Active Planet

We've been so active with our Active Planet IPC theme that we haven't had much time to blog.

Finally here is an update of what we've been doing this half-term.

Plate tectonics
We learnt about  how the crust of the Earth is divided into plates and that these plates are continuously moving as a result of convection within the Earth. This movement causes mountains to form, earthquakes, tsunamis and volcanoes to form and erupt.

We marked out and labeled some of the major plate boundaries on our big 3D map of Earth.

Earthquakes and Tsunamis
We learnt how we measure earthquakes using a seismograph and the Richter scale. We looked at videos of earthquakes and took notice of the housing material.

We made seismograph and tested them.

We also made houses from different materials- lego (brick), concrete (plaster), wood and metal. The we tested the the houses in a very dramatic earthquake that lasted 30secs!.

Volcanoes and Literacy
We've started learning about volcanoes and have selected a volcano to individually research. We will combine our literacy unit of 'Journalistic Writing' with our volcano research to create a magazine.

Literacy
We finally finished typing our long/short stories with dilemmas and it will be published soon. We've learnt about journalistic writing that is used for presenting news reports in newspapers, magazines. online and TV.

Mathematics
We've focused on multiplication and division to start of this term. We've have really made improvements so far!


Music
We have also started music sessions 2 times a week. We are thinking and talking about rhythm and will eventually create an Active Planet percussion piece.


Coming up...
Stay tuned for more on the volcanic activity in our class...The 11 vulcanologist in our class are continuing their research and have issued a 'high alert' warning: there will be lots of volcanic activity in the following week!