History is taught in order to stimulate the pupils’ interest and understanding about significant events and the lives of significant people in the past and how these important factors have influenced our lives today.
We aim to foster in pupils an interest in the past and to develop an understanding that enables them to enjoy all that history has to offer through knowing about significant events in British and world history, appreciating how things have changed over time.
History is taught using a variety of resources and experiences, including visitors to school, drama, artefacts, visual resources and Information Technology.
In the Early Years Foundation Stage, children talk about their experiences and the lives of people around them, as well as developing an understanding of the past and comparing the past with now. This is part of the Understanding the World area of The Statutory Framework for the Early Years Foundation Stage. Staff respond swiftly to the children’s own child initiated learning experiences, interacting in a way which moves learning forwards for all learners. Understanding the World activities are also planned as part of the teaching sequence, which all children will be involved in.
History is planned and delivered at Key Stage 1 (years one and two) in line with the National Curriculum. Skills are taught progressively from Reception to year 6, with opportunities for children to build on and embed their learning.
Autumn 2023
Reception
Reception children undertook activities linked to bonfire night at the beginning of November. Activities included discussing experiences of bonfire night, watching videos of the celebration, finding out about firework safety, and creating firework pictures.
During independent learning time, reception children have had the opportunity to find out about dinosaurs and explore the dinosaur bones.
Whilst playing with the small world play castle, some children were intrigued to learn about real castles.
Reception children learnt about Remembrance Day. They made their own poppies in class and had a class assembly where they observed a two minute silence. They watched a CBeebies video called ‘poppies’ which is a lovely video showing how the poppies grew in the field after all the grass had turned to mud.
Year 1
Year one children found out about extinct animals and also those that are endangered. They made a timeline to show when the animals became extinct.
Year 2
Norwich’s Past
Year 2 children have learnt about life in Norwich in the past. They studied the cathedral and castle in Norwich. Lessons included looking at artefacts relating to Norwich’s past, comparing old and new landmarks in Norwich, and finding out about castles and how they were defended.
See grid below to show understanding before and after the topic.
The children participated in a History Day- see special events tab for further details.
Year two also looked at the significant person William the Conqueror. They created a timeline for his life.
Night time
As part of our topic Night time the children have learnt about a significant person from the past, Guy Fawkes. The children wrote about who Guy Fawkes was and why he is an important historical person.
They picked some items that Guy Fawkes might have used in 1605 and described how he would have used them. They then explained the difference between objects that Guy Fawkes could have used, compared with what he might have used today.
Remembrance Day
Remembrance Day was marked in an assembly at the Junior School. The children learnt about Armistice Day on the 11th November 1918. At 11 o’clock on that day, nations who were fighting laid down their weapons and this signalled the end of the war (known then as the “Great War”). Today, we know it as the First World War. Armistice is an agreement for peace.
One year later, the first two-minute silence was held. King George V had asked the people of Britain to pause and remember all those who had fought and died in the service of their country.
In in 1920, King George unveiled the nation’s new war memorial called the Cenotaph, where people go to remember the fallen.
The children found out about the Royal British Legion and how it remembers the fallen by launching the Poppy Appeal, where members and volunteers sell millions of red paper poppies. In the weeks leading up to 11th November and on Remembrance Sunday, people are asked to wear a poppy as an act of remembrance.
The children listened respectfully and with interest.
On Wednesday 8th November, key stage one children were extremely lucky to be joined by the Mayor of Dereham. He talked to the children about why we wear poppies, the significance of the poppy and encouraged the children to join in with reciting a special passage to remember the soldiers who fought in the wars.
On the Friday the Infant School participated in class assemblies for Remembrance Day, including a two minute silence. Reception children also had the opportunity to make poppies.
Black History Month
Over the last three weeks we have been celebrating Black History Month. Here are some of the activities that have taken place across the Federation.
Reception – In Reception we have been learning about some amazing people in our history. We enjoyed reading Mo Farah’s “Ready Steady Mo” and learning about his amazing achievements at the Olympics. We looked at some iconic music created by black artists and learned the sign for dancing when listening to Martha & The Vandellas “Dancing in the Streets”. We also had a go at dancing to Bob Marley’s classic hit ‘Three Little Birds’.
