Geography
In our geography topic, we have explored where our fruit is imported from using the labels on packaging to identify the countries and then we used this information to plot onto a world map. We discussed why fruit would be grown in other countries due to factors like location, climate and seasonal fruits. We also discovered where our uniform comes from and the process it goes through before we, the consumer, buy it. The words import and export were part of our key vocabulary throughout this topic and we could use them, in our writing with confidence. Finally, we researched the process of chocolate making and how the money from a chocolate bar is shared (unfairly) between each process, looking into Fair trade helped us to understand how this supports the plantation workers and producers. To end our topic, we took part in an incredible class debate, where we discussed our beliefs surrounding the distribution of money towards these various groups of people in the chocolate making process. We thoroughly enjoyed our geography topic!
English
Over the last 10 weeks, we have enjoyed our love for reading text ‘Queen of the Falls’ and learnt all about Annie Edson-Taylor and her heroic stunt over Niagara Falls in a barrel. We were even lucky enough to ‘meet’ Annie and ask her some of our questions to find out more about her life, her stunt and how she felt about her incredible achievement. Alongside reading about Annie, we also looked at a text about Philippe Petit, ‘The Man Who Walked Between The Towers’, another non-fiction text about someone who completed an incredible stunt. Using this text, we had the opportunity to explore New York City using Google Earth, collecting vocabulary for expanded noun phrases, relative clauses and using subordinating conjunctions, whilst using all of our senses. We have written lots of wonderful pieces of writing this term, including biographies, setting descriptions and a short narrative using all of the information we collected.
Science
In our science topic, we have learnt about why things fall to the ground. Why were introduced to Sir Issac Newton and his theory of gravity, using our previous learning about space we understood the importance of having the force of gravity and what would happen if it was not there. We have enjoyed engaging in exciting experiments using a shoe, a Newton meter and different surfaces to discover why we slip over on ice and found that friction plays a part in helping us stay on our feet! Using paper helicopters, air resistance was explored to help us to under that the bigger the surface area the more air resistance there will be against the object, helping with a smoother landing. In groups, we used play doh, test tubes and water to time how long it takes for different shaped objects to move through the water. From this we were able to conclude that streamlined shapes have less water resistance and are able to move through water quite quickly. To conclude our science topic, we had fun researching different pulley systems and were able to make some of our own and test them out using objects around the classroom. We have loved being great scientists this half term!
Maths
In maths, we have worked hard and shown great resilience when completing long multiplication calculations… remembering to drop our egg was one of the hardest steps to remember! Working with decimal numbers has meant that we have understood our place values with confidence and have used decimal numbers to complete both addition and subtraction calculations, as well as converting them into fractions. The key to addition and subtraction, we learnt, was to always line up the decimal points! Moving onto fractions, decimals and percentages has meant that we have been able to convert between all three, making us wonderful mathematicians. We love a challenge in year 5 and the word problems have definitely made us scratch our heads and break each problem down step by step. Coming up next in year 5 is… shape.
Art
Recently, Year 5 have learnt all about LS Lowry and his 3 dimensional perspective drawings. We read about the things that had inspired him as a young artist and his personal artistic style. Embracing his work, we then completed step by step drawings of 3 dimensional houses and finally a city drawing. Using 3 different shading styles, hatching, cross hatching and stippling, we were able to add tone to our artwork before finally adding the 5 colours that Lowry uses in his own artwork. When we were first shown what we needed to draw, there was panic but once we could see the art progressing on the page infront of us, we were incredibly happy with what we had produced.
PSHE/RE/SMSC
In PSHE, we have been discussing the importance of how to use the internet and social media safely to communicate positively with friends and family. We were lucky enough to experience this first hand by speaking to Mrs Hill-Bloor’s parents who live in Egypt! This taught us the difficulties of having to rely on the internet as the only form of communication as we had ‘technical problems’ on the day and even had to move venue (this sounds very posh, but actually we moved from the hall into the classroom). Lots of sensible questions were asked and we learnt so much from the experience. Alongside this, we discussed the importance of asking for consent before posting photographs of others online or without social media apps.
In R.E, we’ve focused on why the Torah is so important to Jewish people. We were very lucky to be able to look at the Torah and took the time to show respect when handling the religious text, following the same rituals that Jewish people follow. We learnt about the Ten Commandments and how these guides Jewish people into living a good life. Wonderful respect was shown during our RE lessons and Year 5 were able to recall their new learning with confidence. Well done Year 5!
During this term, our SMSC days were “What makes a winner” where we took part in a carousel of activities, drawing, a Kahoot quiz and a relay. It was discussed that we all have different strengths and that makes us all unique. We looked at what we felt it meant to be a winner and talked about whether we can always win at everything we participate in, of course the answer was no but our perspectives on what makes a winner was changed by the end of the day as we decided that a winner meant showing confidence, resilience and kindness to ourselves. For our floor books we created beautiful medals displaying the key vocabulary we had looked at throughout the day. Our other SMSC day “Who runs the world” saw us learning about the importance of helping others, through volunteering, fostering animals and giving up our time to help others. We looked at many different volunteering services and used these to support our own thoughts on how we may help others as we become older. We came up with some wonderful, thoughtful ideas that impressed our teachers. We even did some volunteering of our own, helping in both halls to help set up for dinner time and tidying the reading areas around the school. We loved our SMSC days.
