Term 2

This term we had a great time taking part in a Design and Technology Day. We worked in groups to design, make and evaluate gingerbread houses just like the witch's cottage in Hansel and Gretel. As a class, we discussed the rules for successful teamwork. We agreed to take turns, share resources and listen to each other's ideas. We looked at simple working hinges for doors and windows. We found out that we could join two pieces of card to make a hinge using masking tape, treasury tags or sellotape.

Using a model of a cottage, pictures of gingerbread cottages and examples of simple working hinges, we made labelled drawings. We named the main features of our cottages and the materials that we wanted to use.

We learnt how to use equipment safely. We discussed how to mark things out carefully using a ruler.

We made our cottages using our labelled sketches as a guide. We marked out our cottages' features, cut them out and joined them carefully.

We used different joining materials such as masking tape, sellotape and glue to join two pieces of material together. In our groups, we discussed the best materials to use.

We decorated our gingerbread cottages with materials from school and from home.

Finally, we evaluated our finished cottages. We thought about what had gone well and what we could improve.

Here are our gingerbread cottages. Aren't they brilliant!

We were very excited when we heard that we had been nominated to be judges for the Nestle Children's Book Prize 2007. We were asked to judge three books, giving them gold, silver and bronze awards.

Penguin by Polly Dunbar got the highest number of votes. We then completed a class project on the book which involved all of us, reflecting the reasons why we chose it as our favourite, building on the themes of the book and showing our understanding of the book's theme. We chose to explore the characters and settings through drama and artwork, presenting our finished project as a DVD.

We performed our play in front of Classes 5 and 6. They loved it!!