, dribbling and shooting skills before applying these to game scenarios. Mr Tate has seen great skill, teamwork and sportsmanship that has really impressed him.

Art lesson with Mrs Campbell Pugh have been thoroughly enjoyed by all. The focus has been on graffiti art and the children have used a range of media to create graffiti artwork of their own.

What a busy half term it has been! Your children have been a credit to you as they endeavour to show our learning powers and values each day while working hard to achieve as highly as possible. Whilst SATs are important in showing the progress that they have made during their time in primary school, we know that there is much more to your children than the results of these tests: at Margaret Wix, we are proud to be developing well-rounded individuals. I hope that everyone has a restful and enjoyable break (with just a little SATs practice) and I look forward to seeing the children again on Monday 15th April.

Kind regards,

Miss Abbott

Spring 1 Update (February 2024)

What a busy half term it has been for Monarchs class once again; despite only being back at school for six weeks, we have managed to enjoy lots of new learning, experience numerous successes and even squeezed in a few enrichment opportunities too. Some visited the Houses of Parliament and Marvellous Maths Week, which involved a magical workshop, was enjoyed by all. We also welcomed PCSO Russo to talk to us about online safety, took part in a computer coding workshop and enjoyed an art workshop as part of Feel Good Week. I have been especially pleased to continue to see the children striving to demonstrate our learning powers and values in everything we have done this half term.

Our English lessons this half term have all been based upon a fantastic text: Arthur Spiderwick's Field Guide to the Fantastical World Around you. This is an enthralling book, with brilliant language, about an amazing collection of magical and mystical creatures. Through reading it, we have been able to develop our understanding of a variety of grammatical techniques including: active and passive voice, subordinating clauses, hyphenated words, pronouns and adverbial phrases used for cohesion, and much more. We also used drama techniques to immerse ourselves in this fantastical world, such as creating freeze frames to show the chaos a mischievous boggart might create in our classroom. This work has then led to us creating our own non-chronological reports about weird and wonderful beasts that we are looking forward to seeing in our very own class book.

We’ve also developed a bigger focus on oracy this term. As a class, we have agreed the following four oracy targets:

We practise them explicitly each day when we take time to discuss current affairs after watching Newsround and are also striving towards them in every classroom discussion. Please encourage your child to think about our oracy targets when they are talking to you at home too; being great orators is key to success in later life.

Maths this half term has involved recapping previously taught content, aiming to ensure that the children feel as confident as possible in key areas such as calculation strategies, so that they can apply their knowledge and understanding in other, new contexts. We're also tackled a range of new topics including: long division, BIDMAS and algebra, angles and area and perimeter. Whilst some of this learning has proved challenging, I've been impressed by the resilience shown and the desire to improve.

In science, we have learned about light this half term and have particularly enjoyed the opportunities for practical work: we made our own periscopes, investigated shadows, created our own optical illusions and explored how refraction can be used to create a 'magical' tricks such as making a coin 'disappear'. Monarchs had excellent knowledge about how light travels in straight lines and opaque objects create shadows, but there were a few surprises for the children too - did you know that our eyes actually see objects upside down? Monarchs learned about the different parts of the eye, including the optic nerve that sends rapid messages to our brain, which then quickly flips the image to ensure we do actually see it in the correct orientation! Amazing!

We delved into the world of the 'Shang Dynasty' during history lessons this half term. We held 'dragon bones', learned how they revealed much about this ancient dynasty and found that they were used by Shang people to ask questions of their ancestors. We looked at a variety of secondary sources to find out what life was like for emperors and farmers during this time period and were able to identify similarities and differences between them. We were interested to find out about the rise and fall of the Shang Dynasty and learned about the perfect first emperor, King Cheng Tang, who had many desirable qualities. We compared him to King Di Xin, who was a terrible ruler and whose actions resulted in the downfall of the dynasty. Finally, we found out about Fu Hao, a female army general who was in charge of around 13,000 troops. Considering attitudes towards women during this time period, we were surprised that a woman had managed to reach such an esteemed position. It was interesting to see pictures of her tomb, through which we were able to infer much about her life. There has been great interest and curiosity shown during history lessons this term.

