Today was spent working in a year 5 class carrying out our Computing and Design & Technology activity day. Hannah and I worked in one year 5 class while Rosie and Emma worked with the other year 5 class.

Our day began by re-introducing ourselves and explain why we were working in their class today. After this we allowed the children to group themselves into groups of 4 before they designed their car together. We asked the children to draw in detail and add colours and labels to their drawing.

After break time the children chose their role within the group: the collector, the designer, the maker and the tester. They then had an hour and 45 minutes to make their car, including the electrical circuit and decorations. We worked through making the motor circuit as a class which was led by myself, I read the instructions out for the children to all follow and checked they were completing the circuit correctly. After that the children were able to follow their designs and create their decorations which they all did really well. All children showed a strong understanding of how to create their designs using the resources available and all the cars look great.

After lunch time the children explored Crumble and created their own LED circuit which we attached to a ‘Finish’ sign. The children picked up Crumble really well and could easily create a code for lights. We talked about the different commands they could use and we talked about debugging and how to debug a code. A few children applied their debugging knowledge when their code didn’t work as they would like.

After this children completed an evaluation of their work they completed today. At the end of the day we raced the two classes cars against each other in the small hall. We had a start and finish line and set the children off to race their cars. A couple of the cars didn’t race as well as we had hoped but overall the children had a good time and enjoyed the whole day. The class teachers and children agreed that they had been able to explore and use a lot of their skills today and even if their car didn’t turn out as they had hoped they had enjoyed creating the car. The teachers told the children they would be able to play and use their cars during Golden Time and wet play in the future.

Overall it was a successful day, all of us, and the children, had a fun time making the cars and they did look great and worked really well.