Year 1 and year 2 started learning about Black History Month by discussing the importance of treating everyone equally during an assembly. We looked at our PATHS rule ‘Treat others the way you want to be treated’ and talked about the importance of British Values.
Year 1- We enjoyed dancing to Martha & The Vandellas “Dancing in the Streets” and Nina Simone’s “Young Gifted and Black”. We were inspired by the story of the Olympic athlete Mo Farah and enjoyed watching videos of his races. We also learnt about Daniel Hale Williams who was was an African-American surgeon who founded the first non-segregated hospital in the United States in 1891, as well as completing the first successful heart surgery.
Year 2 –In year 2, we have been learning about the lives of Martin Luther King Jr and Rosa Parks as part of our learning in black history month. The children have discussed how black people were treated in the past and how much it has changed thanks to the actions of people like Martin Luther King Jr and Rosa Parks. We also explored some modern day heroes like Mo Farah, Stevie Wonder and Stormzy.
Federation Time Capsule Project with Taylor Wimpey East Anglia
Toftwood Infant and Junior School have been involved in an exciting project to create and then bury a time capsule at the nearby Taylor Wimpey East Anglia development site. Children from both schools chose items which would help people in the future understand what 2023 was like and to give them an insight into school life. Items included photographs of events, drawings by the children, brochures and tickets of places visited, leaflets of Dereham, memorabilia linked to the jubilee and recent coronation, a letter to King Charles, handwritten notes, coins, stamps, a school jumper, a map of the school, a school dinner menu and a sweatshirt.
On Thursday 13th July, a selection of children accompanied Mrs Pedlow and Mrs Sutterby to witness the time capsule being buried at the Etling Grove site in Dereham. The time capsule has been placed in the grounds and the plan is to open it in fifty years.
History Summer term 2023
Reception
In the summer term, Reception children visited Gressenhall Farm and Workhouse for a fairy tale event. Part of the day involved helping the ugly sister and Cinderella with jobs around the house and gardens. Jobs included pumping water from the well to water the plants, washing clothes using the wash board and washing dolly, and milking the pretend cow. They got to see the Suffolk punch horses. This sparked a conversation about working horses and their role before tractors were used.
Year one
Link to Year one Holkham Hall visit.
Year one children wrote letters to the King; they asked him questions about his coronation.
Year One Holkham Hall 2023
On 9th June 2023, the children in Year One were lucky enough to visit Holkham Hall. We started the day with a long bus journey and were very impressed with how well the children were behaving. When we arrived, the children took part in two activities. They were given a tour of the hall and were amazed with all of the sculptures, carpets and ceilings.
They then got to find out about toys from the olden days. They played with ‘pick up’ sticks, marbles, yoyos and tiddlywinks as well as many other toys. The children even got to make their own Victorian toy; a thaumatrope! They drew two pictures on two circles and then stuck them to either side of a straw so that when they spun the straw, the images would blend together to create one image. They loved learning about this optical illusion. The children then said goodbye to Holkham Hall and reflected on their favourite parts of the day during the bus ride home. ‘I loved every part of the day’ said Demi.
The King’s Coronation Celebration
The children at Toftwood Infant and Junior School have had a celebration fit for a king!
The Federation came together for two days of activities and a special lunch to help celebrate the King’s Coronation. To mark this important occasion, the children dressed were invited to dress up in red, white and blue or as a king or queen.
Over the course of two days the children took part in lots of fun activities including crown making, creating Union Jack flags, learning to sign the National Anthem and naming photos of the royal family. Year one children will also be writing to King Charles next week. A special assembly to commemorate the King’s Coronation led by Janet Marshall took place at both schools.
Children were invited to participate in a competition to decorate a Coronation rock. We were very impressed with the individuality of the children designs which included a corgi, a crown and the Union Jack flag. The children have been given the opportunity to take their rocks home or place them in the community in Toftwood or Dereham. Perhaps you will find one of the special rocks when you take a walk around the locality.
On Thursday we had a special federation picnic lunch which we were lucky enough to have outside and all together. Seeing the children outside laughing, playing and enjoying their time together was a wonderful sight.
What a wonderful two days we have had celebrating such an important historical event and special time for our country. Hopefully very memorable for all the children and staff. A big thank you goes out to our wonderful lunchtime and kitchen staff for their hard work.