RE lessons have been centred around the question: 'Is anything ever eternal?'. During this unit of work, we have found out about the Christian perspective on eternal life and eternal love, but also reflected on our own beliefs. RE lessons often prompt interesting discussion as the children share their own thoughts and I have been pleased to see how respectfully they have listened and responded to one other. 

Our PSHE lessons have been focused on dreams and goals. We started our topic by thinking about our long term goals, learning that these needed to be realistic and that we would need to work hard to achieve them. We have aspiring lawyers, authors, gymnastics coaches, footballers, artists, teachers, and more in Monarchs! Next, we reflected on the world around us and things that may concern us such as war, poverty or natural disasters. We thought about our hopes and wishes for the world and what we might be able to do to support others. 

Our computing lessons this term have involved using software called 'Scratch' to programme variables in our own games. We had great fun testing out a variety of games and then seeing how we could create our own versions. We had to programme the games ourselves and, as a result, could make a variety of things happen including creating our own scoring system, changing features after reaching a certain total, some of us introduced a timed element to our games, others enjoyed creating sounds that they programmed to play when certain events happened. Of course, we all very much enjoyed testing out and playing our games too!

I have been impressed with the enthusiasm shown in French lessons over the past half term as we have learned how to answer the question: quelle est la date aujourd'hui? Through various speaking, listening, reading and writing tasks, Monarchs have learned: the days of the week; months of the year and numbers to 31, which they can now confidently use. For example, we were able to ask each other when our birthdays are and responded in French. I have enjoyed hearing the developing French accents and the confidence in speaking another language is growing - c'est super Monarchs!

We have enjoyed music lessons with Mr Mitchell this half term. He has commented often on how the music that he is teaching Monarchs to play on a variety of instruments is much more advanced than what he is able to teach year six pupils at some of his other schools. With the number of children attending choir and band club, it's clear that we have some very talented musicians in Monarchs and I always feel incredibly proud when I go to collect them a few minutes early and get to hear a snippet of what they have been working on - it sounds great and I'm sure you will also be looking forward to hearing the final masterpiece at our Spring music concert next half term.

Art lessons with Mrs Campbell-Pugh have involved both photography and drawing this half term. After exploring some of the most famous paintings in the world, such as the Mona Lisa and The Scream, the children posed and took photographs of each other which they have then tried to replicate through drawing. They have really focused on ensuring accurate proportions and their creations are coming along very nicely indeed! In DT this half term, some of the children designed and made their own waistcoats. Mrs Rose worked with the children to show them how to use a pattern to mark the reverse of the fabric, how to use different stitching techniques, and how to sew on buttons and other decorations. The children were (rightly so) very proud of their finished creations.

Mr Tate has enjoyed teaching dance during PE lessons this half term. The lessons have definitely pushed a number of the children outside their comfort zones, but I have been proud of how they have persevered and shown self-belief. The teamwork demonstrated in creating and performing their carnival dance routines has been equally impressive.

As well as all of this, we squeezed in a second practice SATs week. I have been so pleased to see the growing resilience and determination to succeed has resulted in improved scores from so many children. I know that tests can often be daunting but, hopefully, through this regular practice the children will continue to grow in confidence and approach the real SATs full of self-belief. Your child should have brought home their arithmetic paper to have a look at with you - please support them over half term in correcting mistakes that they made and then use additional resources (found by clicking on the KS2 SATs star at the top of this page) to practise further, hopefully ensuring that they can score as highly as possible on the arithmetic paper.

I am sure that you will agree with me saying that I think Monarchs have worked hard this term! We have covered so much in such a relatively short space of time and I am enjoying seeing the progress the children continue to make. I hope that, as well as practising their arithmetic, the children enjoy a well-earned break over half term and I look forward to seeing them all refreshed and ready to tackle more learning when we return to school on Monday 26th February. As always, thank you parents and carers for your support this half term - together we can help your child reach their full potential.

