Y6 EAST 2019/20
Welcome to the 2019-20 Reading Gladiators™ challenges. Let the reading begin!
There are schools in this group:
- Brightside Primary School
- Toftwood Infant and Junior School Federation
- All Saints’ CEVA Primary School
- Iver Village Junior School
- Snodland CEP
- St Mary’s Prittlewell C of E Primary School
- New Horizons Children’s Academy
- Just Imagine
- Ivy Chimneys Primary School
- Priory Junior School
- St Mary’s Church of England Primary School
- The Grove Primary School
- Brampton CE Primary School
- St Mary’s C of E Primary School
- The Round House Primary Academy
- St Matthews C Of E Primary School (Ipswich)
- Tudor C of E Primary School
Updates
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Reading, Reading, Reading!
To keep us going in these uncertain times the IVJS Reading Gladiators have been stocking up on previous Reading Gladiator books.
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World Book Day at IVJS
Dressing up as our favourite characters, hot chocolate, cookies and a good book:
our Reading Gladiator Club was fantastic!Comments
8th Mar 2020, 10:36am
You all look fantastic and what better way to spend World Book Day than with a great book! -
Submission by Iver Village Junior School
The Iliad
The Iver Village Junior School Reading Gladiators have had great fun illustrating this section of text and worked very well as a team to produce this piece of art. We really enjoyed reading and discussing The Iliad and completing the associated activities too.
Comments
2nd Mar 2020, 10:24am A wonderfully vibrant illustration filled with detail. It's clear that you have worked really well as a team to produce this collaborative piece of work. It's great to hear that you have enjoyed reading this book so much. Thank you for your entry - you should be proud of what you have achieved. -
Submission by The Grove Primary School
The Grove Entry for the Iliad Competition
We started this challenge by re-reading the paragraph that we needed to illustrate. We visualised what we thought this battle scene would look like and pulled out key phrases that described the setting such as the ground being stained with blood so we knew what we were going to include in our illustration. After that we looked carefully at the illustrations in the book.
We noticed the striking contrast between some illustrations that are black and white using silhouettes and others which are brightly coloured patterned bold shapes. We wanted to try to replicate this style in our own illustration.
First two of the Reading Gladiators made the sun out of tissue paper as the sunrise was going to be one of the main features. Another Gladiator washed the background to make the sky and the blood red ground. More Reading Gladiators started to create the soldiers, drawing the Greeks and the Trojans and drew them in different sizes to show perspective, representing the size of the battle.Other Reading Gladiators made the walls and city of Troy as a silhouette and huts to show where the Greeks were staying. Finally, we finished our piece with a Greek ship and the river, which is decorated with Greek writing. One of the Reading Gladiators used the key in the back of the book – can you translate to find out what she has written?
Comments
2nd Mar 2020, 10:21am What a great entry Grove Gladiators! It is clear to see the thought that has gone into the illustration and the way you have spent time looking at the style of Neil Packer. I love the challenge you have set the team of translating the writing in Greek! Could you send us a close up of the text please? We have tried enlarging it but it is then too blurry to read. Well done! -
The Iliad
This challenge was great fun! Everyone at IVJS worked so well as a team.
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New Text Time
The children are so excited to be starting a new text and can’t wait to see if their prior knowledge is going to help them gain a greater understanding of the text as it unfolds
Comments
13th Feb 2020, 10:49am
We hope you enjoy this wonderful edition! -
Performance
The children were really inspired by the performance of Share Kwame Alexander prior to creating their own performance poems.
Comments
30th Jan 2020, 1:12pm
He is a delight to watch isn't he and a superb advocate for engaging children with poetry. -
Submission by The Grove Primary School
The Grove Reading Gladiators
Our 8 children split into smaller groups to summarise the story in their own ways. This storyboard summarises the story and begins by setting the scene (page 1) about when the story is set and who Charlie is. The next poem they chose (pg15) is a flashback where Charlie remembers his dad. As readers we get to understand why Charlie struggles with his emotions. After that they chose a poem (pg 119) where Charlie goes to live with his grandparents. This becomes a turning point in the story as he is suddenly away from his mum and his friends. The next poem is an introduction to Roxie (pg 184). They selected this poem because they felt that Roxie was a key character who encourages Charlie to play basketball (poem 210) and pushes him out of his comfort zone. The poem on page 212, is the first time Charlie agrees to play basketball, building his confidence in his ability. This continues with the poem on page 227 as we see that he continues playing and his talent and passion grows. Finally they chose the poem on pg 409 when Charlie’s letter and his journal is given to his sons. We inferred that Charlie/Chuck may have died in between the main part of the story ending and his sons receiving this present at graduation.
We are unsure what happens to him, but suspected an illness, possibly something similar to what killed his father. We researched Kwame Alexander and found that there is a sequel to this book, called crossover, which the two main characters are Charlie's sons so are keen to read this one to find out what happened to him.
Comments
20th Jan 2020, 9:25am Well done Grove gladiators. We loved reading the reasons for your choices. You are clearly a group who work really well together and think deeply about your reading. Keep up the great work! -
Rebound – Role-on-the-wall
The children have enjoyed the new text and even more so because it is the first verse novel that they have read.
