English
This term Oak students learnt strategies for reading and decoding unfamiliar words and reflected on the function of the different punctuation. The class shared their feelings about books, discussed and wrote about their own experiences and analysed a range of fictional characters using text evidence – content, point of view, language and tone. Following last term’s reading of The Iron Man by Ted Hughes, the class wrote their own fantasy stories. Linked to this term’s study of Ancient Egypt in history, the class also looked at Egyptian myths, such as the Egyptian creation story and the story of Isis and Osiris.
French with Joanna
The festivities continued after the New Year in French class this term. Since we are living in the ‘Culinary Capital’ of the world, there’s always an excuse to bake delicious treats linked of course to a specific festivity. We started off the first term of 2024 learning about and celebrating l’Epiphanie and why the French eat the ‘Galette des Rois’ (6/01) which we baked and ate with all Oak & Elms students and then we invited the parents to partake in this delicious feast. After digesting our galette we celebrated ‘La Chandeleur’ (2/02) by making ‘des crêpes’ with our classmates and after flipping them successfully we chose some scrumptious toppings and ate them with the whole school. We finished off the term learning about Le Nouvel An Chinois, Mardi Gras and La Saint Valentin. We also studied the painting ‘Les Quatre Saisons’ d’Arcimboldo and the students made their own posters by describing each season. The students also learned and presented poems on le mois de janvier perfectly and we studied le passé composé with spelling tests and worksheets.
French with Marie
Durant cette troisième période, les élèves ont étudié plusieurs notions:
en grammaire: adjectifs qualificatifs épithète et attribut, complément du nom
en orthographe: accords dans le Groupe Nominal (genre et nombre).
en conjugaison: le futur des auxiliaires être et avoir, et des verbes du 1er et 2ème groupe.
en vocabulaire: lectures silencieuses.
en mémorisation: apprentissage de 2 poésies “Hiver”et
en littérature: 1 livre a été lu et étudié:
- Emilie et le crayon magique d’Henriette Bichonnier
French with Joanna
3 évaluations ont été faites cette période.
French Topic with Marie
Cette période nous avons continué à étudier le fonctionnement du gouvernement français et vu les caractéristiques de la 5ème République. En effet, après avoir révisé les symboles de la France, les élèves ont analysé plusieurs notions:
- la Déclaration des droits de l’homme et du citoyen (établie après la Révolution française en 1789)
- la démocratie
- la constitution du gouvernement avec les différents membres qui le composent (le président, les ministres, l’Assemblée Nationale avec les députés, le Sénat et les grands élécteurs)
- les 3 pouvoirs et leurs fonctions (législatif, exécutif et judiciaire)
- le fonctionnement du vote
Les enfants ont écouté la chanson de Gérard Lenormand Si j’étais président:
Nous avons lu ces livres:
Puis les enfants ont effectué un grand panneau récapitulant tout ce qu’ils ont intégré:
History
This term Oak historians traveled back in time to Ancient Egypt. The class learnt about daily life for ordinary people, the homes they lived in and what it was to like to be a child in Ancient Egypt. Oaks learnt about food and farming, trading and travel at this time as well as Egyptian writing. Students also discovered about Egyptian beliefs about the afterlife and, of course, the pyramids that housed the bodies of the Pharaohs, the heads of state and religious leaders of this fascinating cultures.
Geography
Oaks continued their study of the Americas this term. They learnt about the continent’s physical geography, its mountains, rivers and seas, and discovered its many different geographical features, from deserts and canyons to volcanoes, forests and glaciers. Oaks learnt about the different biomes across the continent and also about the cultural history of North and South America, the indigenous peoples and the impact of the arrival of Europeans in the 15th century.
Mathematics
In Statistics: This term, Oaks constructed and interpreted various tables, charts, and diagrams, including frequency tables, bar charts, simple pie charts and line graphs. Oak students created their questioner and conducted their survey around the school on topics of favourite colours, domestic pets and means of travel. Linked to our learning in science on ‘State of matter’, students recorded and presented data in tables, bar charts and line graphs and then practiced solving comparison, sum and difference problems. Oak students worked on solving different statistics problems where information had to be analyzed in order to calculate the required average: range, mode, mean and median.
Introduction to Probability : During this unit, we discovered vocabulary related to probability and know that Impossible, Unlikely, Even Chance, Likely and Certain relate to 0, 1/4, 1/2, 3/4 and 1, respectively. We then experimented and solved hands on probability problems with our spinners, dice and coins.
