We have been watching a short animated video clip in literacy, using the story as inspiration for our writing. The story (The Present) is about a boy who recieves an unusual present from his mum. The story raises several issues and dilemmas, although we have had to wait to find out the ending of the story.

Today we role played the character of the boy in the story, carrying out a hot-seating activity to share our thoughts and feelings at different parts of the film and show empathy with the main character.

We have now seen the end of the story (what a twist!). If you want to find out more the clip is available online and is well worth a watch – The Present by Jacob Frey.

Today the whole school held an art day. We all came off timetable to study the work of famous, and some not so famous artists, creating art inspired by Summer and nature.

The children in year 5 worked with some of the year 2 children from Bonsai class. We watched some videos of an unusual artist, named Andres Amador, who sneaks onto an empty beach to create giant patterns in the sand, before the tide comes in and washes it all away.

We came up with our own geometric patterns and designs, before using small tools to create our images in sand. We also had time to fit in some painting, we chose to stick with the beach theme and created seascapes using watercolour paints.

It was lovely to see all of the children working together and collaborating to share ideas.

To see some of our fantastic finished art work, come along to our exhibition afternoon next Thursday.

As part of our DT and History work this term we have been learning about Tudor food. In Pine we have been creating Tudor sweets. We have made Tudor roses from marchpane – a Tudor version of marzipan and dried apples with honey and cinnamon.

The school smelled delicious while the food was baking!

Our marchpane roses look amazing and we will now decorate them with food colouring (just like the Tudors would have done for a feast).