History Infants Spring 2023
Spring 2023
Reception
Reception children talk about their past experiences, including days out with their family and special times such as birthdays. They find out about the past and how life has changed from a variety of sources, including photographs, objects and stories.
Classes looked at castles and found out they were usually made of stone, placed on a high hill and sometimes had a moat with a drawbridge. They also learnt about Norwich castle. Following on from these carpet sessions, some children created their own castles using construction in the classroom.
Year one
Year one studied the topic of ‘Our Planet and Beyond.’ The children learnt about the history of space travel including learning about the race to space and the astronauts Neil Armstrong, Yuri Gagarin. The children thought of questions they would like to ask an astronaut. They have been introduced to time lines for the events of space travel.
Year two
During the topic of ‘Air, Land and Sea’ the children have learnt about Lord Admiral Nelson. They found out about important dates in his life and could use prior knowledge of how a timeline works to create their own timeline for Lord Admiral Nelson. Some of the children were able to expand on the information and wrote additional facts for each date.
Oral History
On Monday 12th December, some of the children got a chance to meet with Jenny, and ask her questions about what Christmas was like when she was a child.
The children had prepared questions to ask her and this is what they found out.
Jenny did decorate the inside of her house, with a tree, baubles and tinsel and she would make and hang paperchains. She was not allowed to have lights on the outside of her house during the war years because of the blackouts. Her father was away fighting in the war, but she did have relatives visiting.
She often had chicken for Christmas dinner as she kept chickens at home. Several of her early Christmases were on war rations, where she exchanged coupons at the green grocers or butchers. They did have crackers to pull.
Santa, as she remembers, wore red, not green like in some of the old images. She would leave him a mince pie and a stocking on her bed. She always got an orange in her stocking as these were a real treat then. She didn’t write long lists or expect many presents and the toys were often homemade. She does remember singing the old traditional carols and going from door to door carol-sing, as well as going to church and Sunday School at Christmas time.
Jenny didn’t have a television so she would spend time listening to the radio, playing board games and playing in the snow (she remembers lots of snowy Christmases).
As a result of this experience, the children now appreciate the importance of oral history, hearing recounts first hand, rather than just relying on books or the internet, to source new information.
History Autumn 2022
Reception
Reception children undertook activities linked to bonfire night at the beginning of November. Activities included discussing experiences of bonfire night, watching videos of the celebration, finding out about firework safety, and creating firework pictures.
Reception children learnt about Remembrance Day and talked about why we wear poppies. They made their own poppies in class and had a class assembly where they observed a two minute silence.
Year 2
Norwich’s Past
Year 2 children have learnt about life in Norwich in the past. They studied the cathedral and castle in Norwich. Lessons included looking at artefacts relating to Norwich’s past, comparing old and new landmarks in Norwich, and finding out about castles and how they were defended.
The children participated in a History Day- see special events tab for further details.
Year two also looked at the significant person William the Conqueror. They created a timeline for his life.
Night time
As part of our topic Night time the children have learnt about a significant person from the past, Guy Fawkes. The children wrote about who Guy Fawkes was and why he is an important historical person.
They picked some items that Guy Fawkes might have used in 1605 and described how he would have used them. They then explained the difference between objects that Guy Fawkes could have used, compared with what he might have used today.
Remembrance Day
To introduce Remembrance Day, years one and two had a special visit from the Royal British Legion on Thursday 10th November (see special events tab). They continued to develop their ideas of Remembrance Day during their assembly on Friday 11th November, which concluded with a 2 minute silence on the playground.
Black History Month
Over the last three weeks we have been celebrating Black History Month. Here are some of the activities that have taken place across the Federation.
Reception – In Reception we have been learning about some amazing people in our history. We enjoyed reading Mo Farah’s “Ready Steady Mo” and learning about his amazing achievements at the Olympics. We looked at some iconic music created by black artists and learned the sign for dancing when listening to Martha & The Vandellas “Dancing in the Streets”. We also had a go at dancing to Bob Marley’s classic hit ‘Three Little Birds’.
Year 1 and year 2 started learning about Black History Month by discussing the importance of treating everyone equally during an assembly. We looked at our PATHS rule ‘Treat others the way you want to be treated’ and talked about the importance of British Values.
