What makes a minibeast choose its habitat?

This term, we’ll head to the woodland area to identify minibeasts in their natural habitat. We’ll write a guide book for other children to use on a minibeast hunt, draw sketch maps of our minibeast hunting area and create minibeast stories and poems. Heading out into the local area, we’ll explore trees and bushes to see what lives there, investigate how far and how fast a snail can travel and create a minibeast habitat of our own. We’ll draw delicate sketches of minibeasts, make models from a variety of materials and use microscopes to observe minibeasts up close. Our ICT skills will help us create a minibeast animation and we’ll observe a beehive through live webcam footage.
 

Design and Technology

The children then got the chance to use their skills of preparing ingredients by peeling, grating, chopping and slicing to create fruit kebab caterpillars. The children also had to think about selecting from and using a range of tools and equipment, while discussing the basic principles of a healthy and varied diet.

Art and design

Today the children created ants out of pipe cleaners, egg boxes and other materials. The children used the pipe cleaners for the ant's legs and antennae, attaching them to the correct body part. Then we painted them brown and attached googly eyes, these ants will then be used in computing lesson bringing them to life in a stop motion animation.

Science

Today we found out how a minibeast’s appearance can help it avoid being eaten. We looked at a range of camouflaged creatures, such as the peppered moth, stick insect and shield bug. We then described their camouflage and compare them with butterflies, ladybirds, wasps and hornets, which have bright colours and patterns. We used our knowledge of camouflage and warning colours to paint minibeasts, some children then wanted to use this knowledge to create bright colourful minibeasts out of playdoh.

Design and Technology

This morning the children observed, smelt and tasted some local honey. They then used the honey to make some delicious honey flapjack, selecting and using suitable tools for the task. The children learnt that some ingredients need to be prepared before they can be cooked or eaten. There are many ways to prepare ingredients: peeling skins using a vegetable peeler, such as potato skins; grating hard ingredients, such as cheese or chocolate; chopping vegetables, such as onions and peppers and slicing foods, such as bread and apples.

JB Adventures

PE

Today the children have been learning the skills of jumping over low hurdles in preparation for Sports day. They learnt the importance of using their arms to enable them to jump really far and using their squishy knees to land correctly and safely. 

Science

This morning the children investigated which fruits butterflies prefer to eat. We then made a range of butterfly foods, using ripe fruit mixed with water and sugar and then placed the fruit in a shallow bowl in a sunny area that butterflies typically visit, unfortunately, we did not see the butterflies eat it but the next day some of the food had disappeared. We also looked at a food chain and investigated what butterflies eat and what eat butterflies, discussing the producer and the predator in the food chain. 

Science

Today the children set up a home for a worm called a wormery. This will help the children build the skills to enable them to keep, observe and care for a range of minibeasts. The children will then use this knowledge to write a set of instructions to set up a home for a minibeast.

Science

Today we have explored small trees and bushes in our local environment to discover what’s hiding in them. We shook the trees and bushes over a sheet and work quickly to catch minibeasts and create a tally chart to record the different types and frequency. Back in the classroom, we used the information to produce a block graph.

Science

The children took part in their memorable experience this afternoon, where they visited the local woodland to identify minibeasts in their natural habitat.  The children were given magnifying glasses so that they can take a sneaky peek into holes and crevices and nets to sweep beneath the surface of ponds and muddy puddles, then lift stones and logs and clear away leaf litter to see what they can find. 

Our creepy-crawly home learning