Halfway Junior School

Welcome to Year 6

Life in year 6

Year 6 is a busy, demanding but fun year at Halfway Junior School, where the focus is ensuring children have the knowledge, skills and character to thrive in their next phase of education. Children enjoy being the eldest in school and as such as expected to act as excellent role models for the rest of the school community. They use their last year with us to demonstrate all our core values, but in particular a strong emphasis is placed on being ambitious with their learning and courageous with their approach to transition and the changes that they are facing.

The year 6 curriculum is designed to help our pupils become Key Stage 3 ready, with topics linked to current global issues, such as Climate Change, as well as STEM projects that demand precision and skills across a variety of subjects. Emphasis is placed on personal development, character and the learning skills required to become flexible and resilient learners as they transition onwards. The curriculum ensures core concepts, ideas and knowledge are embedded and ready to be built upon further as they complete the KS2 programme of study. Our Y6 leave as problem solvers, able to organise and critically process information, and make conscious decions on how to apply their knowledge effectively. 

During year 6, pupils are challenged to push themselves physically and emotionally during residential, class assmenlies, up on stage in a performance and to take on leadership roles, such as house captains, school council members and librarians.

Our year 6s become House Captains or Peer Mentors, taking on roles and responsibilities to support other pupils across school and work with school leaders to shape how the school runs. This level of responsibility and required maturity ensures there is an opportunity for everyone to experience leadership, responsibility and accoutability before they move through to secondary education.

For more information about the transition from year 6 to year 7, please see our transition page. 

Staff

Miss White - Class Teacher

Mrs Wesley- Class Teacher

Mr Owen - Class Teacher

Mrs Cooper- Teaching Assistant

Learning in Year 6 

English

Reading

In year 6, children continue to embed their previous learning. They learn subject specific vocabulary and during daily reading lessons they practise previously learnt skills including drawing inferences, predicting and summarising. They learn how to effectively answer a range of questions about fiction and non-fiction texts through an understanding of the language used and they are encouraged to discuss the author’s use of language and its impact on the reader. Children in both years 5 and 6 participate in discussions about books that are read to them and those they can read for themselves. They are encouraged to explain and discuss their understanding of what they have read and to justify their views. The emphasis within year 6 is to respond to reading, through recognising authorial intent, learning from the content, forming opinions and making links to other aspects of learning, such as moral implications within stories. 

 Writing

In year 6, children are able to reflect their understanding of the audience and purpose for their writing by selecting appropriate vocabulary and grammar. We support our children in preparing for secondary education by ensuring that they can consciously control sentence structure in their writing and understand why sentences are constructed as they are. Children are taught to understand nuances in vocabulary choice and age-appropriate, academic vocabulary. Year 6 children spend time mastering their skills through consolidation, practise and discussion of language.

Maths

Just like in maths last year, a huge focus in year 6 will be how we can think mathematically and make decisions. This will be boosted by continuing to explore mathematical connections, such as those between multiplication and division and fractions, decimals percentages and ratio. It is our aim that children end the year having enjoyed learning and being challenged by maths, and with a secure foundation on which to build as they continue into secondary. As in previous years, we will continue to ensure fluency is embeded and automatic, whther that be procedurally or through a flexible view of number. Spotting structures, patterns and where to apply knowledge is where the challenge lies within maths lessons- an engaging, enriching and fulfilling experience.

Useful links

BBC Bitesize

Sumdog

Numbots

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