Spring Term 2 2018

Thursday 29th March
We had a great, interactive afternoon at Plymouth University on Tuesday. We met the author David Lawrence Jones and he kindly signed a book for each of us. We particularly liked his story on how he got the inspiration for his character Bradley Baker. It was very funny. Our adults said that we were very well behaved.
Today we have a had another interesting time. This morning we performed at our Easter celebration. We played three songs on the hand bells and also used British Sign Language for Hot Cross Buns. We also enjoyed singing 'Blackbird' as a whole school.
We finished off our topic of 'What could I be' by reviewing what we wanted to be at the beginning of the unit and seeing if it was still the same. For many of us it was, however we now knew more of what we would need to do to get there or had a clearer idea of the exact job we would like. Others had completely changed their minds based on the inspiring people we had met or ideas we had found out about at school.
Our Easter bonnet parade gave the teachers a headache trying to choose the best designs. These were inspired by what we want to be.
This afternoon we are looking forward to our egg hunt.
 
Homework: see previous week
Friday 23rd March
What an exciting afternoon we have had. The whole school took part in a dodgeball tournament. We split into our houses and had an inter house competition before each winning team played off against each other. The winning house was Scotland. Each team consisted of children from every class. Our teachers are very proud of us that we can use our values and join in well.
Also this week in another whole school event, we all produced a story based on the character Mr Benn. We watched an episode all together and then planned and wrote our own, choosing whatever we wanted Mr Benn to become. Our teachers are looking forward to reading them next week.
Year 5 have been working hard on written methods in maths and have really built their confidence. Year 6 have had fun tackling algebra and have been confidently solving equations.
Homework
Whole class homework due Monday 16th April please see copy below
Spellings/handwriting due Friday 20th April
Year 6 homework due Friday 20th April
Friday 16th March
This week was STEM week (science, technology, engineering and maths) and we have been doing lots of practical activities linked to these.
At the beginning of the week, we took part in an egg drop challenge. We had to budget for resources and try and build a capsule to safely land our eggs. Not all of them survived!
We also took on the James Dyson spaghetti bridge building challenge. We studied bridges and used this as inspiration for our own bridges made from spaghetti and marshmallows. They had to hold a weight of 300g and all were successful.
For science we tried a variety of experiments involving chemical reaction, pressure and density and static electricity. Take a look at our photos and videos to see more.
 
Homework
Maths due Thursday 22nd - times tables Y5, reasoning year 6
Reading and handwriting/spelling due Friday 23rd as usual 
 
Friday 9th March 2018
We started the week with Sugar Smart training. We learnt about leading healthy active lifestyles coupled with a balanced lifestyle. It also helped us to develop a new idea of leading playground games at lunchtimes. We are looking forward to starting this.
We finished reading our English unit book of Oranges in No Man's Land and thought the ending was surprising but fitting. Our mission now is to write the story from one of the other character's perspective. We get the chance to use our imaginations to fill in her back story as it wasn't all in the book.
In maths we have been working on multiplying and dividing by 10, 100, 1000. This is one of those things where we can say how to do it but don't always put it into practice, so we spent time consolidating it and then applying it in problems.
For world book day we had fun looking at the costumes everyone had worn and then we made book groups and discussed our favourite characters and authors. We also made something to go on our reading display.
We started a new PHSE unit which uses mindfulness to begin and then we were looking at the harmfulness of smoking. This prompted some interesting discussions.
 
Homework
Due Thursday
Maths
Y6 - arithmetic
Y5 - fractions, decimals, percentages
 
Due Friday
Whole school homework designing an invention
Reading x5 signed by an adult
Spelling/ handwriting sheet and test 
 
Friday 23rd February 2018
What a fun start to the new half term - this week has been arts week. We have done lots of arts related activities including painting with a local artist, Chinese paintings, music on hand bells and glockenspiels, exploring dance to different music and drama activities.
This afternoon we took elements from all of these things to share in a performance to the rest of the school. We were also able to watch their performances and see what they have been up to.
For English we have started reading a new book - Oranges in No Man's Land - and are very engrossed. We have used drama to help us understand the characters and written sentences to show the audience we are scared.
Decimals is our new focus in maths and we have been working hard to understand them up to thousandths. We are working on using examples to prove true or false questions.
 
Homework
For Monday to find out about their close family and the main career they had/have
 
For Thursday
Maths
Yr 6 10 minute test
Yr 5 sheet on decimals as fractions
 
For Friday
5 x reading signed
spelling/handwriting sheet completed and revision done for test