Our Year 5 Class       

A very warm welcome to our Year 5 class page. In Year 5  we look forward to the challenges and responsibilities of being in the upper juniors. During the year the children continue to develop their independent learning, research and team work skills. 

Our Year 5 Class 2023-2024

Class Information

Who's who?

Mrs Monaghan - Year 5 teacher

Mrs Bent - HLTA

Things to remember:

• Please remember that homework is due in by WEDNESDAY each week.
• PE lessons for Summer 2 will be on a Wednesday (outdoor) and Friday (Indoor). Please remember to write your child's name on all of their uniform and sports kids to avoid confusion.
• Reading is encouraged both in school but also at home. Reading for enjoyment is as important as reading to learn. It is important that the children read a range of books/comics/newspapers at home and develop their comprehension skills and vocabulary. This will help consolidate the reading work we will be doing in class. In Year 5, we feel it is important for the children to develop a love of reading as this gives their 'imagination wings'.
• We will be following the RWI spelling scheme this year and supplementing this with Spelling Shed. The children will be encouraged to use this at home as well as in school. The children will also be bringing home a list of the key words that they are currently working on. Please practise these at home(little and often).
• It is important that the children still continue to practise their times tables regularly at home. TTRockstars is a fantastic tool for this as well as 'Hit the Button'.

This half term.... Summer Term 2 (June -July 2024)

English 

We will start this half term off by spending a week doing some 'sticky learning' writing around setting and character descriptions. We will also look at the purpose of dialogue in narrative writing and practise the rules of dialogue. We will then spend 2 weeks planning, writing, editing and redrafting independent stories (writing to entertain). After this we will move onto performance poetry. The children will be creating and performing poems in groups. This will help to develop their speaking and listening skills. We will end our English journey in Year 5 by creating a presentation and sharing it with the rest of the class. The preparation for this presentation will be a homework project over a few weeks. 

We will use the Writing Rainbow to help support our writing again this half term and continue to develop our stamina and overall presentation. We will continue to challenge ourselves with our vocabulary choices, use a range of punctuation and vary our sentence structure. It is crucial that the children continue to proof-read their work carefully and check carefully for the basics and that their sentences make sense.

We will complete  class reader 'The Explorer' by Katherine Rundell. Will the children escape for the rainforest?

Throughout the term we will be continuing to develop our comprehension skills and thinking carefully about our reading VIPERS (vocabulary, infer, predict, explain, retrieve, sequence or summarise) It is important that the children continue to read a range of books/comics/newspapers at home and develop their comprehension skills and vocabulary. This will help consolidate the reading work we will be doing in class. In Year 5, we feel it is important for the children to develop a love of reading as this gives their 'imagination wings'. 

In our spelling lessons we will focus on the following spelling rules:

• silent letters
• words that are adverbs of time
• challenge words 

We will be having a big push on our key words this half term ready for our assessment the week before May half-term. We will be doing lots of sticky learning around our grammar consolidating our understanding of:

· adverbials and pronouns

· determiners and apostrophes

· tenses

· apostrophes

Maths  

This half-term our topics are percentages, measures and graphs and tables. The children will be focusing on:

· perimeter of rectangles, rectilinear shapes and polygons

· area of rectangles

· area of compound shapes

· estimating area

· drawing line graphs

· reading and interpreting line graphs

· reading and interpreting tables

· reading an interpreting tables and two-way tables

We will also be completing our weekly arithmetic assessments and revisiting fractions and decimals in our morning activities to consolidate the children's understanding and preparing them for Year 6

All of these activities will give the children the opportunity to develop their reasoning and problem solving skills. We will also continue with our daily reasoning questions with our partner and counting activities. These help the children to develop their mathematical thinking.

At home, it would fantastic if you could keep some of the children's previously learning 'bubbling':

• Reading times on analogue and digital clocks
• Roman Numerals
• Rounding to the nearest 10, 100, 1000, 10000 decimals to the nearest whole number and money to the nearest 10p and £1
• Number Bonds
• Written strategies for addition, subtraction, multiplication and division.
• Equivalent fractions
• Adding, subtracting and multiplying fractions.

