Treasure, Pirates and more!

What a wonderful year we have had in upper pre-primary, so much growing, so much learning and so much fun!

Our last unit on ‘Treasure’ was a great success. From the beginning the children became like real pirates! For our ‘entry point the children had to follow a map and work together, completing different challenges along the way to find the treasure. What a wonderful celebration when they found the box of treasure hidden in the sand- so many happy and excited faces!

Over the past few weeks, the children have been super busy and creative making all things related to pirates-treasure boxes, small pirate boats and treasure maps. They especially loved making their telescopes and cutlasses and of course the large pirate ship which they made together. As we were no longer learning about ‘transport’ the children thought it would be a good idea to turn our bus we made into a ship. Great recycling!

In the ship the children had many adventures, sailing the seas and oceans around the world. To further enhance this play the children made their own maps of the world and learnt the names of the oceans. They were very curious to learn about real pirates, where they sailed and what they did. Blackbird, Anne Bonny, Henry Every where names very regularly heard in upper pre-primary! Pirates survived at sea by fishing, the children become true fishermen and learnt how to catch fish using magnetic fishing rods. To extend their mathematical skills the children learnt how to measure the size of the fish they caught! Through our study on treasure the children also learnt about money, recognizing coins, sorting coins, counting and adding coins together.

Our unit on ‘Treasure’ lead us to a mini study on ‘islands’. The children were very curious to learn about different types of islands – tidal, volcanic, coral, and tropical. We talked about different animals that live on islands. We looked on the world map at the location of some islands and learnt their names. Stimulated by this learning the children created their own individual islands using recycled materials! They were beautiful, so creative!

We sang songs and read stories about pirates, some of the older children even wrote their own pirate stories. The class was full of treasure. The children enjoyed bringing special treasures to school, they loved sorting and exploring each other’s treasure.

To end this fun unit on treasure we had two ‘exit points’. An imaginary trip to a tropical island where they children pretended to be pirates searching for a coconut and a watermelon, having a big feast, and enjoying some friendly pirate fights with the cutlasses they made. And secondly, a trip on a real boat in Ghent. What a wonderful day we had, so exciting being on a boat with all our friends!

The last days of school was very special, the graduation for the older children going to primary, a special art day with Lower pre-primary, a water day, two birthday celebrations for Tulgar and Bruno and a school fun run!

Both Ms. Laura and I would like to wish you all a very happy and sunny summer holiday. We look forward to seeing you all when you return in September!

Lots of love,

Ms. Mia