Year 1 – DT

Year 1 – DT

Project Overview

This half term the children have been designing, making and evaluating their own Christmas card. They had the added challenge of incorporating a sliding element into their card. We started the topic by looking at Christmas cards that you can buy from the shops. The children discussed what they liked and disliked about these cards and we took inspiration from them.

The children then set to work in designing their own Christmas cards. They thought carefully about the aspect of it that would slide, thinking about what it would look like and which way it would move on the card. They then thought about the background of their Christmas card and what they would want this to look like. The children finished the design phase by thinking about the materials they would need to make their card and writing a list.

The making phase of the process we split into lots of little bits. The children begun by making the part of the card that would slide. The children drew these out carefully and then chose what they wanted to decorate this with. They then had to cut these out carefully and attached a piece of card to the back to enable it to slide. We then looked at the background of the card and the children enjoyed using various materials to create this. The children then needed to use a craft knife to slice a cut in their card to ensure the slider would work.

During the evaluation phase children thought about what had gone well, what skills they had developed during this project and what they would do differently next time to make their card better.

What The Student Says

“It’s cool watching them move.” 1LS student.

“I really enjoyed making the card. It was fun being able to make it look however I wanted.” 1LS student.

“I had lot’s of fun making my Christmas card. It was trickier than I thought it would be. ” 1LS student.

“I enjoyed making it, it took a lot longer than I thought it would but I took care and made sure it was perfect.” 1LS Student.

What skills were developed?

The children have:

• designed purposeful, functional, appealing products for themselves and other users based on design criteria
• generated, developed, modelled and communicated their ideas through talking, drawing, templates and mock-ups
• selected from and used a range of tools and equipment to perform practical tasks [for example, cutting, shaping, joining and finishing]
• selected from and used a wide range of materials and components, including construction materials, textiles and ingredients, according to their characteristics
• evaluated their ideas and products against design criteria
• explored and used mechanisms [for example, levers, sliders, wheels and axles], in their products.

What The Teacher Says

“It has been lovely watching the children think of their own Christmas card designs. The children were really proud of their work and paid great attention to detail. I was really proud of the children developing ideas that were completely their own.” Miss Sunderland, class teacher.