Welcome to the summer term!

Our focus this week has been on the Gospel story of the Road to Emmaus. We have been thinking about how the people would have been feeling and about what the story teaches us. To do this, we have engaged with the text through an act of worship and completing role play tasks.  We will use this knowledge to write a newspaper report on this event next week.

In R.E, we have been recalling events of Holy Week and reading what each Gospel tells us about the resurrection. The children did really well at comparing and contrasting them. I was particularly impressed that they recalled their learning on the Gospel of Mark to explain the way in which it was written.

In science, we have completed our unit on life cycles by looking at plants. The children dissected lilies to identify the reproductive parts of flowers.

Our maths topic this week was based on measurement and converting between units. The children applied their knowledge of dividing and multiplying by 10, 100 and 1000 to solve a range of problems.

Coach Dugan joined us for our first session this week. He will continue to teach the children every Wednesday until the end of year 5.

With the sun shining, it has been a fantastic first week back. Well done and thank you to the children who put so much hard work into their holiday home learning. It made our garden look amazing.

I wish you all a wonderful weekend.

Mrs Lines

Home learning:

Maths– Mathletics

English– Next skills test.

No comprehension this week.

Spellings:

ambitious

cautious

infectious

fictitious

scrumptious

nutritious

superstitious

This week, we have been fortunate to take part in amazing computing activities. On Tuesday, we had a drama workshop where we explored internet safety. The children learnt about creating secure passwords, pop up scams and cyber bullying. The workshop was a huge amount of fun and involved the children getting very creative, as you can see by the pictures!

Today, we were visited by SETPOINT, a Hertfordshire organisation that teaches computing skills in school. In this session, we had to code and debug to program a micro:bit. It was great fun and the children showed off their computing skills. Our visitors were really impressed with how much year 5 knew. Well done year 5, this has earned you all 10 Dojos each!

We also spent some learning how to use bluebots. Using Bluetooth technology, children programmed the robot to navigate its way home, sometimes around obstacles.

Thank you to Miss Davey for organising such a great week!

As part of our Lenten journey, we were visited by Cafod this week. We looked at the amazing work they do and how our contributions make a difference. Well done to Year 5 for dressing up today: our donations will ensure Cafod can continue to help others all around the world.

On Thursday, we took part in the sacrament of reconciliation. Well done year 5 for your reverence during this time.

Have a great weekend.

Mrs Lines

Home Learning:

Maths:

Book 4- Page 32- Fractions of amounts.

Book 5 – 32- Multiplying fractions

English:

Spag.com

No comprehension. Instead, I have sent home a sheet about homophones. Please read the sheet and look at the differences between the words. There is no expectation to write anything.

Spellings:

atrocious

conscious

delicious

ferocious

malicious

precious

spacious

suspicious

vicious

This week, we have been enjoying the warmer weather and were finally able to wear our World Book day costumes! The children looked great and got really involved in the learning. We focused on characters by role playing, writing descriptions and making top trumps.

In English, we have continued our class text about Odysseus. We created drama to help us write rich dialogue and improved our comprehension through performance reading. We are developing a much better understanding of our hero by identifying his strengths and weaknesses.

In maths, we have continued our learning on fractions. We have been adding, subtracting and multiplying them, as well as evaluating the effectiveness of strategies for doing so.

Today we listened to a fantastic assembly by year 6 about fair trade. During fair trade fortnight, it is important to remind ourselves of its life changing impact. The children were insightful when debating how profits of bananas should be shared. It was also wonderful to see them linking their understanding to Lent.

Well done to the chess team for their efforts at the competition this week. Francesco, Alessandro, Thomas, Anthony and Toju represented the school brilliantly and were only 1 point from a medal.

I would like to take the opportunity to thank all parents for your continued support. It was fantastic to meet with you all to celebrate your child’s successes and discuss ways of improving further.

Have a great weekend,

Mrs Lines

Home Learning:

Maths:

Mathletics

English:

• Skills test 6
• Comprehension
• English skills test

Spellings:

assistance

defiance

defiant

distance

elegance

expectant

hesitancy

observant

relevant

tolerance

Our final week of term was incredibly busy and I think we are all ready for a well-earned rest!

 

Our Football coaching continued this week and the focus was on improving turning skills. Scott, our coach, commented on the improvement he saw and how impressed he was with their teamwork. Keep it up year 5.

In science, our focus has been on comparing insect life cycles. The children had a clear understanding of a butterfly lifecycle from their KS1 learning and they are now able to discuss it using a wider range of technical vocabulary. This knowledge was then applied to a ladybird lifecycle. Many of the children were surprised to know it has a larva state and were interested to see what it looked like. We then made comparisons between the two life cycles by creating fractions of how long they spend in each stage. We used this information to create pie charts by hand and using Excel. This led to some very challenging discussion about how data can be presented and how to interpret it.

In English, we have been building up our writing skills by practising how to write dialogue accurately, using pronouns to add mystery and use of modal verbs and adjectives of possibility. All of these skills have helped the children to show their knowledge of the text and their deepening understanding of the characters.

Our maths learning has focussed on problem solving this week, in particular, modelling the problem using the bar method. To support the children’s understanding in this, they used an online game called thinking blocks. The discussion in the room during this lesson was fantastic and the children demonstrated a rapid improvement in their understanding. This website will form part of the home learning for this week.

In R.E this week, the children took on the roles of Moses and Aaron, writing vital instructions for the Israelites about Passover. They showed a great understanding of events and used their knowledge of instruction writing to make the information clear.

This week, we had a visitor from Germany in our class, Sandra. She supported the children in lessons and it was wonderful to have her.

Have a fantastic weekend

Mrs Lines

Home Learning

Maths– Play thinking blocks for 20 mins. Choose 2 or 3 problems you have modelled to write up in the maths book. The challenge comes from organising the information, not the numbers themselves.

https://www.mathplayground.com/thinkingblocks.html

English– Reading comprehension and Spag.com

Spellings:

Silence,

Patience

Independence

Evidence

Innocence

Frequency

Absence

Competence

Difference

Magnificence