They are looking forward to adding to the characteristics of Charlie as the story progresses
Comments
24th Jan 2020, 6:07am We'd love to hear how you get on and whether it gives you a taste for reading other verse novels. Great work Snodland! -
IVJS Rebound Storyboard
Wow! What a story and what a tricky challenge to summarise Charlie’s journey in just eight poems! We loved the story, the style of the novel and debating the reasons behind our choices of poem.
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Submission by Iver Village Junior School
IVJS The Way Past Winter
We have thoroughly enjoyed choosing, debating and performing our selected passage from The Way Past Winter. Performing the text in the Reader's Theatre really helped us to understand each character's personality. We hope you receive the video of our performance via dropbox.
Comments
16th Dec 2019, 6:29am You made this so tricky for us to judge Iver Village. You got to grips with readers theatre so well and captured the expression of the characters perfectly. Thank you for your high quality entry - just pipped to the post this month but keep entering. -
Rebound
We are amazed at how much we are enjoying this verse novel. It is a new style of reading for all of us at IVJS.
Comments
13th Dec 2019, 2:35pm You all look engrossed! -
Exploring Characters
The children have really enjoyed using the characteristic cards to discuss which character portrays which characteristic. This caused huge debate amongst the group but the reasons for their responses varied depending on the scene in the story they were discussing.
We also added a few new words to our vocabulary bank.
Comments
29th Nov 2019, 10:55am We are so glad this session engendered some good debate! The Way Past Winter is such a rich text, where your mind can indeed be changed about a character from scene to scene. Well done for being able to give reasons for your choices. -
Visualisation
Our groups interpretation of the sentence: tiny trees twisted into bizarre shapes, leaning towards the birch at their centre.
The interpretation of this was that the other trees were almost bowing down to ‘The Heart Tree.’
Comments
22nd Nov 2019, 9:08am What a joyful picture, Snodland! We are so glad you are enjoying using these techniques to explore the text! -
Readers Theatre
The children enjoyed acting out the scene and interpreting how the characters portray themselves in a particular scene with a focus on the dynamics which drive their relationship.
Comments
12th Nov 2019, 11:01am It's a great way to get under the skin of the characters. -
Enjoying the text
The team are thoroughly enjoying the text and are eager to see what happens next
Comments
12th Nov 2019, 11:00am You look engrossed and what a lovely space to be reading in. I notice there's a spare chair - anyone mind if I curl up with my copy there? -
Conscience Alley
The children enjoyed exploring the two points of view: Why Mila should have taken Pipa and Why Mila should have left Pipa at home. This caused much debate and children could not unanimously agree on the best outcome
Comments
11th Nov 2019, 10:46am Great to see you so engaged in this Snodland! The discussion is key here and it's not unusual to find that the group doesn't agree - it shows you've taken part in high quality talk. Well done. -
Submission by Snodland CEP
Snodland Storyboard
The children have thoroughly enjoyed the text and challenges set - especially trying to create a storyboard using only eight frames.
Comments
8th Nov 2019, 1:17pm A fantastic storyboard Snodland. Thank you for submitting. -
Submission by Iver Village Junior School
IVJS A Wrinkle in Time Storyboard
We have thoroughly enjoyed working as a team to complete our first mini-challenge. We particularly loved reading the book and brainstorming all our ideas.
Comments
8th Nov 2019, 1:07pm A very striking storyboard which impressed us all greatly. You have clearly got to know the story really well to select these moments. Well done. -
Text 2
The children have been introduced to the second text in their Gladiator journey and can’t wait to see what happens.
Comments
21st Oct 2019, 2:26pm We can't wait to hear what you think of it! -
Brainstorming A Wrinkle in Time
IVJS Reading Gladiators were amazed to discover that A Wrinkle in Time was written over 50 years ago – what a wonderful imagination Madeliene L’Engle had!
Comments
12th Oct 2019, 6:46am I agree. It feels like it could have been written yesterday - a timeless classic! This is a wonderful photograph - you all look so deep in thought. -
Debate
The team looked at the statement cards which identify some of the issues regarding what it means to be human. This caused huge debate amongst the group deciding which they agree with and which they don’t.
Comments
3rd Oct 2019, 9:53am It's great to hear that the statements provoked such debate among your gladiators! We love a good discussion. I wonder if you might revisit this in the coming weeks. -
The Tesseract
The team had their second session today and it allowed them to draw their own interpretation of ‘The Tesseract’. The one above is represented by layers of colour as you travel through time.
Comments
25th Sep 2019, 1:37pm Great to see your interpretation of the Tesseract. Well done. -
Gladiators are presented with their badge
The team were very excited today after receiving a gift!
Comments
25th Sep 2019, 1:34pm A badge to wear with pride! -
A Wrinkle In Time
The Year 6 children have started their ‘Reading Gladiator’ journey and are eager to learn more about the tesseract. They first session enabled them to start a character profile on some of the individuals we have been introduced to in the first chapter.
Comments
20th Sep 2019, 12:51pm A great start to your journey! It's lovely to see your smiling faces. Please keep us updated as you read on. We'd love to see pictures of your character profiles as they develop. Happy Reading! -
Let the Challenge Begin!
Welcome year 6 Gladiators. The 2019-20 challenge is about to begin. We can’t wait to hear what you think about your new books.
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