Today we found a shipwreck on the school field! It must be a pirate ship as there was a pirate flag with it and an empty treasure chest! Where had it come from?

We then received a message from the pirates. The pirate ship was on a mission to rescue a princess but crashed and failed in its mission. There was no sign of any pirates, a princess or any treasure. They also wanted our help to make an even better ship. We looked closely at the elements needed for a good pirate ship and set to writing our ideas down. We then remembered that they didn't have an anchor. Could that have been a problem?

We then investigated different materials to see which were waterproof and which weren't but also which materials were most likely to float because we didn't want our ships to sink. We then had a go at creating our own mini pirate ships using our scientific knowledge. 

We love being creative and decided to learn about an artist and their style of work. We learnt about who Henri Matisse is and how he creates art in the style of collage. We then created a large scale pirate ship collage on the carpet together. The children were then able to use their own ideas and create their own collages relating to their own interests.

This week we received another message from the pirates. They had sent us a list of the treasure that they were wanting to collect for the Princess. He explained that his ship was on a quest around the world to collect some important treasures. We looked at some of the icy cold countries on the map and compared them to England (more specifically Leeds)

We then tried to work out which piece of treasure he could get from there. We used our detective skills and worked out that the pirates would be able to get Arctic fox fur from the Arctic, which is a very cold place. We then used our writing skills to make a record of this.

This week we received another voice message from the pirates! They used the Arctic fox fur to make the Princess a dressing gown and are now in the rainforest looking for the next piece of treasure on their list. We looked at photos and videos of the rainforest and used our eyes and ears to describe their environment. We learnt a new word humid. We then worked out that they were looking for snake scales and then wrote this down so we could keep track of which treasure they have retrieved. 

This morning we were presented with some black and white photos of the rainforest. Where had all of the colour gone? How could we get it back? We used our colour mixing skills to help solve the problem!

The pirates have now travelled to India looking for their next piece of treasure! We looked at India on the world map and found out it would take us 75 days to walk from the UK to India, wow! We looked at some photos and decided the next piece of treasure on the list they would be able to get from India was a golden bangle. We used our writing to record this.

We have really enjoyed developing our map skills this year. We have spent lots of time looking at maps and being able to read them. We now thought that we would challenge ourselves and have a go at drawing our own map using drawings to represent different places and objects. What do you think?

The pirates are now in Australia. We looked at the photos that they had taken and compared the landscape to England. We then went through the list of treasures that they needed and worked out that they needed to find a boomerang there. We looked at Australia on the map and compared it's size and shape to England. We couldn't believe the UK was so much smaller. 

When looking at some pictures on the boomerangs, we learnt that the art that featured on some of them was called aboriginal art. We liked the look of this and explored this type of art further. We decided to used the Australian wildlife as our inspiration and then create our own pieces of art.

The pirates are now in North America. We looked at the photos that they had taken and compared the landscape to England. We then went through the list of treasures that they needed and worked out that they needed to find a horseshoe there. We looked at different types of horseshoes and compared the different sizes and shapes to the size of own own feet and our friends. We are all different!

The pirates are hungry on their trip. They’ve only got a few ingredients left on the ship and the ships cook has become sea sick. We read the instructions and followed them carefully to help make the pirates favourite snack!