Kind regards,

Miss Abbott 

Autumn 2 Update (December 2023)

I am struggling to believe that we have reached the end of the autumn term! The past few months seem to have flown by and the children are now a third of the way through year six! What a wonderful first few months it has been. I have loved continuing to see the children embrace everything that Margaret Wix has to offer, demonstrating our learning powers and values at all times. Monarchs have shown: kindness when supporting younger pupils on the playground at lunchtimes each day; curiosity during Aspirations Day and on our trip to the Natural History Museum; respect for others during Anti-Bullying Week when identifying what bullying is and how our differences should be celebrated; self-belief and resilience in their learning, particularly while tackling their first set of practice SATs. The results show some fantastic progress already; I can't wait to see what the rest of the year will bring.

In English, this half term, we have explored poetry, narratives and persuasive writing. During the week of Armistice Day, we spent time reading a poignant story called 'Where the Poppies Now Grow'. This gave us ideas for our own writing, including descriptive and emotive language. Cinquain poems, which we were focused on, have a specific syllable structure so we then spent time ensuring that each line of our poems was the correct length. We shared some of our completed work with the rest of the school in our Remembrance Day assembly. We enjoyed a unit of work based upon 'Uncle Montague's Tales of Terror' - a series of chilling short stories - during which we wrote our own spooky narratives. We studied extracts from other literature and films that built tension and suspense too, focusing on the grammatical techniques used by authors to create their spine-tingling tales, including using show not tell, vivid description and a variety of sentence structures before putting what we had learned into practice.In the final weeks of term, Monarchs have used everything they have learned in their geography lessons to help them write letters to members of parliament in order to try to persuade them to take action against climate change. We focused on writing with a formal tone as well as using techniques such as emotive language, rhetorical questions and flattery to persuade our reader. I think Rishi Sunak and Daisy Cooper are going to find it very difficult to ignore Monarchs and their pleas!

Maths this half term, has seen Monarchs tackle fractions, decimals and percentages. We've spent a lot of time learning how to calculate each of these separately, but have also had to try to understand how they are all linked and master converting between them. It has required a lot of self-belief and resilience but we have certainly made great strides. As we know that these are three areas of mathematics frequently tested in SATs, in addition to being valuable to understand for real-life contexts such as shopping, we will definitely be revisiting this learning again! In recent weeks, we have also explored multiplication, properties of 2D shapes and learned how to calculate the area of squares, rectangles, triangles and parallelograms. We've been very busy!

Monarchs have loved being super scientists this half term while learning all about evolution and inheritance. We began this unit of learning by looking at real fossils and coming to understand how they tell us about living things that existed millions of years ago. The children enjoyed a trip to the Natural History Museum in Tring, during which they took part in workshop linked to their topic. Handling specimens, including a monitor lizard and genet, was a highlight for many as we examined them and discussed how the creatures are adapted to suit their environment. Children have also learned how characteristics are inherited, which explains why offspring look like their parents but less like their cousins. The children found this incredibly interesting and reflected on their own families and how members are similar and different.

Geography, as mentioned, has involved us learning about climate change and its impact on our planet. The children have been extremely interested and shocked to learn that heatwaves, bushfires, floods, droughts, polar regions melting and sea levels rising are all results of the way we are mistreating our world. They have drawn upon skills from other areas of the curriculum in these lessons, creating graphs, designing flood defences and more. There are many strong opinions regarding what we should now do as a school to help reduce the impact of global warming; keep your eyes peeled for an update from our Environment Minister in the new year!

