Extreme Earth Topic Enrichment Pack

Introduce your class to the wilder side of the world with this Extreme Earth KS2 Topic Enrichment Pack! Included are six engaging lessons spanning Art, Music and PSHE, all carefully crafted to help your class develop key skills across the curriculum.

Your class will:

• Explore and create versions of Hokusai's 'The Great Wave', and use colour, line and shading to draw tornados
• Use percussion instruments to create a storm composition, and compose music to portray a natural disaster
• Explore how people around the world are affected by, and respond to, natural disasters, and investigate how human activity can affect climate change.

Whether you’re looking to enrich your existing Extreme Earth topic or deliver a mini cross-curricular project, this pack provides everything you need—lesson plans, slides, activity sheets and resources—ready to download and teach.

You may also like our Extreme Earth Geography scheme of work exploring natural phenomena, including earthquakes, floods, drought and tsunamis. 

The Great Wave

This Great Wave Art lesson for KS2 will give your Year 5/6 class the chance to explore and recreate this famous print by Japanese artist Hokusai. The included slideshow presentation for the teaching input starts by showing them 'The Great Wave off Kanagawa' and asking them questions about it to get them looking at it in more detail. It then goes on to explain what woodblock printing is and explore how Hokusai created this famous image. It also shows some helpful step-by-step photos for how children can create their own version of the Great Wave using card.

During their independent tasks, your class then have a go at recreating the Great Wave for themselves, either by using the method shown on the slides or by choosing their own method and medium.

Included in this Great Wave KS2 lesson pack is: a detailed plan, a set of PDF slides for the teaching input, differentiated activity ideas and printable resources.

View Art Lesson 1

Tornado Art

This Tornado Art KS2 lesson for Year 5 or Year 6 gets your class looking closely at tornadoes and the effects they have on the landscape before giving them the chance to create their own colourful twister tornado pictures, using line and shading to create a 3D illusion. There is also the option of making a 3D tornado mobile by layering discs of coloured card. Either way, they can't fail to produce tornado art to be proud of!

This lesson comes fully planned and ready to teach. It includes a detailed lesson plan with differentiated activity ideas, a slideshow for the teaching input that includes helpful step-by-step photos to model their activities, and a set of printable resources to support them as they create their own tornado art.

View Art Lesson 2

Percussion Storms

This lesson starts by challenging your class to think of as many different examples of percussion instruments as they can before going through some examples on the slides. They will then listen and respond to a composition entitled 'Boom!' which portrays a storm through digital sound effects and various percussion instruments. Children can then work in groups to add their own percussion to the sound-effects background to create their own storm compositions.

An easy-to-follow plan, a set of engaging PDF slides for the teaching input, differentiated activity ideas and printable resources are all included in this downloadable Music lesson pack.

View Music Lesson 1

Disastrous Compositions

This lesson challenges your class to work in groups to create their own compositions to portray a particular natural disaster, such as an earthquake or a tsunami. The groups will need to think about the kind of sounds different instruments produce and which would be most appropriate, as well as considering the rhythm, volume, pitch, tempo and tone of their composition. They can then either create their composition using digital software or by playing instruments.

This Music KS2 lesson pack contains a detailed plan, a set of PDF slides for the teaching input, differentiated activity ideas and printable resources.

View Music Lesson 2

Disaster Relief

This challenging lesson explores the aftermath of natural disasters and the difficulties faced by those affected, such as having no home, a lack of food and water, insufficient medical care and other factors, as well as the emotional hardship faced by survivors. Your class will then consider whether we should try to help people affected and how we could do this, before looking at the work undertaken by aid agencies in the years following a disaster.

An easy-to-follow plan, PDF slides for the teaching input, differentiated activity ideas and printable resources are included in this downloadable PSHE lesson pack.

View PSHE Lesson 1

Crisis Relief

This thought-provoking lesson explores the effects of famine and drought in developing countries. Your KS2 children will think about the effects of drought and famine on people and communities, and look at some heart-wrenching images of some of these effects. They will find out some interesting and eye-opening facts and figures before looking at how charities are aiming to end this extreme issue. The questions for your class are 'Can you help?' and, more importantly, 'Will you help?'.

Everything you need for this lesson is included in this downloadable pack - a detailed plan, a set of PDF slides for the teaching input, activity ideas and printable resources.

View PSHE Lesson 2

Carbon Footprint

This Carbon Footprint lesson for KS2 children teaches your class about the greenhouse effect and the gases that contribute to climate change, before looking at the practical steps that can be taken to reduce our carbon footprints and slow the rate of climate change.

This Carbon Footprint lesson pack comes ready to download and teach – it contains an easy-to-follow lesson plan, a slideshow for the teaching input, differentiated activity ideas and a range of printable resources to support children in their independent learning tasks.

View PSHE Lesson 3