Y6 Midlands

There are schools in this group:

Updates

  • Line of Fire

    The children were really taken with Barroux’s illustrations, and each picked their favourite panels. They asked whether they could create their own pieces – this is using the text from p.76 and 77. They thought about the power of colour in order to add to the mood and atmosphere of the words.

  • Submission by Griffydam Primary School

    A Scene from The Thing about Jellyfish

    Our gladiators performed a scene that they have written from 'The Thing About Jellyfish'. They decided to create a scene set before the action in the main story, which might give some indication of why the girls fell out and some answers to some of the most perplexing questions. We really hope you enjoy it.

    Griffydam Gladiators

    Download the file

  • Submission by St Joseph’s Catholic Primary, Derby

    St. Joseph’s Reads – a newsletter dedicated to reading

    The year 6 Reading Gladiators were set a challenge: to leave a reading legacy for the school. After much discussion, the children chose to plan and create a newsletter devoted exclusively to reading.

    The children have given up their lunchtimes to interview staff and children, finding out which books and authors are currently popular in different year groups. They have been keen to share their own favourites, and have been paying close attention to what is happening in school in terms of reading.

    Copies have been given to each class, are freely available to parents at the school office, and the newsletter has also been published on our blog and school Twitter feed.

    The Reading Gladiators worked so hard in their planning of the newsletter, and have already presented ideas of what could be in the next newsletter to the current year 5 children - true dedication!

    Download the file

  • Submission by St Matthew’s C of E Primary, Birmingham

    St Matthew’s Year 6 Gladiators reading legacy

    We wanted to leave behind a gift of new books for the library so that everyone at St Matthew's learns to love reading as much as us. The powerpoint explains how we raised money - and spent it!

    Download the file

  • Oscar Wilde

    We have fully enjoyed The Happy Prince compilation. For our final session, we all chose and presented a favourite story.

    Here, we can see two of the gladiators presenting in different ways. One child loved the story of ‘The Fisherman and His Soul’, while another presented her thoughts on ‘The Nightingale and the Rose’.

    Both girls explained the morals and messages behind each story, asking questions of their audience and making links to other stories.

    We have been surprised at how much we’ve enjoyed Oscar Wilde’s stories as we were unsure initially. Now we are looking to explore a wider range of fairy tales, such as the Brothers Grimm and Hans Christian Andersen.

    Comments

    Sam Keeley
    Sam Keeley 21st Mar 2018, 3:45pm
    It's interesting that you were unsure initially and then enjoyed the stories. It's worth persevering with books as they can exceed our expectations. It's good to see you choosing different ways of presenting your ideas about the stories - what links did you make to other stories? Enjoy reading on!
    Nicola Gamble
    Nicola Gamble 21st Mar 2018, 6:22pm
    A challenging read, and a lot for us to think about in these stories, which were written over 100 years ago. Lovely to hear that you gave presentations on your favourite stories.

  • The Most Beautiful Girl in the World

    Sneha, one of our Y6 Reading Gladiators, was so inspired by Carol Ann Duffy’s poetry that she wrote this amazing piece herself.

    This was shared across the school – lots of the teachers thought that it was written by Carol Ann Duffy herself!

    Comments

    Nicola Gamble
    Nicola Gamble 28th Feb 2018, 2:37pm
    Sneha, thank you for sharing such a wonderful poem. I particularly liked the line 'singing the song without the need of words'. It reminded me of how powerfully we can communicate with others, even if we don't share the same language: a smile, a tone of voice, a glimmer in the eyes
    Karenza Mahtani 28th Feb 2018, 4:15pm
    What a fantastic poem! Really great repetition and use of language - very impressive!

  • Alphabest

    Gladiator Chloe was inspired by the Carol Ann Duffy poem ‘The Alphabest’ to create her own version. We think it’s pretty amazing!