In RE, we have been learning about how Christians celebrate Christmas and have been asking if their traditions help them to understand who Jesus was and why he was born. We were interested to find out how a number of Christmas traditions may have originated as religious ways of celebrating at this time of year, but now are enjoyed by many people in a secular way. We created questionnaires to find out if everyone in our class celebrates Christmas and if so how - we heard about lots of lovely family traditions that some children enjoy and are very much looking forward to over the coming weeks. It was also wonderful for children from different faiths to share knowledge of celebrations they partake in and explain how they are similar and different to Christmas celebrations.

Monarchs have continued getting to grips with learning French this half term. Our focus has been on our families: we've learned how to talk about the members of our families, including explaining names, ages and relationships to us. In order to do this, we have had to understand how possessive adjectives change depending on whether they are masculine, feminine or plural. In addition, we have had to learn how to count to 100 in French. Tackling a new language is always challenging, but I've been impressed with how willing the children have been to have a go! 

We have some future computing experts in Monarchs class, I am sure! I have been so impressed with the children's work this half term: they have designed and created their very own websites! Each child chose a subject to create a site about and then they have worked hard to add everything from images and texts to hyperlinks in order to make their websites fully functional. It's been brilliant to see how excited they have been each week to get the laptops out and enjoy developing these skills. Take a look at a few of them that are linked below:

All About Monarchs by Carys

Pandas by Dorothy

All About Bunnys by Alyssa

Our latest PSHE unit of work was titled, 'Celebrating Differences' and we have certainly done that in Monarchs class! We have discussed what makes each of us special and unique, and thought about how these things are positives and shouldn't be used to judge or discriminate against people. The mature discussion that takes place in our classroom every Friday in our PSHE lessons is wonderful and I feel privileged to be involved. I can really see the children taking the time to think carefully before they share ideas and they are all showing great respect when faced with differing opinions.

Mr Tate has been extremely impressed with Monarchs during PE lesson this half term. They have enjoyed developing their gymnastics skills and he has noticed a real improvement in their abilities and teamwork as the half term has progressed. In the second PE session of each week, Monarchs have been honing their swimming skills. This culminated with the sponsored swimming session. The children tried extremely hard to swim as much as possible in order to raise money for our class - thank you to those of you who have already sent the sponsorship money in. If you are yet to, please do so before the end of term.

We have crammed a lot into a busy half term - as well as all the learning taking place in class, we've enjoyed taking part in the Christmas music concert, watching the pantomime and nativity, welcoming parents into our classroom for Wondrous Writing Week, participating in Aspirations Day and Anti-Bullying Week, and much more! The children have certainly earned a rest over the next couple of weeks.
 

I wish those of you who celebrate, a very merry Christmas, and look forward to seeing all of your children again in the new year, feeling refreshed and ready to learn again!

Thank you for your continued support,

Miss Abbott 

Autumn 1 Update (October 2023)

What a brilliant first half term we have had in Monarchs! The children have quickly settled into school routines and shown me what enthusiastic learners they can be. They've risen to the challenge of being top of the school and are striving to always demonstrate our learning powers and values. It was fantastic to see the number of children who wanted to take on leadership roles: our House Captains, Pupil Parliament and Charity Committee are already proving to be be responsible, organising playtime equipment, leading school tours, sharing their ideas with Mrs Gibbs and more. I can't wait to see their impact throughout the year.

In the classroom, the children have been working extremely hard. We have focused on a number of different genres of writing this half term: non-chronological reports about our class butterfly, biographies about Adolf Hitler and narratives based on 'Oliver Twist'. Throughout, we have been concentrating on ensuring that every sentence makes sense and is correctly punctuated as well as trying to widen our vocabularies and make use of ambitious words and phrases. 

Maths this half term has predominantly focused on number and place value. This has involved ensuring that we understand the value of every digit in numbers up to ten million. We have been ordering and comparing numbers, rounding them, multiplying and dividing them by 10, 100 and 1000, and much more! Towards the end of this half term, we revised properties of number, in particular revisiting factors and multiples from learning in previous years. Understanding of this is particularly important as we move onto learning about fractions. I've been pleased to see many children practising their their Maths Magicians regularly at home - this also helps to ensure that they can access our learning in class and feel confident to tackle other areas of maths. Keep it up!

