Simple Welsh Conversation

Welsh Conversations

Today we read, wrote and spoke some simple sentences in Welsh. We built on vocabulary learned in years 3, 4 and 5. We asked each other our names and how we were feeling. We then added some questions and answers in the past tense about our summer holidays.
Click on the video to listen to one conversation.
Next time we will add more questions and include more work on the past tense.

Newspaper Article

Today we were given the task of writing a newspaper article about the problem of dog mess in Pontyclun.

Firstly we had a class discussion about the problem. We also interviewed a panel of dog owners from our class and asked them some relevent questions.



The skills we used were to LISTEN TO THE CONTRIBUTION OF OTHERS

to WRITE CLEARLY AND CONFIDENTLY

to CHOOSE WORDS FOR VARIETY AND INTEREST



Our Success Criteria was to listen, respond and write accordingly.



Read Bethan Mullins' article.



POO-LLUTION STRIKES!!

This week, we have been looking at the pollution caused by dog mess in Pontyclun. Today we interviewed a pannel of dog owners from our class. They were Bethan Mullins, Morgan Rose, Charlie Summers and Matthew Pearce. 'Do you pick up your dog's poo?' we asked. The answer was YES! 'It's not hard just to get a poo bag and pick your dog's mess up,' commented Charlie. 'Some lazy people just leave it,' said Matthew. 'Some people just want a good day, they step out, then they step in dog's mess. Not a good start to the day,' was the opinion of Bethan Mullins.

Our ideas to solve this problem are to put dog bags on the dog litter bins so that if you have forgotten to take a bag on your walk there are always some available. Also, we intend to put up posters to let the dog owners of Pontyclun know that dog bags are freely available in the Library. Whenever you are short of dog bags, you can just pop in and grab a batch to re-stock.

There is another problem in Pontyclun. The village does not have enough dog litter bins to encourage people to pick up their dog's mess. We plan to write to the council about this.

Here are some questions for you to think about if you are a dog owner:

Do you bag your dog's mess?

Where do you put your dog's mess?

If you don't pick up your mess have you thought about the serious consequences of illness to children and a heavy fine if you are caught?

Think about these issues and try to use the bins and the bags provided.

Thank you, Bethan Mullins.

P.S.H.E

Today we began our P.S.H.E. topic for this half term.
We began by exploring feelings.
We discussed different sorts of feelings, what makes us feel happy, sad, excited, anxious etc.
We then played an interactive game on the whiteboard and discussed the feelings it produced.
Try this website for lots of discussion ideas.
http://http//www.bbc.co.uk/scotland/education/health/feelings/


We then played a practical game involving our feelings.

Each of us wrote a word to describe a feeling on a small piece of paper. These words were then placed in a hat. Each of us then took a feeling from the hat. This was our feeling for the game. We rotated in concentric circles to find a partner and than had to mime our 'feeling' through everyday activities, such as getting up in the morning and eating dinner. Our partner had to guess how we were feeling.


Most of us managed to guess our partners feelings.

Next time we will discuss what makes us feel this way, and try to design a dream school where there are no negative feelings.


Our lesson today involved THINKING and COMMUNICATION SKILLS.

We are trying to improve our SOCIAL and EMOTIONAL learning: EMPATHY, SELF-AWARENESS, SOCIAL SKILLS and MOTIVATION.

P.E.

Today we took part in PEER COACHING.

We agreed that to be successful, we had to be constructive and sympathetic.


We had to teach each other a range of body positions and movements.

We also had to think of successful strategies and communicate our ides to each other.

We used coaching cards that were enhanced using I.C.T.



We then used the digital camera to analyse our performances.

Practical Problem Solving

Today in Maths we tried some practical problem solving.

We were given a fraction problem which we had to solve.

In our groups we worked to understand the problem.

We were then offered some strategies that could help solve our problem.

Click on the first picture to find out the problem and the strategies offered.

Ebony decided that we should either act out the problem or use a model. We could also work out the answer by working backwards.

Our problem involved working out fractions of ladybirds in a garden.

We used coloured sheets of paper to represent areas of the garden and pictures of ladybirds to help us with our fraction work.

Eventually every group understood the concept and were ready to try some extention activities.

