Reception

Line of Inquiry 1: An inquiry into how people share their ideas and beliefs through artistic expression.

We started our learning with the children exploring the celebration of Remembrance Day. This developed an understanding of the PYP Learner Profile attributes of being open-minded, reflective and great thinkers using our focus text of 'Where the Poppies Now Grow.' This story allowed us to gain a deeper understanding of the events that took place and why the poppy is a significant symbol of Remembrance.  

Exploring how light is a significant symbol in different celebrations around the world, our next text of 'Little Glow'  let us take a look into how light is used and what significance it holds in different celebrations. 

During their play, the children showed they were knowledgeable while exploring the different VIP areas by talking about their new knowledge and applying it in the creative area to reflect this. 

Line of Inquiry 2: An inquiry into how we understand and empathise with others through our ideas and beliefs. 

For this line of inquiry, we continue our focus on how light is a significant symbol in celebrations and beliefs around the world. We started this inquiry by looking at the celebration of Diwali (The Festival of Lights) and how lights are represented during this time.  Our focus text of 'The Best Diwali Ever!' allowed us to deepen our PYP learner profile attribute of being open minded by exploring different artifacts used during this time and how light plays a significant role during this celebration. The children made 'Diva Lamps'  which are used in people's houses during this time. We then went on to explore the celebration of 'Hanukkah' which is celebrated by the Jewish community. We learnt that light plays an important role in this celebration as its lasts for eight nights and each night, another candle is lit on the Menorah which is usually placed in people's windows. The children also had the opportunity to explore different artifacts and play a game of 'Dreidels.'

Line of Inquiry 3: An inquiry into how our artistic expression impacts others.

For our final line of inquiry, we looked at the celebration of Christmas and the Christmas Story.  During this time, the children held their PYP Christmas sing-a-long to which they performed in front of their parents.  They were all amazing and we are extremely proud of them. 

Our first focus text was 'The Christmas Story.' We learnt about the story of baby Jesus and how he was born in a manger and how the bright light from the star is an important symbol in this story. As this story leads onto Christmas, we have used our learner profile attribute of being knowledgeable by applying our phonics skills in writing a wishlist for Santa and writing our Christmas list. We have enjoyed making all things 'Christmassy' and loved making our hats for our Christmas Lunch. Our last focus text of this module is 'Santa's Post.' We learned about how we use light during the celebration of Christmas in various ways such as on our Christmas trees, decorating our houses and by lighting Christmas candles.