We have been immersed in our World War II history topic this half term. Our young historians have amazed me with the knowledge that many of them already have as well as their determination to find out new information about this interesting period in history. We learned how the war began and which countries were involved, took on the role of evacuees and wrote letters home, made propaganda posters to encourage women to play their part in the war effort, created comic strips depicting the Battle of Dunkirk, compared sources of evidence when predicting who won the Battle of Britain, and much, much more! The highlight, of course, was our WWII day during which we dressed as evacuees, learned how to make do an mend, baked carrot biscuits and even made our own Anderson shelters.

In science, Monarchs have been investigating living things and their habitats. We have learned about classification of living things using keys developed by an important scientist, Carl Linneaus. Searching our school grounds for minibeasts gave us the opportunity to put this learning into action as we identified each of them. We learned that living things were sometimes much smaller! We have carried our two investigations into micro-organisms and found that some types of bacteria can be harmful, whilst others are much more useful. We watched the effect of bacteria on food items over a period of time and saw how mould grew. As well as this, we found out that yeast played a positive role in cooking as it helped us to bake bread that rose.

In RE, this half term, we have been learning about the five pillars of Islam and how Muslims show commitment to God. There are a number of children in class who have been able to act as experts, sharing their own knowledge and experiences with the class. Others have considerately and thoughtfully asked questions to deepen their own understanding of how people show commitment in different ways to themselves. We finished by evaluating whether we believed there to be a 'best' way to show our commitment to something and concluded that time and effort were key. We thought about things that we were committed to, such as learning to play an instrument or attending a club, and how we try to remain committed even when faced with challenges.

In computing, we have been learning about systems and networks, with a focus on communication and collaboration. We learned how data is sent from one computer to another using IP addresses and data packets. We discussed methods of online communication, such as email, social media, video sharing sites, instant messaging, video calls, and more. We thought about the benefits and drawbacks of each method including how private they were and whether they had age restrictions. Next, we used one method of communication, Google Docs, to work on a collaborative project with people who were sitting on opposite sides of the room to us. We linked this learning to French and typed a conversation together.

I've been impressed with the developing French knowledge and understanding in Monarchs. This half term, we have learned how to greet each other and ask someone a variety of questions to find out their name, age, where they live and how they are feeling. WE also learned how to answer these questions too. I have loved seeing the children developing their confidence in French as the half term has progressed - they are now able to have whole conversations!

This half term's PSHE unit was titled 'Being Me in My World' and involved us thinking about our goals for this year as well as universal rights of children and how our behaviour and choices can impact others. We compared things we want with things we need and thought about how there are many people, less fortunate than ourselves, whose needs are not met at all. Our learning extended beyond the classroom this half term with a trip to Crucial Crew. We enjoyed learning about hazards and finding out how to keep ourselves and others safe on our Crucial Crew visit. 

Our PE lessons have included netball and swimming this half term. I have heard lots of great things about the successes in swimming, with children showing great self-belief, swimming further and developing stronger strokes. Netball lessons have included lots of skills development. We've learned different types of passes, developed our shooting technique and learned some of the key rules, such as the three second rule.

As part of Black History Month, the children have created mixed-media portraits of inspirational black women. We used a mixture of paint and collage to depict our famous person. After finding out about our inspiring figure, we added a a title to each of our portraits that included a characteristic that we admired, for example, we would like to 'Resist like Rosa Parks' or 'Care like Mary Seacole'.

It was a pleasure to meet many of you at parent consultations this week. Many of the documents referred to, such as reading lists and questions, and grammar glossaries, can be found by clicking on the relevant star at the top of this page. Thank you for your support this half term - together we can help your children to reach their full potential. 

Finally, what a jam-packed half term it has been; I hope the children enjoy a well-earned break next week and I look forward to seeing them all again on Monday 30th October.

Kind regards,

Miss Abbott