Summer 2

Our life cycles topic began with a woodland walk to Barker’s Park where we observed, studied and listened in our local environment. From that experience, we created amazing woodland poetry including Haikus, Kennings and free verse poems and presented these to the Class.

We have thoroughly enjoyed our class story The Butterfly Lion by Michael Morpurgo. Using Comic Life on the iPads, the children created persuasive posters, which Bertie’s Dad may have seen to persuade him to sell the lion to the circus. The text has created a lot of discussion on opinions of animals working in a circus.

In maths, we have completed a measure unit and enjoyed lots pf practical activities in measuring the height of each Classes sunflower, weighing items and measuring the capacity of different bottle. In addition, we focused on 2D and 3D shapes and used our knowledge of this to look at nets of shapes too.

We completed a ‘bee project’ and began our understanding of the importance of bees from reading this moving poem.

The Last Bee

After the last ee

had uzzed its last uzz,

the irds and the utterflies

did what they could.

ut soon the fields lay are,

few flowers were left,

nature was roken,

and the planet ereft.

Following on from this the children created fantastic posters about how pollination depends on bees and ways in which we can protect and save them. After learning about the way in which bees make honey we then enjoyed a baking session and made honey biscuits. It was lovely to see the children enjoying their biscuits and after making another batch, they decorated them to take home. Using their knowledge of nets from maths the children designed their own packaging for the biscuits and thoroughly enjoyed sharing them with family members.

In science, we compared the life cycles of plants, mammals, insects and amphibians. We also learnt the art of zentangle patterns and after practising the techniques, we were ready to create our own beautiful butterfly pictures.

We have had additional PE lessons from Mr Ward from Winterhill this half term and he has focussed on cricket. The children have developed their fielding skills and we have been very impressed by their developing skills.

We have thoroughly enjoyed teacher Class 11 and 12 this year and we know they will make fantastic role models in Year 6.    

Summer 1

Our Summer term 1 topic has been Vicious Vikings. We used our map skills to identify where the Vikings came from and where they settled in England and other countries around the world.

We were all very excited to go on our first visit of Year 5 to Murton Park. The children were impeccably behaved and were fantastic at representing Redscope. Whilst on the visit, we experienced life in a Viking village. We spent time in a longhouse, made, and baked bread on an open fire, which we had collected wood for. We then learnt the skills of farming and the tools used. As Vikings are crafters we made clay candleholders and as we made more than we needed we traded them for money and food. Finally, we learnt about Viking weapons used to protect the villages and used these to depend ourselves within a raid from the Anglo Saxons. The first-hand experience really helped the children understand Viking life.

After becoming very knowledgably about the Vikings, the children independently selected a Viking topic of their choice to further investigate and create a non-chronological report, choosing for themselves how they presented it.

Finally, we looked at the Viking Gods and Goddesses and focused on the myth of Thor and his stolen hammer. As a topic finale we watched the Marvel movie Thor and looked at similarities and differences between the myth and movie. 

In art, the children have been learning how to use pencil to create tone and texture. After learning about Viking longboats the children used their design skills to create a detailed drawing ensuring they included all of the features of the prow, stern and sails. The children have also learnt the skill of weaving which the Vikings were experts at.

In maths the children have finished our multiplication and division unit of work and then understood how to find equivalent fractions by simplifying and expanding and how equivalent fractions represent the same number differently. The children also learnt how to convert between mixed numbers and improper fractions and how to use these in real-life contexts, using pictorial representations to demonstrate their understanding. We’ve also worked on our arithmetic skills and the children have achieved success in beating their scores each week.

Class 11 have had the amazing opportunity to gain a play leaders award this half term – the aim is to build their skills to deliver activities at break times throughout the academic year to help develop leadership skills and role models in the school. Everyone has gained the play leaders bronze certificate, and we have a huge amount of children who wish to progress to achieve their silver, gold and outstanding achievement certificate by doing further leadership activities in school.

We are looking forward to the final half term and seeing the children progress and mature as they become ready for Year 6!