    Comments

    Nicola Gamble
    Nicola Gamble 8th Feb 2018, 1:36pm
    Well done, Chloe. No wonder the other Gladiators are proud of your achievement. You have captured the mood of the original with your own unique variation.
    Stephen Conor 28th Feb 2018, 12:48pm
    Hi Chloe, We really enjoyed reading your poem. It is full of humour and you must have worked hard to start each line with every letter of the alphabet. We loved Carol Ann Duffy's anthology - in one week, we secretly posted poetry in classrooms. None of the teachers knew who they were from but it made everyone talk and think about poems. We wonder if you could do the same with your own poetry :-) St. Joseph's Y6 Reading Gladiators

  • Line of Fire Artistic Response

    The children were really taken with Barroux’s illustrations, and each picked their favourite panels. They asked whether they could create their own pieces – this is using the text from p.76 and 77. They thought about the power of colour in order to add to the mood and atmosphere of the words.

    Comments

    Nicola Gamble
    Nicola Gamble 5th Jan 2018, 11:56pm
    I really like the way you have been inspired by Barroux' illustrations but have innovated by adding the yellow. The colour choice is evocative of the gas that was used in the trenches and it works well because you have been economic with the application. Well done everyone.
    Karenza Mahtani 28th Feb 2018, 4:16pm
    These pictures are wonderful - Barroux's illustrations are really evocative and so are these - fantastic, well done!

  • In the Line of Fire

    Although we missed the submission date, we were pleased to finish the mini-challenge as we can now share it with the rest of the school.

    Comments

    Nicola Gamble
    Nicola Gamble 19th Dec 2017, 11:48pm
    Stunning artwork St Matthews Gladiators. The use of red for the poppies in an otherwise monochromatic picture is very effective. Thank you for sharing your work with us.

  • Working on Line of Fire

    The snow did its best to stop us completing the Line of Fire mini-challenge by the deadline … but we kept working on it anyway.

  • The Thing About Jellyfish

    So far, this has been our favourite book this year. We loved how it had lots of facts about jellyfish while also telling a story, and it had a mix of emotions throughout the text.

    Tega – I just love it.
    Josh – It reminds us that friends are important.
    Andre – It teaches us how to teach other people.
    Diana – It shows us how things can change.

    Daisy’s review: ‘The thing about Jellyfish’ is a great and interesting book, if I could read it again I definitely would. First of all, the main character in this book is called Suzanne (also called Suzy and Zu throughout the story) who is the perspective this book is written from. Additionally, Suzy meets her soon to be best friend at swimming guppies, Franny, their friendship carrying on till they go to middle school (a school in America ranging from students 9 – 13 years old).

    Unfortunately, Franny apparently ‘drowns’ while on holiday after their last week of middle school. This leaves Suzy devasted, hurt and even guilty. While on a school trip to an aquarium, Zu begins to assume how this could’ve happened – Franny was a brilliant swimmer, what went wrong? That’s when she jumps to conclusions. Maybe a jellyfish stung her…

    All in all, Ali Benjamin did great describing Zu’s emotions throughout the book. I’ve still left out a lot of details, maybe you could finish Zu’s story and find out what did kill Franny…

    Rating: 9/10

    Comments

    Nicola Gamble
    Nicola Gamble 29th Nov 2017, 12:56pm
    What a superb update. We love your thoughtful responses and the display. It should encourage other children to read it. Great work, everyone.

  • The Mount Nod Team!

    We are all looking forward to the challenge of Reading Gladiators and are enjoying our first book!

    Comments

    Nicola Gamble
    Nicola Gamble 26th Sep 2017, 4:12pm
    Hello Mount Nod Gladiators! You are in for some reading treats this year. Let us know what you think about the books. Happy Reading

  • St Matthew’s Reading Gladiators

    My group are loving the first book and are excited about our next discussion session. Go Gladiators!

    Comments

    Nicola Gamble
    Nicola Gamble 24th Sep 2017, 4:20pm
    Hi St Matthews Gladiators! A big wave from our barn in Essex to all of you in Birmingham. We are looking forward to hearing your thoughts about the first book. Happy Reading!

  • Griffydam’s Y6 Gladiators

    Our Griffydam Gladiators have been chosen and are ready to read! We’re all so excited to be a part of the project and are looking forward to the challenges ahead!

    Comments

    Nicola Gamble
    Nicola Gamble 4th Sep 2017, 10:04am
    Hello Year 6 Griffydam Gladiators. Lovely to see you all. We are looking forward to hearing your thoughts about the books that you are reading this year!

  • 2017 – 2018 Challenges

    The 2016 – 17 challenges are now finished and we are enrolling schools for 2017-18. Why not join us?