Heavier or Lighter
This week, we have been thinking about weight.
We have been comparing objects in our classroom and using the words ‘heavier’ and ‘lighter’ to describe them.
Sometimes, we were tricked! Some of us thought that the biggest object might be the heaviest. We now know, that’s not always the case!
Help at home: Can you compare some objects that you have? Which feels heavier and lighter when you feel them?
Great Fairies of the World
This week, we read Great Fairies of the World by Stephanie Moss. This rhyming story introduces fairy characters with jobs that help others, including an architect fairy, a doctor fairy and an engineer fairy, to name just a few!
We really enjoyed retelling the using the story map to our grown ups when they came our Stay and Learn session.
Help at home- Use the story map to tell the story to your grown ups. Don’t forget to do the actions and encourage everyone to join in.
Phonics
Spring 1 week 5 focused on reading longer words, using the ‘chunking method’. When we ‘chunk it up’, we blend longer words one syllable at a time. For example: sunset (s-u-n, sun. Then, read s-e-t, set. Finally, join them together. Sun-set. Sunset.)
Help at home- Ask your child to show you how they ‘chunk-it-up’!
Friday Afternoon Book Club
Every Friday afternoon, Year 2 visit the library for Book Club. Children enjoy time to read for pleasure and choose a book to take home for the week.
This weekly visit supports our reading curriculum by building fluency, vocabulary and a love of reading.
We encourage families to read the book together at home and talk about the story.
Please remember to return library books by Friday so your child can choose a new one. Thank you for supporting our young readers.
Maths (area)
In maths, Year 5 are learning all about area.
Perimeter is the distance all the way around the outside of a shape.
Area is the amount of space inside a shape.
We usually measure area in square units, like square centimetres or square metres. The children have started off strongly – they’ve been working out the area of shapes by counting all squares inside each shape. More recently, we have started to notice that the area of rectangles and squares can be calculated by:
length x width
width x length
Multiplication is commutative, so no matter which factor we put first, the product (or area in this case) will be the same result.
Year 5 were tasked with designing a floor plan for a school hall. We pretended that our current PE equipment had been removed and we decided to buy some new stuff! Our job was to fit the equipment in the hall effectively. To do this, we had to think about:
- the area of each piece of equipment
- where to place it in the hall
- where the entrance to the hall would be
- not cramping/squashing equipment together
The children loved this task and did really well! Here are some examples of work from Emily, Emily and Elara.
A Visit from the Doctor
Over the past two weeks we have been using the story Great Fairies of the World as our focus book. We have learned to retell the story using a story map and a simplified version of the story.
We have also talked about the different People Who Help Us in the story and on today we welcomed a special visitor to our classroom Doctor Katie (Mrs Kendrew’s sister). She is a Paediatric Doctor and she told us she works with children and babies in a hospital.
She brought in a stethoscope and let us all listen to our own or each others hearts beating and she answered lots of our questions.
“Do you make people better?”
“Do you give injections?”
“Do you work at night time?”
We really enjoyed her visit and continued playing hospitals after she had left. Thank You for visiting us Doctor Katie.
School Trip!
We had an amazing time on our school trip to the Yorkshire Museum in York, where we learned all about the Roman way of life. We explored fascinating Roman artefacts and discovered that York’s Latin name was Eboracum.
We also got to march like a Roman legion (IMG_2234), learning how Roman soldiers worked together. Things got very exciting when we put our Roman army tactics into action and attacked Miss Gilliland! Luckily, we’re hoping she’ll make a full recovery from her battle wounds and be back teaching tomorrow.
We also walked down to the River Ouse to look at the flood defences, which will be really helpful for our next topic in Geography.
One of the highlights from the day was having lunch with friends, where we had a catch-up and talked about everything we’ve learnt so far.
Check out the photos below!
Abbey House Museum
To enhance their history learning about old and new toys, Year 2 visited Abbey House Museum. The children thoroughly enjoyed exploring life in the past, discovering how things have changed over time and examining historical artefacts.
Walking through the Victorian street was particularly exciting and helped the children imagine what life might have been like long ago.
During a workshop, the class compared toys from the past with modern toys and learned how older toys were often made from very different materials than those used today.
Help at home
Chat to your child about this doll.
What is it made from?
How old is it?
How is it different to a modern doll?
Topic – Trip to Abbey House Museum
Year 1 had a brilliant day out on our school trip. We visited Abbey House Museum as part of our history learning about old toys and we had so much fun exploring and discovering how children played in the past.
We loved walking down the Victorian street, visiting the school room and even stepping inside the jail (don’t worry – no one stayed there!). Dressing up in Victorian clothes was a big hit and helped us imagine what life was like long ago.
We also took part in a fantastic workshop where we saw lots of old toys – some were 200 years old! We even got to play with some of the toys which was really interesting and made us think about how toys have changed over time.
It was a fun-filled day and the children represented St James’ CE Primary impeccably.
Help at home:
Have a chat about toys from the past. Can you look at photos or talk to family members about what toys they played with when they were young? You could even compare an old toy with a modern one and spot what’s the same and what’s different.
Science – thermal insulators
In science, we’ve been testing materials based on their ability to insulate heat. We did this because we received a letter from King Charles asking for a hot cup of tea. We tested three materials: tin foil, fabric and polyester wadding.
During the testing, we worked safely and sensibly, ensuring we recorded results accurately. Once we had completed the testing phase, we presented our results in the form of a line graph.
There were many scientific elements of this lesson that were important to consider: independent, dependent, controlled variables, working safely and ensuring we tested fairly.
Help at home – speak to your child about the experiment they carried out. Can they tell you which variable was the independent/dependent/controlled variable? What did they find? Can you replicate the experiment at home?
Writing – battling those Rotten Romans … a gruesome recount!
We’ve loved writing our recounts of our battle against the Romans on the Chromebooks. Hopefully you enjoyed reading them when the children brought a copy home on Friday.
It was great for the children to be able to edit their writing further when writing on the Chromebooks. The joy that filled the classroom when the children found out they would be typing their recounts was palpable.
As well as editing our writing, the Chromebooks helped us to fix spelling mistakes and we learned how to write a capital letter using the shift key and move down a line by pressing the enter key.
There was a glow of teamwork as children helped each other out and a huge sense of pride as their recounts flew off the printer.