Year 1- We enjoyed dancing to Martha & The Vandellas “Dancing in the Streets” and Nina Simone’s “Young Gifted and Black”. We were inspired by the determination and courage of a little girl called Grace in the story ‘Amazing Grace’ by Mary Hoffman & Caroline Binch. This is a great story for teaching us that gender and race should never be a barrier. We listened to the story ‘Counting on Katherine’ by Helaine Becker. This told us how Katherine Johnson helped to get the first astronauts onto the moon with her fantastic maths skills. We also listened to the story “JoJo and Gran Gran-It’s time to go on a voyage” which explained Gran Gran’s journey from Jamaica to England.
Year 2 – In Year 2 we have learnt about Black History month through watching videos and discussion in class and assemblies. We’ve learnt about different Black History heroes such as Rosa Parks and Chadwick Boseman. We learnt about the importance of accepting everybody’s differences and that these are the things that make us special!
Children at the Junior School joined classes from all over Norfolk for a special online assembly. Lead by the amazing Anna Mudeka, pupils were introduced to the culture and customs of Zimbabwe, through music, stories and songs. Children learned about Anna’s childhood and joined in call and response singing. The sound of the Mbira (thumb piano) was mesmerising and Anna’s stories transported us to village life in Africa.
Year 3 – During Black History Month, year 3 have been exploring the lives of Maya Angelou, the American author and activist, and the inspiring story of the Olympic athlete Mo Farah. We were particularly fascinated at how Mo Farah had moved from Somalia to the UK and being separated from his father, and what this might have been like for him.
Years 3 and 4 learned a song ‘Tue Tue’ from Ghana in a singing assembly.
History Summer term 2022
Our Time Capsule
The whole federation was involved with planting a tree and burying a time capsule, as part of our platinum jubilee celebrations. The children were given the opportunity to decide what was buried in the time capsule. Items from our recent ‘history of our school day’ and jubilee celebrations were placed in the time capsule. A plaque was placed next to the time capsule and tree, to enable children and staff to locate it in the future.
Reception
Reception children learnt about the Queen as part of the platinum jubilee celebrations. This included finding out how long she has reigned, about her family, horses and corgis. The children were intrigued to find out more about the Queen. “How far is the Queen,” one child remarked. The children had the opportunity to create stamps of the Queen and write cards to the Queen. The home learning activity was to find out about the Queen.
An example of home learning.
In summer two, Reception children visited Gressenhall Farm and Workhouse for a fairy tale event. Part of the day involved helping the ugly sister and Cinderella with jobs around the house and gardens. Jobs included pumping water from the well to water the plants, washing clothes using the wash board and washing dolly, and milking the pretend cow. Some children were also lucky enough to watch the farrier fit new shoes onto the Suffolk punch horse. This sparked a conversation about working horses and their role before tractors were used.
“Just pretend it’s a real cow, look how fast I can move it,” one child commented as they attempted to milk the pretend cow.
“I know what that’s for, it’s for clothes,” one child commented when they saw the wash board.
Year one
Year one children wrote fact files about the Queen, in the week leading up to the jubilee celebrations.
Year one children experienced a Victorian wash day.
They also visited Holkham Hall in the summer term (see write up under year groups, year one).
Year 2
Year 2 children learnt about the Queen and wrote letters to her, as part of the jubilee celebrations.
History Spring 2022 – Infant
Reception
Reception children talk about their past experiences, including days out with their family and special times such as birthdays. They find out about the past and how life has changed from a variety of sources, including photographs, objects and stories.
Classes looked at castles and found out they were usually made of stone, placed on a high hill and sometimes had a moat with a drawbridge. They also found out that we have a castle near us in Norwich.
Year one
Year one studied the topic of ‘Our Planet and Beyond.’ The children learnt about the history of space travel including learning about the race to space and the astronauts Neil Armstrong, Yuri Gagarin. The children thought of questions they would like to ask an astronaut. They have been introduced to time lines for the events of space travel.
Year two
During the topic of ‘Air, Land and Sea’ the children have learnt about Lord Admiral Nelson. They found out about important dates in his life and could use prior knowledge of how a timeline works to create their own timeline for Lord Admiral Nelson. Some of the children were able to expand on the information and wrote additional facts for each date.
