Beech Tree Class Blog 2023-2024
Beech Tree Blog
Weekly Update-16/5/25
Mr Kyriacou (n.kyriacou) on: Beech Tree Blog
Hello everyone,
In our writing, we have started our new unit of work, which will still use the Stone Age Boy story as a launching point. Our new piece of writing will be an adventure story which will start off exactly how the original story does, with the boy falling down, but instead of ending up in the Stone Age, it will be at a completely different point in time. To start with, we looked a WAGOLL adventure story and identified a range of features that have been used within the story. We also looked at the structure of it as well to understand how you develop the story. Then, as a class, we came up with our ideas about which period of time we would like our main character to end up in. We had so many brilliant ideas, which included ending up in 1912 and being on the maiden voyage of Titanic and changing history by making sure it does not hit the iceberg and sink or ending up in Egypt in 1922 to discover Tutankhamun together with Howard Carter.
In our reading, we have continued to read Stig of the Dump, focusing on the fourth chapter. The children really enjoyed commentating and sharing their opinions about that they like about the story so far and why, what they dislike about the story so far and why, any questions they have about the story so far and any recurring patterns that they have noticed. We also focused on retrieval and inference skills, along with using a range of reading skills for 60 second reads.
In maths, we have been focusing on our unit of work on money. This week, we have been working on comparing amounts of money, estimating amounts of money, calculating money and solving problems with money by breaking down those tricky word problems by highlighting the key vocabulary and then using a range of mathematical operations to complete the multiple steps required to solve the problem.
In science, our lesson revolved around the human impact on habitats. This revolved around the negative and the positive impacts and generated a fantastic and stimulating class discussion. The children understood what human beings have done that has negatively impacted habitats and why that has occurred, but they also learnt about what can be done to repair the damage and how the area that has been disrupted due to human interference can be restored back to its original state. The children also learnt what human beings can do on a smaller scale as well which can have a positive impact on the habitat and the living things within it.
Take care,
Mr Kyriacou :)
Weekly Update-9/5/25
Mr Kyriacou (n.kyriacou) on: Beech Tree Blog
Hello everyone,
This week, in our reading, we have continued to read our class novel (Stig of the Dump) and have focused on understanding the tricky vocabulary, using our scanning and retrieval skills to identify a range of similes and then focusing on using inference skills for a range of comprehension questions related to the third chapter of the book. We have also completed reading our third story time book of the year (The Secrets of Vesuvius) and the children really enjoyed it. The book was a sequel to our very first guided reading class novel of the year and the children chose it as our story time book because they enjoyed that first guided reading novel so much.
In our writing, the children have been writing their whole diary entry which has been written from the perspective of Om and they have completed their first draft.They have also used their purple pens to edit and improve the quality of it.
In PSHE, as part of our unit of work on Being My Best, the children were tasked with working out what could be wrong with Harold the Giraffe, who looked very unwell and was lying in his bed at home. The children came up with lots of great ideas about why he could be unwell and in bed. Once we discussed these ideas, we then had super discussion about what Harold could do to make sure that he keeps himself as healthy as possible. The children came up with ideas like: eating healthily and having a balanced diet, good amounts of sleep with a regular sleep routine, good amounts of daily exercise, taking medicine (only when necessary and the appropriate amount) and having good personal hygiene.
In our Fruit and Vegetables art unit lesson for this week, the children have been using a range of different skills to create their own mini clay sculptures based on real peppers in front of them. Although this was challenging for some children, it was great to see their resilience and the lovely pieces that they produced by the end of the lesson.
Take care,
Mr Kyriacou :)
Weekly Update-2/5/25
Mr Kyriacou (n.kyriacou) on: Beech Tree Blog
Hello everyone,
This week, in our reading, we have continued to read our class novel (Stig of the Dump) and have focused on understanding the tricky vocabulary, our summarising skills and our retrieval and inference skills. It’s so lovely to see how much the children are enjoying it!
In our writing, we have focused on placing the events of Stone Age Boy in chronological order, writing in first person, past tense, using fronted adverbials effectively and creating powerful expanded noun phrases with prepositional phrases. The children have produced some super work which will really support them when they begin to write their diary entries.
In maths, we have come to the end of our unit of work on decimals this week. The children have been focusing on comparing decimals, ordering them, rounding them to the nearest whole and focusing on halves and quarters and converting them from fractions to decimals and vice versa. They have continued to work extremely hard, even during some of the more challenging lessons. It's great to see such resilience!
In computing, our unit of work this half term is focused on programming events and actions. This week, the lesson revolved around maze movement. The children learnt how to create their own maze, add their own sprites into the maze and then create the code to allow the sprite to move forwards going up, down, left and right in order to be able to navigate the sprite through the maze and to the other side. The children absolutely loved this and created some fantastic pieces of work! The children were also challenged with making parts of their mazes even more narrow and creating code that would allow them to reduce the size of their sprite in order to allow it to move through without touching the walls of the maze and then increase the size again when there was space to do so.
Take care,
Mr Kyriacou :)