Welcome to the lovely, legendary Leopards!

Miss Kennedy is the class teacher and Mr Dobb is the teaching assistant in Leopards. 

We are beginning our Summer Term in Year 6 with a History-based topic which all of our work will centre around. Our title for the Summer Term is ‘Crime and Punishment – Whose Courtroom was the Cruellest?’. We will be reading ‘Holes’ by Louis Sachar as part of our class book.

We begin our History lessons with exploring what crime and punishment is before developing our understanding of what crime and punishment was like in different time periods: Roman Britain, Anglo-Saxon, Tudor, Victorian and 21st century. We will explore how the police force developed through the 20^th century before making comparisons about crime and punishment today with the past.

In Summer 2, our Geography learning will involve undertaking fieldwork in our school. We will explore how we can be more sustainable by reducing plastic waste. During this topic, we will plan and carry out effective ways to reduce plastic waste in school and we will evaluate the effectiveness of this towards the end.

Our Writing will continue to follow our ‘Pathways to Write’ scheme of learning and our two focus texts will be ‘Plastic Planet and ‘Sky Chasers’.

In Summer 1, our learning will be leading up to writing our own persuasive speech based on ‘Plastic Planet’ campaigning for the reduction in plastic waste to an audience of peers. We will consolidate our learning of our ‘Gateway Keys’ which are extending the range of sentences with a range of conjunctions; using fronted adverbials and pronouns to build cohesion and organising paragraphs around a theme. Our ‘Mastery Keys (year group national curriculum expectations) will focus on: using relative clauses; using a wide range of devices to build cohesion; use a colon to introduce a list and use semi-colons within lists and use hyphens to avoid ambiguity. We will include emotive language, persuasive points and evidence alongside a formal tone to meet the audience and purpose of our text.

In Summer 2, our writing outcome will be to write the next chapter of ‘Sky Chasers’ in the style of the author from two different viewpoints. We will consolidate our learning of basic skills (‘Gateway Keys’) including expanded noun phrases; integrating dialogue to convey character and advance action and using a wide range of cohesive devices. Throughout the unit, we will focus on our ‘Mastery Keys’ where we develop our knowledge of recognising vocabulary and structures for formal speech and writing; identifying the audience and purpose of writing; choosing the appropriate register and using semi-colons, dashes and colons to mark boundaries between independent clauses. Linking to the genre of our writing, we will use paragraphs to vary pace; use dialogue to explain the plot, reveal new information or convey the mood; combine action, dialogue and description and use powerful and varied verbs for action.

Throughout each week, we will be consolidating our SPaG learning through daily SPaG bursts.

Reading this term will be centred around a range of key, engaging texts following the Grammarsaurus Comprehension Crusher scheme. This will help us foster a love of reading. We begin Summer 1 exploring a poem called ‘The Listeners’ before moving onto a non-fiction text ‘New Species Discovered’ which is a recount newspaper report. We will be utilising skills of retrieval, inference, summarising and prediction with a huge focus on vocabulary to build on our ‘Wonderful Words’. We will ensure we build on our skills of fluency and comprehension during each lesson.

In Summer 2, we will look a range of texts including a persuasive advert, a non-chronological report and a playscript. We will be ‘creating connections’ with the text ‘A Visit to the Galapagos Islands’ which is a topic we have previously explored in our Writing unit in Spring 2.

The class stories we have read for pleasure so far are ‘Letters from a Lighthouse’ by Emma Carroll and ‘Kick’ by Mitch Johnson. Next term, we will move on to reading ‘Holes’ by Luis Sachar. As we enjoyed reading ‘Letters from the Lighthouse’ by Emma Carrol, we are excited to read one of her other books in our Writing unit during Summer 1.