The History of our School Day. 21st February 2022
The staff and children of Toftwood Federation would like to thank the readers of the EDP who kindly took time to contribute photos and memories of their time at the schools. They made a lovely display and the children enjoyed looking at the photos and hearing about possible locations of the time capsules.
The children across the Federation, had a special opportunity to find out about the history of their school, using extracts from the original log book, stored at County Hall Records Office in Norwich as a unique and valuable source of evidence.The children were presented with extracts from the log book and were encouraged to use their inference skills to respond and share their ideas. For example:
March 15th 1876
Sent to Mrs Land to obtain the ages of her children as I discovered that though in their school previously to my undertaking charge, their ages had not been entered in the Admission Register. Mrs Land in reply said, “she could not recollect nearer than the month, “ being unable to state the exact days on which they completed their 12th 10th and 7th years respectively.
April 25th
Sent again for ages of children, which I had previously failed to procure. Their mother had promised to obtain them from the parish register.
August 11th 1897
The attendance has been low all week in the upper classes owing to the harvest having commenced and children being required to carry dinners and help in other ways. Number present 103 in the afternoon.
August 13th
Broke up for Harvest Holidays. Average for the week 114.
Number of scholars on books 157.
September 6th
Resumed duties this morning. Attendance rather low all day. 115 scholars present. Mr Brown visited school in the afternoon. On inquiries being made, I find several scholars are absent owing to harvest not being finished. Children are required to carry dinners etc.Year one children were intrigued to discover the reasons why children were absent from school, including helping with the harvest and working at the market. They enjoyed re-enacting these experiences in class.
We studied maps and photos to see that the old Toftwood school (which is now a Social Club) stood near a blacksmith and a corn mill, and how the current school buildings are built on common land.
Junior school children had the opportunity to try handwriting from an original copy book. They were able to handle ink pens and ink wells as well as a traditional writing slate and a Norfolk County attendance medal from 1908.
Some of the extracts from the 1800s log book, made reference to health and illnesses. The children enjoyed being able to draw parallels with our current COVID pandemic. We learnt that children suffered from Typhoid Fever, Scarlet Fever, Measles, Whooping Cough, Ringworm and Carbunkles. Doctors, regularly ordered the school to be shut for weeks to avoid the spread of these illnesses. The children were a fascinated and discussed the following extracts, which proved an interesting point for discussion.
November 10th 1892
Punished several boys by keeping them in, for persisting in coming to school in a dirty and untidy manner after being warned not to.
October 13th 1893
Punished Alan Smith and 4 other boys for coming to school late and dirty, whereupon Mrs Smith wrote a note complaining about her boy being “so unjustly” punished and saying she should complain to the Board. (The punishment consisted of writing the word dirty 500 times.)
One kind EDP viewer gave us a plan of the school dated around 1977 and the children enjoyed being detectives and trying to identify and compare the room uses today and then. They also identified new additional buildings.
The children were very intrigued by how the classrooms used to look and were shocked to discover that boys and girls were taught separately and were taught a different curriculum.
Reception children compared their school experiences with school in the past by talking to their parents about school when they attended, and looking at photographs and objects. The reception girls participated in sewing activities, whilst the boys attempted handwriting using chalks. They also learnt about children making their own toys, then attempted to make spinners using cardboard and string.
Year two children focused on school in Victorian times. They looked at items found in Victorian classrooms and participated in Victorian style lessons. Activities included writing lines for English, reciting times tables for maths, and an object lesson.
The children also studied extracts taken from the Dereham Parish records between 1873 – 1880 and tried to list all the occupations they could think of. They were fascinated by the wide variety and how some, like Draper, Chandler and Mason were also surnames. They enjoyed researching some like chandler, glover, draper, mercer, hawker, umbrella maker.
The following log book entry inspired some creative writing, writing a diary entry from the perspective of the key thief. They loved creating ingenious ways to steal the keys.
