Whilst working on their narrative poetry unit in English lessons, Year 6 children studied the poems ‘The Raven’ by Edgar Allen Poe and ‘A Plagued Journey’ by Maya Angelou. In depth, children discussed the themes and feelings depicted in both of the poems and looked at the language closely in order to work out how these were achieved. They also linked their English learning to their PSHE units by talking about mental health.
To extend their understanding of Maya Angelou’s poem, Year 6 pupils dramatized the poem by acting it out. All the pupils thought really carefully about how the character in the poem was feeling and how best they could depict different scenes with movements and facial expressions.
It is now amazing to see that many words, phrases and figurative language features from both poems are being used by our pupils in their work regularly.
For a while, Normanhurst school has been experimenting with a new approach to teaching spelling where spelling lessons are active, engaging and creative. As one of the various activities that we use to teach spelling patterns and to help pupils practise them whilst they learn the words’ meanings, Year 6 pupil played Spelling Charades!
They acted out different spelling words to their team and their teammates would need to use the spelling pattern for the week to correctly spell them. Each group that got their words correct received a point.
It was a fun and active session where a lot of words were spelt and laughter heard.