In Number and Fraction, Oak students worked on finding fractions of shapes and now will move onto finding fraction of amounts, finding equivalent fractions and will carry out operations with fractions, improper fractions and mixed numbers.
Les Concours Archimède
On the 1st of February, 3 students from Oak and Elm crunched mathematical puzzles that were intend to be solved during Les Concours Archimède. Unfortunately, the competition was cancelled this year due to the organisational issues, but our young mathematicians were keen to put their logical minds to the test. Well done to Roger, Leonard and Stefan! Fantastic results and we are very proud of you!
Les JEUX ÉNIGMES SOLIDAIRES pour collégiens francophones depuis 1989. These puzzle games allowed children to highlight their knowledge, clearly express their mathematical thoughts and use their sense of observation.
Science
During this term, Oak students dived into the world of physics and investigated with the three states of matter. Young scientists proposed their questions, changed one variable, tested their hypothesis three times, recorded their findings and made their conclusions. Students discussed everyday solids, liquids and gases, considering their shape and volume. Students carried out different experiments where they observed changes during cooling, freezing and melting process. Oak students plotted and analyzed heating or cooling plot graphs, drew conclusions about the melting and boiling points of substances. Oaks also investigated with different solids and liquids while mixing, diluting and dissolving and then grouped them into reversible and irreversible changes.
Experiments with snow
During the snowy January days, Oak scientists investigated with snow and tested different materials to find good thermal insulators and conductors. Students devised different experiments where they measured the time, temperature and amount of water formed after snow or ice was melted.
Chocolate orangette
Linked to our science topic, we created our own chocolate-dipped orangette. First we made candied orange peels and then dipped them in our pre-tempered chocolate. We tried to master the complex process of tempering chocolate while melting, cooling down and reheating chocolate that gave us a glossy effect.
Celebrating St. Valentine’s day with Pavlova meringaie
Experiment with water in a paper cup. We managed to heat water up to 60.3°C in a paper cup, and we did this in 25 mins with one tealight candle. Feel free to try this home but don’t do this when you are in a hurry, or just have a cup of tea while you wait. Paper cup doesn’t burn, as water acts as a good conductor of heat and prevents the paper from reaching the kindling point. We didn’t manage to boil the water but recommend that you place a lid on your cup, it might help. Try and let us know.
ICT
During the term, Oak Class designed and programmed different projects in Scratch:
– Created shapes using count-controlled loops.
– Explored infinite and count-controlled loops. They practiced using these within the program and considered which might be more suitable for different purposes.
– Created designs for an animation of the letters in their names. The animation used repetition to change the costume (appearance) of the sprite. The letter sprites all animated together when the event block (green flag) was clicked.
– Our last project of the term involved designing their own games based on the model project, producing designs and algorithms for sprites in the game.
Spanish
This term in Spanish, Oak Class became familiar and confident with the parts of the body and the key concept of gender differences in nouns. They continued practicing the key Spanish sounds, numbers, and colors. They described monsters using the verb ‘tener’ (to have) and adjusted the sentence according to gender and number. We concluded this term by practicing common vocabulary and phrases used on Valentine’s Day.
Forest Exploration and PE
Forest Challenges and Team building Activities
During our whole school forest challenges and team building activities, the children were engaged in a variety of physical and logical tasks. Not only that they started to develop a sense of belonging to the team but also tried to overcome frustration when something was not going their way. As a team, they tried to work on these tasks and often agreed on the strategies and techniques that they had to use. The main mission for these challenges is not only to allow children to have fun but also enrich their set of skills that will be useful for the rest of their lives.
The children worked on their Morality, Enquiry, Cooperation, Communication, Thoughtfulness, Respect, Resilience and Determination personal goals.
These skills are vital to acquire from an early age and knowing ‘how to get up when we are knocked down’ is very important.
Team building challenges
Coding and Programming Workshop
This term, Oak Class created a catch game in Scratch using an apple and a bowl. In this game, they had to catch apples falling from the sky using a bowl. This involved a multi-step process where students programmed the apple to ascend, fall, maneuver the catcher, and catch it. They also set up a scoring system, implemented a program for bonus points, and included a victory message at the end. It was an interesting and challenging term for Oak Class.