We then discussed how we had solved each problem. We all decided that this had made our understanding of fractions much clearer.

Geography -Pollution in Pontyclun

Following our work on dog and pigeon pollution in Paris this morning, we carried out a survey on dog mess in Pontyclun.

We walked through the lanes and up to the Rugby Club. In groups we completed a tally chart on the number of dog droppings we saw.

In the Rugby Club there were two bins like this in which dog owners can deposit their dog's mess. We agreed that there should be more of these bins in Pontyclun.

There were lots of posters in the village warning of fines if you do not clean up your dog's mess.

Bags like this are available for free from the Library if you want to clear up after your dog!

We met Mrs Rose walking her dog Nanook. She showed us how she always carries a bag to clear up after him. If only more villagers were as thoughtful!

Back in class we counted up our tally charts. There was a large RANGE of results. The RANGE went from 12 sightings of dog mess to 60 sightings. Jamie and Cory were very enthusiastic in searching out dog mess! We then used our NUMBER SKILLS to make an AVERAGE of the number of dog droppings spotted. Our class AVERAGE was 21 sightings. We decided that this was far too many for such a small area, especially when there are so many signs warning of fines, and free bags available from the Library. Prehaps more bins would help with the problem. What would your solution be?

Geography and I.C.T -Pollution in Paris

Today we have been talking about pollution problems in Paris. We have discussed how many problems are caused by dogs mess and pigeon droppings. There are more than 200,000 dogs in Paris and because of this the pavements are very dirty. To solve this problem, dog dropping pick-up kits are available. Pigeons are loved by the Parisians, but there are so many in the city that they are creating a nuisance. There is a law that forbids feeding the pigeons, so to avoid being fined, some people feed the pigeons at night. Unfortunately this attracts rats.

We used our I.T and Communication Skills to create a poster about this problem.

Our SUCCESS CRITERIA was to produce an informative and eye catching poster which explained the problems and offered some solutions.















Click on two of our posters to decide whether we met our success criteria.

Electric Cars

Today we continued with our Electric Cars. We had to write a DESIGN SPECIFICATION. We took several factors into consideration:
The appearance.
The size.
The intention.
The time we have to make our car.
The cost of each car.
What materials would be available.
We then constructed an annotated design.

Click on the picture above to see Bethan's designs.

This week we have been writing letters for and against the building of Euro Disney in Paris. Our SUCCESS CRITERIA was:

• To write a balanced argument supporting our views.
• To write in paragraphs.
• To use connectives in our sentences.
• To include a rhetorical question.
  
  Here is Andrew's letter. Do you agree with his point of view? Did he meet his SUCCESS CRITERIA?
  
  Vicarage
  Heol Miskin
  Cf72 3QE
  
  Dear Sir/Madam
  I am a French worker in a small shop and I would like to tell you my views on having a Disneyland Resort in Paris.
  Firstly, lots of people will lose their jobs because other people want to visit there or even work there! I'm running short on customers, meanwhile, the resort is packed with people and the workers there are earning lots of money.
  Secondly, it's causing a great deal of uproar for French citizens because Disneyland Paris is an American resort and not French so consequently people such as the Parisians are angry. Who would want an American resort slap bang in the middle of Paris? Paris has lots of real French culture like the Eiffel Tower, Musee De Lourve and Notre Dame.
  Thirdly, all the fumes caused by the workers and visitors going to and from the resort in their cars will cause pollution in the area and make Paris more filthy. It will destroy Paris' hygiene.
  Finally, all the sweets and packets of food visitors buy from the resort will probably be dropped on the floor as litter. Cans and plastic bags are dangerous, as animals such as ducks and squirrels might choke on them!
  Thank you for taking the time to read my letter, I will be awaiting your response.
  With Best Wishes,
  Andrew Karamura.

In year 6 we are using Bilingualism in each lesson such as:

Ble yn y byd mae...?

Where in the world is....?

Beth mae bywyd fel yn ...?
What is life like in....?

Gweithiwch mewn grwp.
Work in a group.

Gweithiwch da partner.
Work with a partner.

Beth ydy de farn di?
What is your opinion.


Cymharwch y tywydd.
Compare the weather.


Lluswch.
Multiply.


Rhannwch.
Divide.


