Y4 West Midlands 2018
Welcome to the 2018-19 Reading Gladiators challenges. Let the reading begin!
There are schools in this group:
- Just Imagine
- Bearwood Primary School
- Lodge Primary School
- St Matthew’s C of E Primary, Birmingham
- Percy Shurmer Academy
- Montgomery Primary
- Gilbertstone Primary School
- Glenmead Primary School
- Little Sutton Primary School
- Parkfield Community School
- Henley Green Primary School
- St George’s C of E Primary School, Birmingham
- Our Lady & St Teresa’s Catholic Primary School
- Mount Nod Primary School
- Frederick Bird Primary School
- Pegasus Primary School
- Oaklands Primary School
- Court Farm Primary School
Updates
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Celebrations and Inspirations!
Frederick Bird Gladiators were so excited to receive our prize this week. We can’t wait to take it in turns borrowing the books to share at home with our families. We also really enjoyed continuing our reading of The Song From Somewhere else and slightly unnerved ourselves with our own illustrations of the troll, which we crceated based only on hearing the description read to us!
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The Song from Somewhere Else
We have been reading about Frank while listening to ‘Haunting and Heartbreaking’. We discussed how Frank must be feeling and how the music fits the rhythms of Harrold’s writing.
Comments
17th May 2019, 10:08am
Listening to music is such a powerful way to help children enter an imagined world. We'd love to here your thoughts. -
What’s that sound?
Today we began by reading the start of the book together. We talked a lot about how Frank must be feeling. We then listened to ‘Haunting and Heartbreaking’ as we read page 28 and looked at the illustration. When asked what we thought the sound suggested, our responses were varied. They included; a portal, a time machine, a refelction of Frank knowing she had not been kind, her imagination playing with her feelings. We’re really looking forward to solving the mystery!
Comments
13th May 2019, 7:22pm Sharing stories is such a good way of sharing thoughts about feelings. I'm sure alongside the illustration that the music helped children to conjure up stronger feelings too. -
Submission by Frederick Bird Primary School
Summoning the troups together!
We chose the scene where Eska was speaking heroically to the tribes and Flint. We thought the Battle Song from Narnia was a good match because the music was dramatic and that worked well with drama in the scene.
Comments
10th May 2019, 4:04pm Powerful stuff! and creatively presented too. Well done! -
Jacob / The Tale of Angelino Brown
Comments
15th Apr 2019, 2:05pm
A very angelic egg Jacob! Well done. -
Omhle / Sky Song
Comments
15th Apr 2019, 1:56pm
Wow! You've really captured the feeling of the landscape in Sky Song! -
Omhle / Sky Song
Comments
15th Apr 2019, 1:56pm Fantastic icebergs -
Gloria / Sky Song
Comments
15th Apr 2019, 1:58pm I love the colours that you have used. They match the book jacket perfectly! -
Gloria / Sky Song
Comments
15th Apr 2019, 2:06pm Another beautiful Sky Song egg. I think Abi Elphinstone would love to see these! -
Patrick / Town is by the Sea
Comments
15th Apr 2019, 1:59pm I can see that you've thought about Sydney Smith's use of black in Town is by the Sea. Well done! -
Patrick / Town is by the Sea
Comments
15th Apr 2019, 2:00pm Thank you for sharing your lovely egg with us. -
Emmanuel / The Ice Garden
Comments
15th Apr 2019, 2:05pm Than you for sharing your lovely egg with us Emmanuel. It looks as cool as an ice garden. -
Ayrton / The Tale of Angelino Brown
Comments
15th Apr 2019, 2:06pm That's a lovely cheery egg, Ayrton. Just like Angelino's hair. -
Henley Green Primary School / Year 4
Decorating plaster eggs drawing our inspiration from the books we have read this year as Reading Gladiators.
Comments
15th Apr 2019, 2:08pm We absolutely love your eggs Henley Green gladiators - they've brought a big smile to our faces and we think they're even better than chocolate eggs (and we really love chocolate!)15th Apr 2019, 2:09pm What an eggscellent idea (we couldn't resist the pun). Your eggs are fantastic! -
The Who’s Who of Sky Song
This week we read the first 2 chapters of the book together. We are loving the detailed descriptions and wanted to make sure we were keeping track of what was going on and who was doing what!
Comments
26th Mar 2019, 9:56am What a great idea Frederick Bird. Visualising is an essential technique to help us keep track of what we are reading.1st Apr 2019, 4:14pmFrom our continued reading, we now know that Eska has bright blue eyes and a shock of red hair. We also think that Flint has a bit of a temper but essentially has a good heart.15th Apr 2019, 2:10pm Great to see you building on your early reading and adding to your mental images, -
The Kingdom of Erkenwald
Today we listened to the prologue as it was read by our teacher. As we listened, we drew what we thought the land of Erkenwald might look like on a map. We then talked about the importance of the Little Bear constellation and the Northern Lights representing the Sky Gods. This inspired us to create some pastel artwork to accompany our maps!
