Life ‘across the pond’ in North America has been the focus for Year 5 children at Upton Juniors in Broadstairs.

Pupils have explored the culture, history and heritage of USA and enjoyed finding out about the country’s people and places.

They started the term learning about different North American artists and recreated some of their artwork which resulted in colourful, thoughtful creative works.

With this being such a geographical-based topic, they also investigated the topography of the country, focusing on mountains, deserts and land use. They then compared their findings to the UK to show similarities and differences.

They compared the use of farmland in Mexico and the UK and produced wonderful information texts.

As part of their mountain range work they researched key facts for each range and also wrote postcards from the summits to explain what they could see.

The history of early colonisation also played a part on their journey through America’s timeline.

The topic ended with cultural capital week during which pupils researched the individual states of the union until all 50 were covered.

This was celebrated by creating ‘top trump’ style cards which the children then shared with their peers, alongside playing a game to guess the state.

Billie Danson, Head of Year 5, said: “This has been such an exciting and engaging topic. The children have loved learning so much about the similarities and differences between North America and the UK.

“They were mesmerised by the diversity of the land in North America and how different it was to our country - another wow moment was when they discovered that deserts can be cold as well as very hot.”

*Uncle Sam is a common national personification of the federal government of the United States or the country in general. Since the early 19th century, Uncle Sam has been a popular symbol of the U.S. government in American culture and a manifestation of patriotic emotion.

Upton Junior School is part of the Viking Academy Trust with Chilton Primary School and Ramsgate Arts Primary School.

*For more information contact Head of School Darci Arthur on 01843 861393.