Learning is fun at Earlham!
We believe that hands on experiences are a great way to learn and to apply the knowledge we learn in class. Here are just a few of the great learning experiences we have had recently!
Shakespeare Week
Our first whole school Shakespeare Week, in April 2019, was a huge success. Children from Reception to Year 6 engaged with a range of the Bard's plays including Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet, Anthony and Cleopatra, Hamlet, Othello and Twelfth Night and finally A Winter's Tale. The week contained a great deal of acting, writing, exploring vocabulary and key themes.
It has been amazing and inspiring to see how much all our children have enjoyed exploring Shakespeare's language, including in Reception and Key Stage 1. The challenges were set in Key Stage 2 where the children read from manga, comic and the traditional style form of Shakespearean play scripts. The oral and written outcomes across the school were remarkable, and we are now thinking about how we can build on this as we design our curriculum for next year.
We celebrated Shakespeare week with deeds, and not just words! Each year group produced artwork inspired by the play they explored. Our Year 4 pupils enjoyed an amazing day working with local sculptor Darcy Turner to produce wonderful pieces of 3D artwork inspired by the plays of Shakespeare. In Year 2 the children made animations of scenes from Macbeth - watch some of the amazing productions!
Yr3 Clown Project
In 2019 the Eko Trust worked with Michael Rosen on a pilot project in Year 3 across three of our schools, including Earlham. The project used a single text to develop a cohesive unit of integrated learning. The book, suggested to us by Michael, was Clown, by Quentin Blake. The project ran in the Spring 1 half-term.
Clown is a wordless text, which led to some terrific creative writing: it enabled the children to develop their own version of the story, to add dialogue, and to create their own illustrated stories. The themes of the book include kindness, altruism, friendship, adventures, journeys, waste and recycling, and this enabled our talented Year 3 teachers to create an exciting 6 weeks of integrated learning.
Here are some images of our learning, and two of our pupils talk about their learning as part of this project.
The Victorians come to life! Year 2 become movie producers
In November Year 2 enjoyed a visit to the wonderful Ragged School Museum in East London. The children were so inspired by their learning that they decided to make a movie about poor children living in East London in the 1880s, and the opportunities the Ragged School gave them.
The children wrote their own movie scripts. In 2W, they wrote a movie about some poor orphans living in East London. and in 2S, they wrote a movie about going to Dr Barnardo’s Ragged School. We held auditions, and the children then learnt their parts. They then used an ipad and green screen technology to film their movies. They selected the music and created the titles. Quite rightly they are very proud of their final movies. We hope you enjoy watching them as much as the children did making them!