Comments
18th Mar 2019, 8:45pm These are stunning Frederick Bird Gladiators!19th Mar 2019, 8:22am You have transported me back into Erkenwald. It makes me want to re-read this story! You have some very talented artists. -
The Ice Garden vs The Real World
We worked in a relay to add the descriptive phrases we found for these two settings. We noticed the main differences were in the description of temperature, the level of detail and how it made us feel as readers. The words that came to mind for us when thinking about the ice garden itself later, were, ‘magical’, ‘frosty’, ‘adventure’,
‘glacial’ and ‘extraordinary’.Comments
8th Mar 2019, 12:32pm Those are really interesting words to choose. It really is a magical place full of wonder. I certainly felt the change in temperature when we entered the ice garden and felt the need for an extra layer! -
The Ice Garden
This week, we were excited to start reading The Ice Garden. So far, we have found out all about Jess, who is allergic to the sun. In the photo you can see the still image we created, which shows Jess standing at a hospital window in her protective clothing, watching other ‘normal’ children playing outside. We felt sorry for Jess because we realised she must feel incredibly lonely.
Comments
28th Feb 2019, 2:16pm It must be hard to have to watch but not be able to participate. Let us know what you think of the book, when you have read a bit more.4th Mar 2019, 3:46pmWe have really enjoyed reading further into The Ice Garden. We spotted a few examples of personification and discussed why this was used and what effect it has for readers like us. -
Friendship, Adventure and Magic! What could it mean?
Today we thought about the suggested themes of friendship, adventure and magic. We talked about what they meant to use and how we could represent this through images and words.
Comments
16th Feb 2019, 4:47pm Hello Frederick Bird Gladiators. Lovely to see your thoughts around those key words. I wonder how they will come together in the story? -
Submission by St Matthew’s C of E Primary, Birmingham
Behind the Staff-room door
St. Matthew's Reading Gladiators have all had a fabulous time reading and doing various activities to Lost Magic. They have done performances to their favourite poems, drawn text maps and even did video recordings and role play. We all love this book and had an amazing time reading and performing poetry together :)
Comments
15th Feb 2019, 2:04pm Great use of graphics and emoji's to write your chosen poems. -
Submission by Henley Green Primary School
Henley Green Primary School – Our Favourite Poems
Comments
12th Feb 2019, 11:26am Thank you for taking the time to record your entry Henley Green. This poem was certainly a popular choice as you will see from the other entries! I hope you have seen Brian reading it too. -
Little Sutton Year 4 Gladiators
Here we are enjoying our success from the mini-challenge and reading our favourite poems from ‘Lost Magic’. Our particular favourite is ‘Cakes in the Staffroom’.
Comments
31st Jan 2019, 4:22pm Congratulation again to Little Sutton for your fabulous mini-challenge entry. I hope you are re-enacting 'Cakes in the Staffroom' on location and with accompanying artefacts! -
It’s all in the mind’s eye!
Today we talked about our favourite poems from Lost Magic, having started our reading at home. In our session today, we listened to some poems being read and sketched out what we were imaging as the reading continued! Even though we were drawing independently, many of our images looked the same. We decided that this showed how well the poets built a picture of what they were describing for us. They were also good at creating feelings in us such as fear of the snakes; particularly the python welcoming guests and crushing bones!
Comments
21st Jan 2019, 10:11pm Thank you for sharing your work with us. Interesting that your images were similar. I wonder if any of the details were different? Why might tht be?28th Jan 2019, 4:14pmWe spoke about this and thought the differences could be down to our different experiences, ideas and creativity! -
Submission by Parkfield Community School
Town is by the sea mini challenge
We created a picture to represent the physical and emotional feelings of being in the dark. We had to imagine what it would be like for father to work all day down in the coal mine.
Comments
11th Jan 2019, 10:05am Excellent use of symbols to represent the range of emotions. A picture can speak a thousand words can't it. -
Submission by Little Sutton Primary School
Town is by the Sea
The year four gladiators loved exploring the theme of darkness and how it made them feel! Here, some of the gladiators produced artwork at home to reflect and present their ideas.
Comments
11th Jan 2019, 9:57am Fantastic to see four different interpretations. I can imagine you had some interesting discussion about being alone in the dark and belonging in the dark. -
Submission by Frederick Bird Primary School
What on earth is a Wimbley Woo?
We worked to construct our own rhyming couplets, lines and stanzas and after that, had to work really hard as a team to mix them together to create a whole poem. It took some compromising and lots of cooperation, but we are very proud of the poem we created. We enjoyed reading it out loud together but did not all want to share our voices in a recording, so we thought we would help the reader imagine the scene by creating some illustrations!
Comments
14th Dec 2018, 4:02pm Great teamwork! I think there is one word we will all remember after reading Wed Wabbit and that's 'hue'. I hope you will use it in your own writing soon. -
Parkfield Community School Town Is By The Sea
We have been listening to ‘The Coal Miners Song’ by Jimmy Joe Lee and imagining what it would be like to be in a dark space. We tried moving around and doing a simple task in the dark. It was really hard!
Comments
13th Dec 2018, 5:28pm Being in the dark is tricky isn't it. I always feel really disorientated in the dark. -
Parkfield Community School Angelino Brown
We have been exploring all the different characters in this this story. We have also been thinking about why an angel like Angelino has entered the lives of Bert and Betty.
Comments
5th Dec 2018, 1:41pm Fantastic to see you Parkfield! It's the sign of a great reader to question what you read. Do let us know your thoughts as you read on. -
Henley Green Primary School – Year 4 Reading Gladiators
We are growing glorious Reading Gladiators in our garden!
Comments
19th Nov 2018, 3:56pm Glorious GREEN gladiators! How appropriate. Hello everyone, I hope you are still having fun and enjoying your reading. -
Bearwood visit Wimbley Land
Comments
23rd Nov 2018, 1:08am Hi Bearwood, thank you for sharing the map of Wimbley land with us. What a crazy place! Do you think you could speak in rhyme all day long?
Comments