Dice Games –
Equipment Needed:
a partner
Dice (up to 6 dice)
paper or squared paper
Pencil
Mrs McNamara, Ms Varga and Miss Donatantonio
It’s the end of another week! Here’s what we got up to in Year 5:
🔬 Science: We experimented with parachutes of different sizes to investigate how surface area affects air resistance.
📚 English: We practiced varying our sentence openers and crafted an eerie description of The Watchtower. Exploring the past perfect tense added depth to our writing, and it was interesting to look at the effect it had.
➕ Maths: We tackled long multiplication, including solving word problems involving 4-digit by 2-digit numbers.
📖 RE: We dove further into the story of Passover in Exodus, discussing its significance, purpose, and the beliefs the Israelites would have derived from it.
🏋️♂️ PE: In gymnastics, we perfected our rolls in gymnastics on Wednesday and engaged in circuit training on Thursday to enhance our fitness levels. Sweat and determination were our companions!
💻 Computing: We explored smart systems through the lens of smart lockers, as part of our topic on computer systems.
👦 TenTen: We spilt into two groups (boys and girls) to learn about the changes that boys experience during puberty, and allowed the children to ask questions that they had, anonymously if they wished.
🎵 Music: Our exploration of Gospel music continued, focusing on the importance of good articulation when singing, and listening to how the musical genre has evolved through the years. We all enjoyed tapping our feet and feeling the soul that was present in all the music that we discussed.
Home learning for this week:
| Maths | Mathletics assignments:
· Multiplying a 4-digit by a 2-digit number · Solving problems with multiplication |
| Reading | 5 tests on Readtheory or 20 minutes of reading per day |
| SPaG | Spag.com assignment:
· Verbs in perfect form |
| Spelling | Log on to Spelling Shed using your EdShed login, and play a variety of games to practise this week’s spelling rule: Challenge words (words from the Year 5 & 6 Statutory Spelling List)
· accommodate · opportunity · available · secretary · controversy · sincerely · dictionary · suggest · marvellous · twelfth |
26th -28th January
The big Garden Birdwatch is the world’s largest garden wildlife survey. Every year, hundreds of thousands of nature lovers like you take part, helping to build a picture of how garden birds are faring. We would like Pope Paul to take part. Please follow the instructions on the leaflets attached.
Count the birds you see in your garden, from your balcony or in your local park for one hour. Use the tally chart attached and submit your results on www.rspb.org.uk/birdwatch
Please send a copy of your results to school.
Happy New Year and welcome back!
It has been lovely to see the children again this week after the Christmas break and to hear some of their stories from the holidays!
In RE, we have been thinking about the meaning of the Feast of the Epiphany, and then began our new topic for this half term, which is about Exodus and Passover. In Maths, we were multiplying and dividing by 10, 100 and 1000, whilst in History, the children began a new topic with Mrs Heymoz (who will be teaching the children on Tuesday afternoons this half term) on Ancient Greece.
In D&T, we began our learning about mechanical systems, for which the premise is that the WWF (World Wide Fund for Nature) want to get people interested in caring for the endangered/vulnerable animals which live on our planet but do not believe it is ethically correct to put live animals on display. Instead, a way to show the animals could be to use working, moving models. Thus the design brief that we have been given is to create a collection of appealing moving mechanical animal models that will captivate people’s interest. In order to research what to aim for in our models, we watched clips of different endangered animals and focused on what they look like, how they move and what their natural habitats are.
PE this half term will continue to be on Wednesday and Thursday. Wednesdays will be gymnastics and Thursdays will be health-related fitness. Here are some snaps from Thursday’s circuit training session!
| Maths | Mathletics assignments:
· Multiplying by 10, 100, and 1000 · Dividing by 10, 100, 1000 |
| Reading | 5 tests on Readtheory or 20 minutes of reading per day |
| Spelling | Log on to Spelling Shed using your EdShed login, and play a variety of games to practise this week’s spelling rule: Words ending in ‘-able’ and ‘-ible’
· dependable · reliable · comfortable · possible · understandable · horrible · reasonable · terrible · enjoyable · incredible |
This term we also start our new units in RHE using our Life to the Full Programme. The letter for parents is attached here.
