Yr6 Curriculum Update – 13/09/19
Working together to achieve success for every child
The Year 6 Team
Welcome to the 2nd edition of our Year 6 Curriculum Update!
In each update, you will be able to see glimpses of the learning journey that our students have been involved in over the previous two weeks. Our Learning Journey is written by teachers and students.
Our first Year 6 assembly! On Friday, September the 20th, some of our Y6 students will showcase their learning to the school community at 2:00pm in the school hall. Parents and guardians are most welcome to attend this assembly. In case you are planning to attend this event, please arrive no earlier than 1:45pm and make your way to the school hall.
Transdisciplinary Learning – It’s all connected!
Our second unit of inquiry is under the transdisciplinary theme – How the World Works. Our Central Idea: the design and making process can be used to solve problems. The learner profile attributes for this unit are open-minded and thinker. We will be focusing on further developing the skills of evaluation, group decision making and analysis. As part of a pre-assessment, we worked together in order to solve our teacher’s problems. Some of us created organizers for whiteboard markers and erasers and other classes tried to tidy the problem of messy IWB wires. Here are some important words related to this unit, and please work with your child on these words in their Mother Tongues: technology, creativity, design thinking, systems and empathy, elevation, blueprint and prototype.
We have also been learning about the Internet and how it works. Several classes have done roleplaying about the World Wide Web, and learned how computers and websites process information by pretending to be various sites and people, such as google.com or a group of students. We learned that the computer, which hosts information and allows other computers to access is called a web server. It serves us data. Our computer sends a request to the web server for the image.The request is sent in a ‘packet’. A packet is like a virtual parcel which has lots of important information attached to it. Some of the groups wrote messages on paper as requests and cut them into pieces to create packets of information to imitate how websites receive information through optic fibres. We also learned that every computer in the world has a unique address and is called an IP Address. It is like a pin code for each computer connected to the internet.
In Maths, some classes have been working on visualising math problems. Students have been using isometric paper to help them learn how to draw 3D shapes from different scales, shapes and views. Students have also learned about an acronym called T.A.I.L.S. to help them create graphs. T stands for title, A for axis, I for intervals, L for labels, and S for scale. Inside other Y6 classes, students have been studying relationships of 2-D and 3-D shapes through isometric paper and that 2-D shapes are 3-D models from a certain view. Classes have also experimented and discussed about what shape nature favours the most. Using the scientific cycle classes have come to the conclusion that hexagons are the best shape covering the most area with the smallest perimeter using bubbles.
We also explored the Pascal triangle which was trying to find the patterns and write it down on to the right place.To build this triangle, start with “1” at the top, then continue placing numbers below it in a triangular pattern. Try it at home with your child as it is fun to explore so many different patterns!
In Mandarin, students have been working on getting ready for Mid- Autumn Festival. Some classes have been making lanterns or other decorations, posters and presentations about the holiday, and some even having some mooncakes! One class is even going to sing a song in the Mid- Autumn Festival assembly. Students have also learned how and why we celebrate the Mid- Autumn Festival. Last Friday, we had a Mid- Autumn Festival Assembly hosted by our Student Council. Students from Years 2-6 sang songs about the moon and the festival, told stories and did short plays in the assembly.
In Music, classes have been working on emulating drum sets with three levels of frequency: high, low, and medium. Instruments like shakers and tambourines emulate the Hi-Hats on a drum set, instruments like wooden sticks or flutes emulate Snare drums and instruments like Djembe emulate the bass drum. Using the unique frequencies of each instrument, we have been able to make very catchy rhythms. As always, an instrument could play in 2, 4, 8, or even 16 depending on the speed.
In PE, students have been starting off their unit about movement compositions. Compositions consist of certain inspirations e.g. gymnastics, ball games, running, climbing, etc. Their compositions have to be in rhythm to a certain beat, eg: 4, 8, 16, 32. The basic goal for attractive movement compositions is creating simple movements whilst adding in complexity. Adding complexity to a simple skipping rope by developing complex movements is a good example.
In Art, some classes have been doing tessellations with different shapes. Tessellations appear when you repeat a polygon over and over again without leaving any gaps between the shapes. Some examples of tessellating shapes are: Quadrilaterals, hexagons, and triangles. They also sketched self-portraits of themselves. They have also started working on planometric drawing, which includes drawing out objects/buildings in a 3-D perspective/angle. Students have also been encouraged to use Isometric paper to start off with drawing simple 3-D objects, some have even moved on towards sketching it on plain paper! Some of us have been busy creating our portraits. We have used the grid method to sketch and draw our facial features.
Battle of the books:
Students can start borrowing and reading the BOB books so that they can finish all 20 by next year before May where the tournament will commence. You can check on Gateway to see if your child has successfully entered the club.
Year 6 House and Vice Captains
Congratulations to all the students who have been elected by their house team to serve as a KJS team captain! There have been 4 students elected from each house team and the positions are vice and house-captains, two of each!
St. Patricks(Green House)
Team Captains:
Naitik Keswani (6A)
Charlotte Raeburn Ward (6E)
Vice Captains:
Kateyln Wong(6E)
Duncan So(6G)
St. Davids(Yellow House)
Team Captains:
Porus Law (6T)
Charmian Siu (6P)
Vice Captains:
Alice Jung (6T)
Vian Gidwani (6G)
St. Andrews(Blue House)
Team Captains:
Sophie Capelo (6A)
Trevor Wong (6T)
Vice Captains:
Emma Oh (6E)
Jun Young NG (6P)
St. Georges(Red House)
Team Captains:
Maya Ma (6G)
Max Ma (6T)
Vice Captains:
Shaivi Jha (6G)
Ryder So (6P)
Congratulations to all the other applicants for trying out!
Student Council Members
Congratulations to our amazing Y6 Student Council members!
Claire So(6A)
Ching Yeung Chan- CY(6T)
Prisha Bahrunani (6E)
Suhani Methi (6G)
Momoka Kobayashi (6G)
Serena Melwani (6T)
How you can help at home?
As part of the action for Y6, students need to bring fruits/vegetables or food that is home-made in reusable containers. In order to reduce the single use plastic, we have pledged not to bring in snacks wrapped in plastic, such as chips and biscuits. Year 6s are aiming to be more eco-friendly, so we advise that students should drink water instead of juice, soda or other drinks.
Important dates
Year 6 Design day Monday, 16th September
Friday, September 20th Year 6 assembly at 2:00pm
Monday 30 September CPD Day – No school
Tuesday 1 October National Day – No school
Friday 4 October Day before Mid-Term Break – FULL Day Classes
7 – 11 October Mid-Term Break
We Need Your Help!
As one of our sustainability goals for Year 2019/2020, we are going to replant and propagate our plants from the last year. We believe in partnering with parents to boost our students learning. As part of the process to develop the shared area, our students would like to set up a nursery to help them with the repotting process. We will need soil packs, planters, big clean yoghurt tubs, or any other big clean plastic containers. In case you have any of the above items at home, kindly send them to the school.
OUR LEARNING JOURNEY
Kind regards,
Year 6 Teachers and Students Editors and Photographers
(Anya Motiwala 6A, Claire So 6A, Natasha Lai 6P, Brandon Wong 6E, Shaila Aswani 6G, Scotter Wong 6A, Jolly Law 6G, Momoka Kobayashi 6G, Chesney Yim 6T, Moe Sugawara 6T, Praneel Melwani 6P, Zach Scurville 6E)