February 14th 1898
In consequence of some keys belonging to the school being missing, the mistress reported the case to the Mr Aldiss, who after consulting with Mr Edwards, decided to place the matter in the hands of the police. In consequence of this the school was visited on Monday by Police Sergeant (Oliver? Deuce?) and Mr Aldiss for the purpose of investigating the case. One of the keys has since been returned.The log book entry regarding the missing keys was also used in year one to create an orienteering activity in the school grounds. The children had to find the pictures of the keys in the school grounds with letters on, to discover the name of the culprit.
The children also took drill lessons; they enjoyed the new challenges that these brought. They enjoyed standing to attention and following the various instructions given.
Many of the children said the highlight of the day was looking at Victorian school punishments and were shocked to discover punishments like the cane and deprivation of lunch were legal. From this, the children enjoyed creating rules for their Victorian school in order to prevent the pupils from receiving corporal punishment.
Year 6 also have a wealth of “school days during WW1 and WW2” resources that they can dip into for first hand reference to their locality, to enhance their summer term history studies.
Initially, we had hoped to locate a time-capsule, thought to be buried at the Toftwood schools. The EDP readers, kindly offered suggestions from their recollections. These included: beside a gate post at the Infant School gate, under the year 6 block classrooms, and in a courtyard are beside the Junior School hall. Unfortunately, these locations are all inaccessible to us now. Therefore, we considered what might have been in the previous time-capsules. This gave us ideas for what we might include in our own time capsule ie coins, pens, photos of children and school, LFTs, masks with a letter of explanation, uniform and logo, weather record. Newspaper, comic etc. We hope to bury our new time-capsule in March and mark it’s date and location with a brass plaque for future generations to ponder over.
History Autumn 2021
Reception
Reception children undertook activities linked to bonfire night at the beginning of November. Activities included discussing experiences of bonfire night, watching videos of the celebration, finding out about firework safety, and creating firework pictures.
Year 1
During the topic ‘Winter Wonderland’ the children learnt about Robert Falcon Scott and how his team tried several times to reach the South Pole. The children learnt that he recorded his travels in a diary, his ship got stuck in ice for 20 days and that unfortunately they did not make it home from the South Pole. The children enjoyed learning about how his team put a British flag at the South Pole when they finally arrived but were disappointed that another team had beaten Robert Falcon Scott’s team. After lots of class discussion, the children were keen to record their learning onto fact sheets. They used what they had learnt and their knowledge from the geography lesson to record full sentences.
Year 2
Norwich’s Past
Year 2 children have learnt about life in Norwich in the past. They studied the cathedral and castle in Norwich. Lessons included looking at artefacts relating to Norwich’s past, comparing old and new landmarks in Norwich, and finding out about castles and how they were defended.
The children participated in a Medieval Day. They came to school in medieval costumes, including Lords, Ladies, knights, maids and jesters. Janet Marshall came into school to complete Edith Cavell workshops. Janet introduced herself as Edith Cavell, telling the children about her life as a nurse and what she did during the war.
Year two also looked at the significant person William the Conquerer.
Night time
As part of our topic Night time the children have learnt about a significant person from the past, Guy Fawkes. The children wrote about who Guy Fawkes was and why he is an important historical person.
They picked some items that Guy Fawkes might have used in 1605 and described how he would have used them. They then explained the difference between objects that Guy Fawkes could have used, compared with what he might have used today.
Remembrance Day
To introduce Remembrance Day, years one and two had a special visit from Janet Marshall on Wednesday 10th November. She spoke about memories, how some are happy and some are sad, and how we remember things. She also discussed the life of a soldier.
Remembrance Day was marked across the federation in all year groups. The children learnt about and discussed the importance of the day, and took part in a two minute silence at 11am. The Reception children spent time during the day creating and making their own poppies to take home. During the infant assemblies, the children were shown a short animation designed to explain Remembrance Day to younger children.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b04p4zsl/poppies
Black History Month October 2021
Over the last three weeks we have been celebrating Black History Month. Here are some of the activities that have taken place across the Federation.
Reception – In Reception we have been learning about some amazing people in our history. We enjoyed reading Mo Farah’s ‘Ready Steady Mo’ and learning about his amazing achievements at the Olympics. We looked at some iconic music created by black artists and learned the sign for dancing when listening to Martha & The Vandellas “Dancing in the Streets”. We also had a go at dancing to Bob Marley’s classic hit ‘Three Little Birds’.
