This term, Year 4 have really enjoyed their new topic of Extreme Habitats. At the beginning of the topic, the whole year group explored the grounds in search of minibeasts in our school habitats. Here is a newspaper extract from a member of Chestnut class:

Armed with a magnifying glass and bug boxes, the children set off on their adventure to explore the wonders of the vast school grounds. A wide variety of minibeasts were found to the absolute delight of the year 4 explorers. The question is what did they find?

Hidden beneath the blanket of leaves, a woodland spider was camouflaged hiding from its prey. Buried beneath the soil lay a long wiggly worm digging deep into the mud. Using their magnifying glasses and microscopes the pupils were able to observe these wonderful creatures more carefully using their classification charts to help identify species. “We are so lucky to have so much outside space to explore and find these amazing insects,” said a pupil from Chestnut class. After observing these wonderful insects, everyone was carefully returned to its home. “This has been my favourite lesson this year exploring the school grounds,” reported an excited learner from Maple Class.

Our first extreme habitat that we have explored is the icy polar habitats of the Arctic and the Antarctic, and we have read Shackleton’s Journey by William Grill to inspire our writing. Through drama and hot-seating, the children have connected with different members of Shackleton’s crew and journeyed with them in their endeavour to be the first team to succeed in the Trans-Antarctic crossing via the South Pole. The eventual destruction of Endurance (Shackleton’s ship) proved very emotive. In the below photos there are some extracts from newspaper reports written by the children about the event.