Year 5’s Alien Planet – Who says older
children don’t do role play?
Guest Post by Mrs Walker
Before Easter and the earlier part of
last half term Year 5 had a class visitor, Mr Alien. He wanted them to
explore many things such as looking at different settlements so they could help
him to settle in a new part of his alien planet. To round off Mr Alien’s
visit we had two fantastic visits into the school woodlands.
The first afternoon the children were
settlers on the alien planet and used what they could find in the woodlands to
think and act like settlers. Some children focused on making shelters and
homes to live in and looked at the physical features of the woodlands to decide
where best to set up camp. Other children looked at how to make a living
on the new planet and decided that by setting up a hunting shop to sell hunting
tools they could make a living but also help others to catch their own food.
.jpg)
The children who made shops and café’s
also made their own currency and started to trade goods between
themselves. This was something that we hadn't covered in the classroom
but gave the children the experience of what it was like to be a settler in a
new area. Some of the children took it a step further and created a
cinema for the settler and even put on a show for us all in 4D! They used a
leaf ticketing system to control the entrance to the cinema and made a candy
floss machine using a hollowed out log.
The afternoon went by far too quickly
so we decided to do a full day in the woodlands the following week incorporating
structured activities as well as free play time to see where the children took
their learning. I also like to involve children in the planning process
so wanted to include some of their ideas into the woodlands day.
Earlier on in the term some had shown
an interest at looking at what aliens might eat. This was the focus for
one of our activities during the woodlands day. I asked the children to
create recipes for an alien café using only materials that they found in the
woodlands. When creating the recipes the children were noting down the
quantities of ingredients used and it was nice to hear them using mathematical
vocabulary. It also reinforced their understanding of ratios that they
had learned a few weeks earlier and were using terms such as “one handful of
mud for every two handfuls of sticks”.
In addition to the alien café the
children also went on a bug hunt with Mrs Bell in the woodlands where they
found some marvellous creatures and were able to look at them up close.
Miss Harrison arranged a fantastic orienteering activity with lots of clues
hidden around the school ground for the children to work out. We never
realised that Popcorn the class hamster was Mr Alien’s helper!!
At lunch time we had a lovely treat of
salmon and new potatoes. I’d never cooked in the woodlands before but had
fantastic support from Mrs Carter and Mrs Bell who rustled up a scrumptious
lunch and there was plenty left over for those who hadn't tried salmon before
to have a taste.
After lunch the children had a free
play session but I was amazed at how the majority of them carried on with their
settlement ideas. The girls decided to create a jewellery shop and
created some original pieces from things found in the woodlands and the boys
carried on with their hunting supply shop. The main thing that struck me
from their free play was how they also carried on developing their currencies
something which could possibly be taken further in the classroom.
I’d never organised a full day in the
woodlands before but followed some fantastic advice from Miss Kenyon that ‘less
is more’ and it certainly was in this case. Just by planting a few seeds
into their imaginations it was great to see how they engaged in role play and
developed their classroom learning into contexts that made sense to them.
I thoroughly enjoyed working with the
children (and staff) in Year 5 and I miss their creative imaginations already
!!
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