Year 1- In Year 1 we started learning about Black History Month by discussing the importance of treating everyone equally. We looked at our PATHS rule ‘Treat others the way you want to be treated’ and talked about the importance of British Values. We enjoyed listening to Mo Farah’s story ‘Ready Steady Go and also danced to Martha & The Vandellas “Dancing in the Streets”. We were inspired by the determination and courage of a little girl called Grace in the story ‘Amazing Grace’ by Mary Hoffman & Caroline Binch. This is a great story for teaching us that gender and race should never be a barrier. The year 1’s were also very excited by the steel drum music from the story ‘My Two Grandads’ by Floella Benjamin. After listening to the story we enjoyed practicing our dance moves to some amazing steel drum musicians from Jamaica.
Year 2 – As part of Black History Month, Year 2 have been learning about Black History Heroes including Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King Jr, Bob Marley and Stormzy. We also read ‘Ready Steady Mo!’ a book written by Mo Farrah that the children enjoyed and were inspired to go out running!
Year 3 – As we reached Black History month, we recapped the life of Mary Seacole and of Harriet Tubman and the impact of their lives on others. We discussed equality and individual liberty and listened to some multi-cultural stories.
Year 4 – For Black History Month, Year 4 have been practising the Old Town Road dance. We have watched some of the inspiring stories on CBBC’s Black History Heroes. SW4 class were particularly knowledgeable about black sporting legends such as Michael Jordan, LeBron James and Usain Bolt.
We found Misty Copeland’s book totally engrossing! We thought Misty’s message was that ‘you can be whatever you want to be, so long as you don’t give up.’
Year 5- During an assembly, we listened to Misty Copeland reading her book “Firebird” and reflected on the messages that she conveyed to us.
Misty Copeland (born September 10, 1982, Kansas City, Missouri, U.S.) became the first African American female principal dancer with the American Ballet Theatre.
The phrase in her story, “…..I’m grey as rain…..low as a storm pressing on rooftops….” prompted these responses from some of the pupils:
“Even if you are having a bad day – don’t give up.”
“Forever is not so far away; if you don’t try you won’t accomplish your dreams.”
“If you give in you will never know how good you could have been.”
When Misty described dancing on the stage and “spinning wishes for new little children,” a child in LW5 said she was “trying to inspire others.”
We also tried to perfect the moves of the Cha Cha Slide Kids dance. One child in SJ5 found it “exhilarating to move to and he enjoyed it.” The children found it fun and energetic and gave each other positive feedback, to help build confidence and self-esteem. We also tried to dance to “Old Town Road” to experience a different genre.
Year 6 – In year 6, the children really enjoyed the Cha Cha slide in the ‘move’ resources of the black history month pack. The resources will also be sent home for half term via dojo to encourage children to try out some of the recipes from different cultures.
History Summer 2021
Reception
Reception children continue to talk about their own experiences of events. They act out scenarios which demonstrate their knowledge of the past. For example, a child may build a bus, role play the journey, then discuss bus trips they have completed with family members.
Year One
During the Summer term, year one children studied artefacts from the past, as part of the topic “Step back in time”. They learnt about different periods in history including the Victorian era and cave paintings. They also found out about significant people, including William Shakespeare and the Beatles band, as part of their cross- curricular work.
Year Two
As part of the topic “Art around the world”, year two children were introduced to the Egyptians. The children attempted to copy hieroglyphic symbols, which were used by the Egyptians.
History Spring 2021
EYFS
Children talk about their past experiences, including days out with their family and special times such as birthdays. They find out about the past and how life has changed from a variety of sources, including photographs, objects and stories.
During the Spring term, the children learnt about dinosaurs. They found out lots of facts about dinosaurs using a variety of resources.
Year one
Year one studied the topic of ‘Our Planet and Beyond.’ The children learnt about the history of space travel including learning about the race to space and the astronauts Neil Armstrong, Yuri Gagarin. They have been introduced to time lines for the events of space travel.
Year two
During the topic of ‘Air, Land and Sea’ the children have learnt about Lord Admiral Nelson. They found out about important dates in his life and could use prior knowledge of how a timeline works to create their own timeline for Lord Admiral Nelson. Some of the children were able to expand on the information and wrote additional facts for each date.
