This week, Year 6 travelled inside the human body with the help of a pair of VR (Virtual Reality) goggles. We had a visit from one of Islington’s Computing Lead teachers, Donna Shah. Over the course of an afternoon, she treated Year 6 to some mind-boggling facts about the human body, whilst they journeyed through veins and arteries. At one point, there was a collective gasp as she changed the image to one of the human heart.
This really is the future. One day soon, Science lessons (and English, Maths etc) will begin with the words, “Ok, now put your VR googles on and let’s see what life is like on Mars.” It’s also wonderful to be able to say, ‘St. Joseph’s had it here first.’
In Religion, the children have been using the Lectio Divina form of prayer to really engage with church readings at this time of year. This week, the children meditated over Mark’s gospel of when John the Baptist began baptising people in the desert. The children have been approaching these meditations with maturity and have been responding really well to each passage. Perhaps when they hear these readings in Mass, it will have a more profound meaning for them.
This week’s Current Affairs was a reference to cyber-bullying. Those who have been following our blog recently will note that this is the second time we have covered cyber-bullying – once for Odd Sock’s Day last week. We feel it is important that Year 6 understand the impact hurtful comments can have on others, but also we want them to be safe online. The children responded thoughtfully and had some great ideas about how social media companies can help keep us all safe when we use their apps.
Year 6 are currently reading ‘The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas’ by John Boyne and have been preparing for a narrative piece. They have been learning about how dialogue can add more depth to their characters, but that it shouldn’t take priority over rich setting and character descriptions.
Finally, a sad moment – Year 6 planted their last daffodil bulbs. The children were encouraged to take a moment to reflect on these little events as it will be the last time they do them here at St Joseph’s.
Homework Friday 24th November
- Maths – We have given you a Maths worksheet to practise fractions.
- Times tables – Continue to practise your times tables for our weekly tables test. Practise these by chanting through them, going to the Times Tables songs on Mathletics, asking someone to test you, testing yourself, using look-cover-write-check, playing on ‘Hit the Button’ on Topmarks or J2Blast.
- Spellings – Please learn spellings for a test next week. Use Look, Cover, Spell, Check. We would then like you to use each of the spellings in a sentence. Try to make it an exciting sentence with correct punctuation. You will need to find out the meaning of the word first.
- Current Affairs – Read a quality news article about the recent budget report. List 10 facts about the budget which could include: who wrote the budget, when it was published, and what changes have been made to prices of fuel, bread, milk etc.
Check out the following websites to help you. Print out the article if you can.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk
Homework will be given out each Friday and is due to be returned the following Wednesday.
Have a lovely weekend.
Mr Prescott and Mr. Groarke