We will be beginning the Summer Term by continuing our learning about statistics where we will look at how data can be presented in many ways: bar charts, line graphs, pictograph and pie charts. We will draw pie charts and also look at a range of questions involving numbers and percentages. Throughout Summer 1, we will be consolidating our arithmetic skills weekly and consolidating our learning on fractions, geometry, shape and time. We are looking forward to Summer 2 where we will be taking part in a variety of different projects where we can apply our mathematical knowledge and thinking. The first project we will begin with is a baking project with a focus on measurement and money.

As well as being reminded about the importance of e-safety, in our computing lessons, we will be focusing on programming – sensing movements. This will involve creating a programme to run on a controllable device and lead to designing a project that uses inputs and outputs on a controllable device. In Summer 2, we will be creating media through video production. We will explore how we can capture a video using a range of techniques before improving it through reshooting and editing.

In art, we will be developing our mastery of art and design techniques with a focus on street art. We will use stencils to create street art by applying our knowledge of using art to express ideas. We will focus on using stylised graffiti lettering.

In the Summer Term, we will be using the RE skills developed in our Bible Explorers workshops to answer some big questions and consider the beliefs in action in the world. We will explore what contributions do religions make to local life in Nottinghamshire and develop our understanding of how we can make Nottinghamshire a county of tolerance and respect. We will make links with our ‘Crescent Values’. In Summer 2, we will explore how religions and beliefs respond to global issues of human rights, fairness, social justice and the importance of the environment. We will ask ourselves which is more important – freedom or justice?

Year Six will have PE on a Tuesday which will be outdoors. Please ensure children are coming to school on these days wearing a full PE kit.

In Science, we will learn about 'Electricity: changing circuits’. We will be exploring how circuits work; how we can change circuits and how we can change certain variables to affect the brightness of a lamp. In Summer 2, we will be focusing on ‘Body Health’ where we will explore how we can make healthy food choices and integrate physical exercise into our lives. Creating connections with our DAaRT learning, we will explore how smoking and vaping can affect our lung capacity. This will also link to our ‘Healthy Bodies, Healthy Minds’ learning.

In RSHE, Year 6 will continue to link our ‘Healthy Bodies, Healthy Minds’ learning by thinking about how we can be the best version of ourselves. We will focus on self-respect; the impact of social media on our minds and bodies and we will discuss the terms ‘mental health’ and ‘mental ill-health’.

Linking to E-Safety, we will explore privacy and security where we describe strategies to help us identify online content which can target people to gain money or information illegally. We will also explore copyright and ownership: looking at the use of search tools to find and access online content which can be reused by others. We will explore families and close positive relationships with a focus on how forcing anyone to marry against their will is a crime.

In preparation for transition, we will explore how we can cope with change in Summer 2. We will look at the emotional effects of change and explore how we can best prepare or respond to change which we may experience in our lives. Our ‘No Outsiders’ learning will focus on showing acceptance and democracy. The books we are using for these lessons will be shared with parents and carers.

During Summer 2, our SRE learning will focus on making babies where we discuss sexual intercourse, assisted fertility, pregnancy and birth. Parents can opt out of these sessions. Please come and speak to your child’s class teacher if you have any questions or concerns regarding our RSHE learning.

In Music we will explore how we can improvise with confidence by creating our own personal musical ideas with a consideration to phrasing and dynamics. In Summer 2, we will focus on ‘Farewell Tour’. This will be our last performance before we move to secondary school so we will consider the songs and music that represents our class.

In French, we will be linking our Science and ‘Healthy Bodies, Healthy Minds’ learning to exploring healthy lifestyles: Manger et Bouger. In Summer 2,  we will be creating connections with our History learning from the Autumn Term where will be looking at World War 2: La Seconde Guerre Mondiale.

Weekly homework and spellings will always be on Seesaw. Please encourage your child to practise their spellings, complete their homework and read at least 3 times a week in line with our home/school agreement.

Children will be assigned weekly spellings on EdShed.

Miss Kennedy will be available on the door each morning and at the end of the day. If you need a longer discussion, we will arrange an appointment for an appropriate time. If you need to contact Miss Kennedy in or out f school hours, please email on:

skennedy-brown@crescent.notts.sch.uk