Have a great weekend!
Miss Donatantonio
The Christmas holidays are upon us, and it has been a lovely 2.5 days to top off an excellent Autumn Term! On Monday, we had a fun-filled party day, in which we played some ridiculous games, met Santa, dressed up for the photo booth, decorated cakes, and had a dance battle!
Thank you for your generous gifts and for your Christmas wishes. I hope that you all have a peaceful and wholesome couple of weeks with your families, and come back on the 8th January rejuvenated and ready for the Spring Term!
Merry Christmas to you all.
Love Miss Donatantonio 🎄☃️
On Wednesday, everyone enjoyed a tasty Christmas lunch!
On Monday we will have our Christmas party day, so come prepared for games, dancing, meeting Santa and more festive fun!
Enjoy your weekend.
Miss Donatantonio 🎄
On Monday, Year 5 had a wonderful day out to the British Library. We took part in 2 workshops: Fantasy: Realms of Imagination and Malorie Blackman: The Power of Stories.
Julia writes:
When we went to the British Library, it was very fun. First, we went to the Fantasy section. We got to make up our own heroes and villains. We could see unusual creatures, heroes and lands in the exhibition. There was a mission we had to accomplish: the evil queen fairy made an agreement with the devil and took an enchanted book and we had to get it back. We also made our own mythical islands. We used a lot of our imagination making mythical creatures, islands and heroes.
In the afternoon, we went to the Malorie Blackman exhibition and saw lots of her different books like Pig Heart Boy, Hacker and A Dangerous Game. We learnt about her childhood, and that she wanted to become an author because she didn’t see black people represented in the fiction she read as a child, and wanted to change that. It was inspiring to learn that Malorie Blackman was rejected by publishers over 82 times, but never gave up on her dream of becoming an author.
The children were so engaged, participant and enthused, and the facilitators at the British Library commented on how impressed they were with the class’s input and ideas. You were also fantastic on the journey to and from the library. It was such a pleasure Year 5 and I was so proud of you. Thank you very much to Gene’s mum and Charlie’s dad who helped us on the trip.
Wednesday’s Advent Service was another highlight of the week. Your reading, acting, singing, drumming and dancing brought such joy to the service – well done!
Here is your home learning for this week:
Next week (probably Thursday), we will be having auditions in class for the talent show, so if you want to enter, make sure you prepare you act for then.
Enjoy your weekend!
Miss Donatantonio
Well done on your mad hair today, Year 5! I was very impressed with your creativity!
In Maths this week, we have been busy drawing factor bugs in order to find factor pairs and common factors. The children have really got the hang of it!
In English, we have been enjoying our current text, The Christmas Miracle of Jonathan Toomey, for which we have been describing characters, inferring their feelings and discussing different viewpoints. For Monday’s lessons, the children have been asked to bring in something from home which means a lot to them. Alternatively, you could send in a photograph of this item. Thanks in advance.
In Guided Reading, we started on the text The Highwayman, which we’re all really enjoying and curious to find out what happens next to Bess the landlord’s daughter!
In RE, the children have prepared their own Lectio Divina prayers, which we will pray as a class weekly in the new year.
In PE, we were practising how to dodge in netball, for which we got to take advantage of the beautifully sunny winter weather!
Half the class were out on Wednesday afternoon singing for the elderly at the Baptist Church on Barnet Road; the rest of the children joined forces with Year 6 and played team building and problem solving games.
We have also been at the church practising for next week’s Advent Service. It’s sounding beautiful, so this week’s home learning is to learn your words (which can be found here) and the song lyrics off by heart (which can be found here).
