Welcome to Fox class! Our teacher is Mr Roberts, who has been at Bedwell ever since he started teaching, 17 years ago. He particularly likes science, storytelling and sport, and is also our Deputy Headteacher.

• Our curriculum map - find out about our current topics
• Our latest class newsletter
• Meet our school councilors, Ella and Lucas

Home learning ideas:

• All of the maths we’re doing this term is dependent on quick recall of tables facts, so it would be brilliant if you could work on this. Focus on one table at a time and try: 
  • Making-up rhymes to help remember number facts (“4 x 6 is 24, bears growl and lions roar!”) 
  • Looking for numbers in that table in the world around you - on doors, car number plates, in phone numbers or when you’re out shopping. 
  • Writing-out tables with finger paints, chalk or water-on-tarmac, or make them from playdoh. 
  • Chanting, singing, whispering... Say tables out loud together whenever you have the chance.
• Each week we are set spellings to learn. Click here for guidance on strategies you can use to support your child in learning these at home.  
• To learn more about the Mayans, have a look at the BBC Bitesize resources, here. This includes really quick video clips that explain who the Mayans were and where they came from, and will give us a good head-start in lessons.
  
• We’re investigating forces in science this term, so keep an eye out for examples of forces around us - magnets that hold things shut, friction that slows us down, gravity stretching springs etc. What are the strangest examples you can find? Remember, it’s not magic - it’s science! There are lessons online to support our next topic on the Oak Academy site. 
• Keeping fit, happy and healthy is always important. There are links to lots of great resources and workouts to help everyone in the family get active at www.sportengland.org/jointhemovement

Our latest news:

• We've learnt loads about the Battle of Britain and World War 2, supported by our trip to RAF Hendon and our fantastic World War 2 Day in school. We made gas masks, learnt about pre-decimal money, made cakes using ration-book recipes, filled sandbags and blacked-out windows - all of which helped us to better understand what it would have been like to grow up during World War 2.    
 

 
• We organised a Stay and Read session, where we invited our parents and carers to join us in school for an hour of fun reading activities. We based the session around a brilliant book called The Mystery of the Clockwork Sparrow, and shared some of the ways we get 'into' a story with our families, including vocabulary games, exploring character feelings and choosing pictures to match sections of the story. 
 

 
• We've jumped at every chance to join-in with whole-school activities and projects this term, with several of us playing for school sports teams, standing for election to School Council and singing and dancing in front of the school. Our Halloween Disco and Christmas parties were definite highlights of the term!
 

We have been learning about... 

History - Throughout the term, we have been learning about the Battle of Britain, discovering why this key moment is considered a 'turning point' in British history, as well as finding out what it was like to grow up during World War 2.  

Science - This term, we have been investigating the heart and how to stay healthy. We learnt about the structure of this vital organ, the way it keeps every part of our body supplied with oxygenated blood, and we also designed and carried out investigations to test pulse rate.

English - We have focussed on Fiction Genres, exploring differences between fantasy, mystery, historical, science-fiction, realistic and comedy stories - and then messing around with these conventions by writing our own adventures that bounced between several different genres.     

This term's topics

English - Our next story writing unit will see us learning to build suspense, surprise and a spooky atmosphere as we focus our work around ghost stories. We will be exploring a model text which uses a non-linear structure (jumping around in time) and examining how authors tie stories together in clever ways. We will use our experiences at Knebworth House to help us to develop dramatic settings, with lots of hidden doors, secret staircases and suits of armour hidden around every corner! We will be reading lots of ghost stories as well, looking in particular at ways in which authors use weather, sounds and movements to create spooky atmospheres and a sense of ’something’s coming’ in their writing.

Maths - We will start the term by developing our understanding of shape, building (and naming) 3d shapes, matching them to 2d representations and using them to solve problems. After that, we will explore reflection and translation, working out what shapes will look like in a mirror or after they have been moved around coordinate grids. Later in the term, we will return to the topic of angles, developing our ability to measure, plot, name and calculate angles. Finally, we will return to our key calculation strategies, revising the use of written methods for addition, subtraction, multiplication and division and using these to solve increasingly complex problems.

Science - We will be investigating forces, identifying different forces that act on objects in a variety of situations. We will look at air and water resistance and the effect that these can have on moving objects (such as planes and ships) and the way these are designed. Finally, we will explore how levers, pulleys and gears are used in everyday life and the ways in which they can help us.

Humanities - We will begin by discovering who the Mayans were, where they lived and when their civilisation existed. We will then investigate their daily lives, comparing their homes, schools, clothes, food and warriors with other historical civilisations we have already learnt about (eg. Greeks, Romans, Vikings and Normans). We will also be exploring Mayan Gods and religion and examining the way that historians can learn about lives in Mayan times. Finally, we will be exploring Mayan Art and using this to inspire our own work.

Take a look at our curriculum map for more information on our topics.