To begin our year we decided to get into character and travel back to The Titanic's maiden voyage in April 1912. Throughout this term we will be learning about the importance of the Titanic and the timeline of events that occurred during this fateful journey. We will explore the structure of this significant ship looking further into what life was like for first, second and third class passengers. Lastly, we will be connecting our English to The Titanic by role playing and writing diaries in the role a passenger as well as eventually creating a fact file with all the amazing information we have learned!

On Friday 2nd we began our topic with a Titanic workshop day. We started all together in the hall to create a timeline to put the events in order so we could learn about when The Titanic journey happened. We then looked at interesting artefacts from the ship in 1912 and discussed and asked questions about their importance. Next, we tried our best to create 'unsinkable' boats, but we learnt that even the sturdiest boats can sink. Then, we discovered the international language of Morse Code and learnt that it is a communication that can be used by anyone across the world to send messages. We all practiced sending our names and the important SOS message. After lunch, we had a competitive quiz to show how much we have learnt already and we rounded the day up with a first class tea party with sandwiches and cakes! 

After the workshop we worked together as a class to order the events in a timeline and recorded this in our books. 

We have been learning about the structure of ships like the Titanic. We played a game where we created specific moves to remember parts like the funnel, crows nest and hull. We had lots of fun! 

In English we have been getting into character of a Titanic passenger by thinking about what they might have been doing on the ship and their feelings. In groups we created some freeze frames linked to a scenario for example ‘water is rising around you’ or ‘you have been saved by a lifeboat’. The rest of the class had to think about how they were feeling. 

We have been working on features of diaries in English and this week we managed to finish our first diary entry! We broke it down into three parts: a introduction, middle and end. Coming up with ideas as a group we then put this into our diaries. Some of us even practised writing out our sentences independently. Miss Buckett and Mrs Fowler are so proud of all of you! 

This week in topic we started looking more closely at the different classes on the Titanic. We went on scavenger hunts to find information cards to learn all about 1st, 2nd and 3rd class. We then sorted pictures into columns from the information we discovered. 

Continuing with our Titanic topic we took a closer look at the different menus available for 1st, 2nd and 3rd class. We tried some foods from each class and even had a go at making and tasting our own 3rd class gruel! 

In English we have started a new book called Lost and Found. We have been learning all about the characters and different parts of the book. As groups we acted out different parts of the story. 

We have focussed on lifeboats and life jackets this week in topic. By looking at floating and sinking we investigated which materials would be best for a boat to carry survivors. Additionally, we looked at what materials would be suitable for life jackets by checking if they are waterproof. 

Model cabins

We first looked at examples and discussed as a group what we liked about them and things we might change. In red pencil we wrote parts we might change and in green pencil we wrote down the parts we liked.

To start our cabins we first looked at flooring and wallpaper that first class cabins might have had and we decided to use paint to decorate our third class cabins. 

We started building our furniture for our cabins. Looking at the difference between 1st and 3rd class cabins we chose our designs and materials carefully.

We did an amazing job on our Titanic cabin designs! We worked as a team and contributed our ideas to create an end product! We thought about the differences between third and first class cabins when designing them, thinking about which materials would work well.