Wyt ti'n barod?
Are you ready?


Gan Frankie.
By Frankie.

Frère Jacques

Today we continued with our music project, Exploring Rounds.

We began by recapping on what we did last week. We tried to remember all the musical terms we had used.

These were CHORD, OSTINATO, DRONE, IMPROVISATION, SCALE, RHYTHM and DYNAMICS.

We were set the challenge to perform a three part ROUND, accompanied by a drone on the chord of G. A ROUND is a piece of music in which two or more performers or groups start one after the other. As each group reaches the end of the music, they start again - the music going round and round - hence the name.

We practised the song Frere Jacques in UNISON (all performers performing the same thing at the same time), before performing it as a two part ROUND.

We then explored the CHORD of G. Each group was given tuned instruments which played G, B and D. These notes make up the CHORD of G. We then created a DRONE over which we sang Frere Jacques, firstly in UNISON, then in two parts and finally in three parts.

Mr Lloyd, our Music Governor took part in the lesson and then filmed our performance. We watched our final performance and were able to appraise and discuss whether we had met our SUCCESS CRITERIA.

Jessica ' Our start and finish was accurate as we all watched the conductor.'

Matthew 'We played the rhythm accurately.'

Frankie ' We kept to our parts well.'

Mercedes 'We came in at the right places.'

Ewan ' We listened carefully to each other.'

To improve our performance we could:

Louis 'We could make our words more clear.'

Charlie 'We could improve our tuning.'

Frankie 'We could include some dynamics.'

Watch the video of our performance later.

If you are interested in learning more rounds, here is a good website.

http://bussongs.com/round_songs.php

During our first lesson today we worked with our TALKING PARTNERS and used our COMMUNICATION SKILLS while taking part in a quiz about Paris. We were asked some true or false questions about our findings so far, discussed the answers and then moved to areas in the hall. These areas were represented by traffic light colours of RED for false, YELLOW for don't know and GREEN for true. We then used NUMBER SKILLS to convert our correct answers into percentages.
To do this we divided the number of pupils with correct answers by the number of pupils taking part in the task and then multiplied by 100 (We multiplied by 100 because percent means per 100).

For example, 23 out of our class of 30 pupils knew that the Eiffel Tower is the tallest building in Paris. To find the percentage, we divided 23 by 30 and then multiplied the result by 100. This gave us 76%.

Here are some of our other results in percentages:

86% of us knew that you can't get to the top of the Eiffel Tower by lift. You have to walk the final 15 steps.

46% of us knew that Euro Disney is only 32K from Paris.

66% knew that Euro Disney was the second Disney resort to be built outside of the U.S. The first was Disney Tokyo.

Only 23% of us knew that the Arc de Triomphe is on the Champs Elysees.

76% knew that Sacre Coeur means Sacred Heart.

Later we were set the challenge to create a balanced argument about the building of Euro Disneyland Resort Paris.
We each wrote one pro and one con about the building of this resort on post it notes. We then stuck our arguments on a large piece of paper.

Five different statements were chosen, and in our groups we had to argue against them.

We then had to decide which argument had swayed us. We converted our results into percentages using a calculator race!

This time we had to divide by 24 as some of our boys had gone to rugby!


17 of us thought that Euro Disney was perfect for a family holiday, while 7 disagreed.
This worked out as 70% for and 30% against.

Many French people did not like the idea of such a symbol of America in France. Only 8% of us agreed with this, 29% were undecided while 63% disagreed.

33% of us were concerned about the amount of traffic and pollution that Euro Disney would produce, 13% had no opinion, while 54% thought that the good points of Euro Disney, for example new job opportunities, outweighed the bad.

Today the children were developing their ability to use different levels within a sequence.

They used their NUMBER SKILLS to work out the timing of their groups.

THINKING SKILLS and COMMUNICATION SKILLS were used to work out and tell each partner what they had to do to be successful.


I.C.T. SKILLS were used to enhance performance with the use of the digital camera to analyse the quality of the actions.

Partners gave each other targets for next week.

Can they achieve them?

