Humanities

PRE-SCHOOL

Through the year, our Pre-School children learn about what life is like in different countries around the world as well as learning about different festivals that take place such as Diwali and Chinese New Year.

Our Upper Pre-School children showed a real interest in weddings earlier in the year, and went to the School Chapel to re-enact a wedding ceremony. They decorated a wedding cake, made invitations and flower arrangements, and some children even made their own wedding outfits by sewing their chosen fabrics. Rev. Katy showed the children photos of actual weddings that had taken place in the Chapel during one of her weekly assemblies.

The children learnt about the Queen and celebrated her Platinum Jubilee, joining Mr Brearey and the rest of KPS for a wonderful picnic. Each Pre-School class made a card which was sent to Buckingham Palace, and we received a much treasured thank you note from the Palace.

HUMANITIES

...we received a much treasured thank you note from the Palace.

RECEPTION

In Reception the children are busy building their knowledge and understanding of the world around them.

They learn to talk about their own personal past and love to tell us tales of their adventures. We read lots of stories to find out about different people and places and loved celebrating special days throughout year. During topic work they learnt about famous explorers, past and present, made and followed simple maps and loved learning about Inuit culture.

YEAR 1

During the Spring Term, Year 1 jetted off to a different country around the world each fortnight, learning about their cultures, language and landmarks.

They enjoyed using atlases to locate countries, oceans and continents. To complete our term’s topic of ‘Up, Up and Away’ we visited Bristol Aerospace and the children went on board a real Concorde!

In History, our focus has been on the Victorian era, particularly comparing the seaside and homes then and now. They have studied influential figures from the past including Jacques Cousteau, Grace Darling, inspirational females, Rosa Parks and Nelson Mandela.

In Religious Education children have learnt about different religious celebrations and traditions. They have been reflective in class discussions, listening to other children’s points of view and sharing their own.

Year 1 Topic comments...

Which lesson have you enjoyed the most?

LUCY: ”I loved learning about the different animals on the river as they are so interesting, swans are so graceful.’

Which trip did you enjoy the most?

ROBIN: ”I liked visiting Farley Hungerford Castle as we lifted chain mail!“ LIBBY: ”I liked the boat trip as we had lunch on the boat and we saw lots of lily pads and cormorants, the SS Great Britain was also amazing!“ FREDDIE & ALFIE: ”The horned bridge was cool, so was the cruise ship with a helicopter on top!“ DANIEL: ”The SS Great Britain was massive and it was incredible sailing under the Clifton Suspension Bridge!“

Facts we’ve learn from our Topic lessons this year…

LUCY: ”Swans can break your neck!“ LIBBY & HARRY: ”Fruit bats are pollinators and so are butterflies.“ ALFIE: ”Bees have little suckers to suck the pollen!“ GEORGE: ”In the Middle Ages they used poo for concrete!“

YEAR 2

This year we saw it all, from castles in Term 1 to a trip down the river in Term 3, our Year 2 are adventurous explorers!

What a journey we have been on. We learnt about map symbols and used atlases and created our own imaginary lands.

THOMAS: “I loved learning about Brunel. He was an inventor who changed our lives with train travel.”

TOBY: ‘’I liked looking at the different keys.”

CHARLIE & HARRY: “We liked going under bridges and seeing the SS Great Britain from a boat.”

YEAR 3

Term 1 started with an exploration into the origins of chocolate: where were cacao beans discovered? Who discovered them? And how did they go from being a tiny, bitter bean used by the Mayans as a form of money, into a bar of delicious Dairy Milk that you can buy in the supermarket?

To continue their research into this, Year 3 took a trip to Cadbury World! They learnt all about the history of chocolate including Mayan culture, saw the machines that create all the different Cadbury chocolate bars, and of course got to sample some themselves!

In Term 2 the children dived into a new topic: Footprints from the Past. Everyone had great fun learning about dinosaurs, how they became extinct and how fossils are formed. This was a brilliant opportunity for the children to share their extensive knowledge of dinosaurs and they even got to make their own ‘Top Trumps’ card. They also had their residential trip to Magdalen Farm. The children took part in a host of exciting activities, like den building in a muddy forest, singing silly songs around the campfire, and feeding the farm’s pigs and goats!

During Term 3’s topic, ‘Different People, Similar Lives’ the children enjoyed exploring African culture. They had the chance to immerse themselves in drumming and dance workshops and created some beautiful pieces of woven artwork. They also had fun choosing and researching an African country and the children enjoyed presenting their findings to the rest of the class.

YEAR 4

The Year 4 children have been learning about how the movement of the tectonic plates can cause huge earthquakes, volcanoes and tsunamis that devastate communities across wide areas.

In their study of the geography of our planet, they found out about how the Earth is formed and what causes earthquakes.

LACHIE: ”We used different colours of plasticine to represent the layers of the Earth. We moulded them together then sliced them in half!“

ARTHUR: ”We used biscuits as tectonic plates to see what would happen when they collide, and then we ate them!“

YEAR 5

Georgian topic / River trip

Tudor world was the best! We got to role play and enjoy such an interactive experience!

YEAR 6

We have really enjoyed creating poster and factfiles and PowerPoint presentations for our topic homework all year!

We have enjoyed discussing and debating the ultimate questions in RE!

DID YOU KNOW...

In Japan they have blue traffic lights not green!

Africa isn’t what you think it is.

‘North Korea is a ‘bad’ place as you can’t wear jeans!’

Tudor houses were larger on the top than the bottom as they had to pay for the land underneath the house!

More people live in part of Asia than in the rest of the world.

The true life story of Salva Dut was very inspirational and opened our eyes to the struggles of some people in Africa. The American Museum was brilliant!

Handling the real artefacts and learning about the journey of the first nation Americans was incredible.