On Monday, we have our school trip to the British Library. We will be walking to Potters Bar station and then from KGX to the British Library, so please make sure you’re wrapped up warm and have waterproofs in case of rain. It’s set to be an exciting day with really engaging and interactive workshops.
Have a lovely weekend; see you on Monday.
Miss D ❄️
Please practise the songs for the KS2 Advent Service, using these videos to help you.
On Monday, whilst half the class were out with the choir, the remaining Y5s joined forces with the remaining Y4s and Y6s for a day filled with problem solving and teamwork. In the morning, they were set a challenge involving teacups and saucers, and in the afternoon they were tasked with designing and building a marble run. It was fascinating to see the different approaches that the groups took, and it was a delight to see them working so brilliantly in their groups.
This week in English, the children completed their journalistic reports based on The Boy at the Back of the Class. I’ve been really impressed with the formal language that they have used in their pieces – well done! We began our new unit based on a classic Christmas text called The Christmas Miracle of Jonathan Toomey – after discussing the front cover and reading the blurb, the children are curious to find out the mystery behind Mr Toomey’s kitchen drawer!
In Maths, we concluded our learning on addition and subtraction, and moved onto the properties of number, this week focusing on multiples.
In RE, the children have been praying the Lectio Divina, and I am blown away by the beautiful reflections that they have written.
In PE, we continued our netball unit by this week learning how to pivot.
This afternoon, we began a new Music unit about Gospel music. We learnt about the background to spiritual and Gospel songs, then listened to a couple of contrasting arrangements of Wade in the Water, followed by a powerful performance by Aretha Franklin in a Baptist church.
We have also made great progress with our song for the Advent Service. Please practise at home using this video:
Home learning for this week:
| Maths | Mathletics assignments – revision of this half term’s place value concepts:
· Multiples (Quest) · Common Multiples (Quest) |
| Reading | 5 tests on Readtheory or 20 minutes of reading per day |
| SPaG | Assignment to practise modal verbs on spag.com:
· Probability Words |
| Spelling | Log on to Spelling Shed using your EdShed login, and play a variety of games to practise this week’s spelling rule: Words ending in ‘-ent’ and ‘-ence’
· innocence · transparent · eloquence · frequent · confidence · decent · competence · emergent · intelligence · violent |
Have a lovely weekend; see you on Monday!
Miss Donatantonio
This week has been national Anti-Bullying Week, which for Pope Paul School has been Anti-Racism Week more particularly. In Year 5, we have had some really interesting, thought-provoking and challenging discussions in class that began on Monday with defining exactly what race and racism mean, moving onto what it means to be anti-racist (as opposed to simply being non-racist), and then how we can be anti-racist in our actions. The photos below show the children acting out scenarios, which led to discussions about what should have been done to challenge the racism in each situation. The children have been mature, curious and brave in the questions they have asked and in the ideas that they have shared. I am really proud of how they have participated and am confident that they are going to be wonderful advocators of anti-racism in our world.
In Science, we concluded our Animals Including Humans unit this week by carrying out investigations involving measuring children from different classes. After turning our data into line graphs, we could see a clear positive correlation between age and height.
Fraser, Nathan and Aram led us in a thoughtful collective worship on the theme of forgiveness – thank you boys.
Home learning for this week:
| Maths | Mathletics assignments – revision of this half term’s place value concepts:
· Inverse operations (addition & subtraction) (Quest) · Multi-step addition & subtraction problems (Quest) |
| Reading | 5 tests on Readtheory or 20 minutes of reading per day |
| SPaG | Assignment on spag.com:
· Relative clauses |
| Spelling | Log on to Spelling Shed using your EdShed login, and play a variety of games to practise this week’s spelling rule: Words ending in ‘-ant’
· distant · elegant · abundant · fragrant · brilliant · ignorant · constant · tolerant · dominant · vacant |
Please also become familiar with our Advent Service song that we started learning today:
Enjoy your weekend and I’ll see you on Monday.
Miss Donatantonio
