Year 6 Summer Curriculum Letter

Summer 2018 – Curriculum Newsletter

YEAR 6

Dear Parents,

At the start of a new term it is useful to know about each year group’s routines and curriculum information.  The Summer Term is a pinnacle term for Year 6.  It involves the children taking the National Tests and their final levels being submitted.  It is, therefore, vital that the children remain focused for the duration of the year to ensure that they achieve their predicted levels.

As such, the first half term will focus on developing and embedding test skills and revising the curriculum that the children have covered in lessons during Spring and Autumn Term.  Following this, the children will then have opportunities to demonstrate fully the levels they will receive at the end of the year through different activities across a range of subjects.  For the first half term, the children will remain on the project, ‘From Nazi to NASA’.

The second half term will offer the children opportunities to have more input into their project, which will be ‘H₂wOah’ and will focus on water.  It is during this term, that they will also work on their Leavers’ Concert, which will give them the chance to showcase themselves to their parents, peers and staff.

 

Our main project during the Summer Term will be…

H₂wOah

LITERACY – Where appropriate, Literacy is linked to our class project work. This allows us to establish meaningful contexts in which to develop oracy, reading and writing skills. We will be encouraging the children to share their ideas for genres and texts that we could cover in the summer term, but potential options include ‘The Watertower’ and various information texts exploring the mysteries of Atlantis.  We will continue to develop the children’s narrative writing skills and explore the language features associated with a range of non-fiction genres.

READING: The children will continue to take part in reading activities related to their main class texts but also take part in daily whole-class guided reading sessions. We will be continuing with our current book ‘Goodnight Mister Tom’.  Pupils are expected to read at home under the guidance of parents and can select from books in school and/or their own reading material.

SPELLINGS:  Pupils will normally bring home spellings to learn on a Friday to be tested on the following Friday.

NUMERACY

We follow the teaching objectives outlined in the Programme of Study for Mathematics. Class lessons include mental maths activities followed by a main teaching activity. During the Summer Term the children will continue to develop their understanding of place value, time, written methods, fractions, decimals and percentages; alongside improving their application of shape, space and measures. Pupils are required to learn their tables on a regular basis. Pupils’ mental maths skills will usually be tested for speed and accuracy on a Friday.  A weekly times table test is also undertaken on a Friday.  In the summer term project, children will have opportunity to apply their maths skills to design a pier for Cardiff Bay.

SCIENCE

Our science curriculum during the first half of Summer Term will be covered through our theme ‘To Infinity and Beyond. This topic will focus on space, including orbits, UV light and the formation of volcanos.  Following this, the children will move onto their ‘Water Wonders’ topic which will look closely at the water cycle, adaption of animals and food webs and chains.

WELSH

Welsh this term focuses on holidays.  The children are working hard on their oracy and will be taking on the roles of a travel agent and customer to organise their own holidays.  They will also be writing postcards from their destination.

ICT

Throughout our project the children will use Word and PowerPoint to plan, create, develop and combine information with a sense of purpose and awareness of audience. Additionally, the children are now accessing spreadsheet programs such as Excel.  In the summer term, children will have opportunity to develop and apply their coding and stop-frame animation skills.

ART, DESIGN TECHNOLOGY, RELIGIOUS EDUCATION, HISTORY, GEOGRAPHY,

These curriculum areas will be informed greatly by the children’s own ideas.  Following discussion and various activities with the children later this half-term, additional updated information will follow outlining some of the activities we will be getting up to in the second half-term.

ESDGC/PSE

Children will be encouraged to empathise with others’ feelings and experiences; understand that there is value both in the similarities and the differences between aspects of life in different countries and understand that the behaviour of individuals has an effect on the lives of others.  Focus will be given this term predominantly to thoughts and feelings surrounding the transition to High School.

PE

P.E. lessons are on a Thursday afternoon (outside) and a Friday morning (inside). I would be grateful if you would ensure that the children have appropriate kit in school on these days, in particular a warm kit for games outside during colder days. The children will be reminded of the school health and safety policy of no jewelry being worn during these lessons.

PUPIL VOICE

At Glasllwch School we continue to adapt and improve our school curriculum to encompass the interests and experiences of the children.  We believe that asking pupils about what they would like to learn is fundamental to providing an engaging and inspiring curriculum. Please discuss with your child what they would like to learn about during our project as there will be lots of opportunity for us to explore the children’s ideas during this project.

HOMEWORK

In addition to learning spellings and practising multiplication and division facts, we may ask for your support in helping your child with the above projects in different ways.  The homework for this half-term will focus on preparation for the national tests in May.

It is important that we continue to work in partnership in order for your child to flourish and reach his or her potential. If you have any questions concerning your child’s education, do not hesitate to contact me.

Yours sincerely,

Miss Cornelius  and Mrs Logan

(Year 6 Teacher)     (HLTA and Welsh Coordinator)