Year 4 learned lots about the Anglo-Saxons at Jarrow Hall. We explored the Anglo-Saxon village learning what the animals were used for and their value. We investigated how herbs were used to make medicines and discovered that some of the Anglo-Saxon treatments are still used today! We then handled artefacts and made deductions and inferences about them. To end our fantastic day we staged our own battle, it was so much fun!
The children have made some special poppies for Veterans at Ease in South Shields. They look amazing in their window display!
The children have been busy making poppies for the charity ‘Veterans at Ease’. The poppies will be displayed in their shop window on King Street.
Year 6 have taken part in some fantastic workshops this half term to support their learning in History lessons around Crime and Punishment and how this has changed over time. These include a whole day workshop with Past Productions where children had the opportunity to explore artefacts, take part in drama role-play and act out a ‘court scene’. The children also took part in an online workshop with the National Archives where we discussed and examined a range of historical sources.
Year 4 had so much fun at South Shield’s Museum. We took part in a mission called ‘Time Odyssey’. We met different characters from the past who were lost in time. We had to choose and analyse museum objects in our teams to help our character to return to their time zone!
This week we had a special visitor transport us back to what life was like in the Stone Age times. We learned how to light a fire using flint and a fire steel, just like they would have thousands of years ago. Back then, the hunter gathers had to source their own food, we handled lots of different tools and thought about how they would have been used. After that we made ancient bannock bread and cooked it over our open fire. It was delicious!
A hunter gather had to move around as the seasons changed to ensure they had food to eat, so our final task was to work in teams to create our own nomadic shelter. We had so much fun!
In History, we have been learning about the Stone Age.
So far we have found out when the Stone Age occurred on a timeline of different civilisations, learnt about hunter-gatherers and found out about some Stone Age settlements.
This week we looked at some Stone Age cave art and then created our own using charcoal.
We imagined that we had been transported back in time to the Stone Age, we had to think like hunter-gathers in order to survive! We explored our school grounds to look out for any assets that might help us.
As part of our Maya topic in History, we had a visit from a Maya warrior called Big Nose.
We had a fantastic day! We learnt about different aspects of Maya life: what they wore, what they ate, their numbers and even some different ways the Maya sacrificed people to please the gods!
We took part in drama activities in groups acting out Maya stories; how to prepare the most important drink from Maya times (chocolatl); a Maya ball game called Pok-a-Tok; and how to prepare a body for burial.
There were Maya artefacts for us to look at and we thought about what they might have been used for, and what clues they gave us about Maya life.
We ended the day all together acting out the Maya creation story. Did you know the Maya believed the first people were made from corn?
What a great start to our new History topic!
Today we had a special assembly to mark to 80th Anniversary of D-Day. The children discovered what D-Day was and why it was so important. They also found out about men from South Shields who played a role in D-Day. They heard stories from the book ‘Their Finest Hour’ by Terry Ford. Terry has been working with Oxford University and the South Shields Local History Group to collect stories of ‘South Shields Heroes from World War II’. The children enjoyed listening to some of these fantastic stories!