Gateway goes back in time!

On Wednesday 27 September, we celebrated a 1960s themed History day! Everyone enjoyed dressing up, including the teachers. We wore neon, bright colours and had a delightful day! Mrs Bufton-Green discovered some extraordinary learning, “It's been great to see children and teachers engaged in many fun activities in their lessons on the theme of the 1960s. We have seen a famous Japanese song from this period to writing descriptions for a 60s themed catwalk fashion show. Such great creativity in the curriculum”.

Year 6 learnt about the Beatles and answered a few questions about them in Music. In Maths, they searched for different prices of items and compared them to now. Everyone enjoyed English as they were making a fact file about someone famous from the 1960s such as Paul McCartney, Twiggy, Neil Armstrong and Mary Quant. Mr Blakeley (Year 6 teacher) quoted “History Day was great fun and it was a brilliant opportunity to learn about some different topics and try a variety of interesting activities. Year 6 seemed fascinated by the Apollo program. All the costumes were fantastic and it was great that everyone seemed to embrace the spirit of the day.” Every lesson brought in the children's creative imagination and amusement. “Science was interesting, we were doing the mission to the moon. In Maths, we were working out if the 1960s were more expensive than now.”

In Year 5 they were learning that schools in the 1960s were quite harsh and despicable. They learnt this by getting taught like they were in the 1960s! Not many children liked this way of teaching at all! Some found it funny that they would get told off straight away! Some Year 5 children remarked,"My favourite part in Science was learning about two dogs that went to the moon and were the first animals to be there.” Mrs Ashmore ( Year 5 teacher) quoted “History Day was a really fantastic day across the school. It was particularly fun seeing all the children dressed in their 1960s inspired outfits and taking part in different activities throughout the day.” It looked like everyone in Year 5 had a “fab” day!

Next, in Year 4, they were making posters about famous people or things back in that period like music (the Beatles e.g.), fashion, or famous people. Mrs Lang quoted “ Year 4 have embraced the 60s, we are loving the freedom to be creative and have learnt some awesome 1960s dance moves!” Along with the teacher, a pupil quoted “ Today we did silly dressing up and freestyle fashion posters! ” Sounds like Year 4 had a fantastic day full of happiness, joy and laughter!

Year 3 were learning about money and the types of foods they had in the 1960s. One classroom was made into a mini grocery store from the 1960s and they had lots of foods from there too such as Pringles, chocolate bars and cereal! The children were surprised that Pringles were made in the 1960s. Mr Miles quoted “ We were looking at foods from the 1960s comparing the prices to today and looking at the adverts and thinking about how we can make our own adverts and at the end of the day the children took a little gift from the 1960s shop.” So, Year 3, along with the other years, had a tremendously fascinating time.

Overall, everyone was joyous at the end of the day. We have enjoyed comparing our lives in the present day with the swinging ‘60s!

By Mariam Ali and Alice Proudlove (Year 6)