After we finished our voting on our favourite landmarks in Paris we were set the NUMERACY challenge of putting them in order of preference of the whole class. We were given 15 mins to decide on a method by which to rate our choices. We considered tally charts, voting for our favourites and least favourites and several other methods. Eventually Molly's group and Daniel's group decided on the Eurovision Song Contest method of voting: 7 points for each favourite vote down to 1 for our least favourite. We then multiplied each score by the number of votes and added the final scores together. Click on our score card for a break down of our results.

Our favourite Parisian Landmarks in order were:

Euro Disney

The Eiffel Tower

The Louvre

Notre Dame

The Champs Elysees

The Sacre Coeur

The Arc de Triomphe

We were also set the challenge of finding a way in which to represent our results. Some thought that a table would be a good idea, while others suggested graphs. Find out tomorrow which method we have decided upon.

What would your choice be and why?

Today we looked at famous landmarks in Paris.

We were given some research materials, and in our TALKING PARTNERS we had to discuss the attractions and detractions of each landmark. We then had to rank them in order of preference, and give reasons for our decisions. This generated a lot of discussion. We also used a lot of COMMUNICATION SKILLS.

We thought that the Louvre would be an interesting destination as many of us would like to see the Mona Lisa. Some of us thought that we would not be very interested in such a big museum.


Lots of us were fascinated by the thought of climbing the Eiffel Tower.
Ioan wants to see if it really does sway in a strong wind!


We would like to visit the Champs Elysees as it is one of the most famous streets in the world. It has many cafes and restaurants and luxury shops.

We would love to visit Notre Dame as many of us have seen the film and would like to meet Quasimodo!

Sacre Coeur would interest us as it is at the highest point of the city and has wonderful views.

Euro Disney was a favourite! Almost everyone would like to visit this theme park.

The Arc De Triomphe honours people who have fought for France. Many of us liked the idea of seeing it illuminated by night in the middle of a huge roundabout!

.

Paris vs. Pontyclun

Pontyclun or Paris?


Following our research using reference books, group discussions (Communication Skills) and the internet (I.T.Skills), we had a debate as to which was the better place to live, Paris or Pontyclun.



We began the debate in our groups. No one knew which city/village they would finally be representing in the class debate, so everyone had to listen to each other's arguments carefully.







Many issues were hotly contested.


For Pontyclun:

A quiet, peaceful village.

Lots of shops.

Plenty of clubs and activities.

Lovely countryside.

Lots of walks and public footpaths.

Not much crime.

A fantastic school!!!!

Good public transport.

Access to lots of places due to M4 and railway.

Not much pollution.

Paris:

Wonderful buildings.

Interesting history.

Fantastic shops.

Museams.

Great food.

Euro Disney.

Good weather.

Against Pontyclun:

Parking problems.

No cinemas, museams etc.

Litter and dog mess.

Teenagers making people feel threatened.

Awful weather.

Against Paris:

Crowds.

Traffic.

Pollution.

Crime.

Where would you rather live and what are your reasons?

Today we started our Music topic - Exploring Rounds.

We began by listening to Gnossienne No 3 by Satie.

Listen to Gnossienne No 3 here.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r_w_lckqz8A

Satie was a French composer who lived from 1866 to 1925.

Satie built his music using three different scales (sets of notes that we use to create melodies and chords).

We looked at the scales and then we made up chords (three or more notes played at the same time) from these scales.


In our groups we decided on different jobs for our task. One of us played the drone (a steady beat on the bottom note of the chord), while others in the group played the rest of the notes to build up the chord. One person became the conductor whose job it was to bring players in and out over the drone. We then rotated our jobs. We had to concentrate really hard, and use plenty of COMMUNICATION SKILLS.


Later, we added chords using different rhythms (timings).

Each group then performed their improvisations (compositions made up on the spot) to the rest of the class.

We discussed the sound of the chords and rhythms produced and their effectiveness.

Today we linked Geography and Number skills. We had to describe and compare sets of data about weather in Paris and Cardiff. This information will eventually feed into a debate about in which city we would rather live.

We had to use geographical data to back up a viewpoint.

After looking at the data about temperature and rainfall in both cities, we then had to draw two graphs comparing Paris and Cardiff.

Click on Lily's graph to compare the temperature in Cardiff and Paris.

Click on Ewan's graph to compare the rainfall in Paris and Cardiff.