Science

This half term, our Science topic is named ‘Types of Change’. During this topic the children will learn:

• How can we make a meal from a mixture? They will make booklets labelled ʻMaterials dictionaryʼ and write definitions for terms relating to separating mixtures and types of change. In groups, children predict how many drops of water it will take to dissolve granulated sweetener, icing sugar and caster sugar. They test their predictions and record the results.
• to observe their solutions from the previous lesson and predict what would happen if water was added once more. They will add water and place their solutions in the same spot to be revisited later. They repeat their investigation on solubility with cinnamon rather than sugar and observe the differences. Each group is given a bag containing sugar, cinnamon and dried fruit. They list how they would separate the mixture by order of ingredients and techniques.
• to describe the properties of an ice cube. In pairs, they are given a cup of hot water with a lid and a piece of wax. They observe what happens to the wax when it is placed on the lid as an example of a reversible change. They are then are given a variety of materials and predict which ones will melt on top of hot water and which ones wonʼt. They test their predictions and conduct further research to then share with the class. Each group is given a jelly sweet to add to hot water as they consider the difference between the melting stage and the dissolving stage. 
• that burning is an irreversible change and they discuss new materials made from burning and when burning might be useful. They will make a biscuit mix and test what happens when they are put in the oven, observing them every five minutes, as another example of irreversible change.
• in groups, to observe the effects of mixing vinegar and bicarbonate of soda. Children discuss various acids that are used in the kitchen, and are given a variety of materials such as a stop watch, cylinder, tape measure, beakers, bicarbonate of soda, water and acids to use to test the reaction rates of bicarbonate of soda and acid. They will choose a question that can be answered with a fair test and then plan and carry out their investigation.
• to read and revise their ʻMaterials dictionariesʼ and discuss any revisions. Children are asked to create a meal using given ingredients, mixtures and heat. They record their recipes in groups, making note of types of changes involved.

Computing

Our topic for this half term is Programming - Micro:bit. During this topic the children will:

• be tinkering with BBC Micro:bit
• programming an animation
• recognising coding structures
• creating a program for a specific task 

HEARTSMART - 

Heartsmart/PATHS- 

We will be looking at the Heart Smart principle 'No Way Through isn't True!' 

We will be learning:

• that there is always a way through difficult situations.
• that success is not always what you see.
• the importance of hope
• reflecting on who we are.

We will also continue with our PATHS lessons this half term. These lessons support the children in developing their social emotional skills.

Music

For their final half term in music with Mr Wilkinson, the children will be improving their ukulele skills ready for our Summer Music Concert on Thursday 11th July.

History

Our topic for this half term is 'The Stone Age to Iron Age.' We will be discussing and learning about the following key questions:

• KQ1 - Is it true to say that Stone Age man was just a simple hunter gatherer only interested in food and shelter?
• KQ2 - How much did life change when man learnt to farm?
• KQ3 - What can we learn about life in the Stone Age from a study of Skara Brae?
• KQ4 - Why is it so difficult to work out why Stonehenge was built?
• KQ5 - How much did life really change during the Iron Age and how could we possibly know.

We will also be creating our own cave paintings.

French 

This half-term Mrs Bent will be focusing on the topic 'Meet my French family' with the children. They will be learning to:

• recognise and use phrases to say if they have a brother or sister.
• be able to name different family members on a family tree.
• build descriptive sentences into a short paragraph.
• be able to understand and express simple opinions.
• plan and prepare a short presentation about their family. 

D.T

Mrs Bent will teach the D.T this half-term. The children will be focusing on food technology. They will:

• explore the concept of fair trade/ ethical trading and its importance to developing countries.
• explore ways in which we can support fairly traded goods.
• understand the journey of a fair trade product. 

R.E

This half term we will be looking at the key question - How can following God bring freedom and justice? (People of God) During the topic we will be focusing on the following questions:

• What can we learn about the story of the Exodus in the Bible?
• Where do we think the Exodus story shows Moses' trust in God?
• How might the Exodus story help Christians when life gets tough?
• What do we think about the importance of the Ten Commandments?
• How do many Christians try to bring freedom and justice into today's world?

 PE

Our indoor P.E is on a Friday afternoon. This half-term our unit is 'Handball'. During this unit the children will be learning to:

• practise ball control, agility and quickness
• develop and refine throwing and catching skills
• combine the skills of moving and passing in handball
• use the defensive skills of marking and intercepting in a game
• to aim for a target
• to protect a target
• to work as part of a team
• to participate n a class handball tournament

 Our outdoor P.E is on a Wednesday afternoon. This half-term our unit is 'Strike and Field - Rounders'. During this unit the children will learn:

• the correct techniques for batting and bowling in rounders
• the correct techniques for throwing and catching when fielding in rounders
• the roles and responsibilities of the backstop and base fielders in rounders
• to field effectively in these positions and demonstrate a good skill and technique
• the roles and responsibilities of deep fielders in rounders
• to 'read' the game and apply tactics to outwit opponents 

Our sporting value for this half term is Determination, linked to our HeartSmart unit - 'No Way Through' isn't True! The children will be encouraged to TRY, and see that sometimes you have to keep trying! It's also the School Sports Festival Day this half term!

Summer Term 1 NEWS!

Another busy half term that has flown by again! Once again I am very proud of the work that the children have produced. Their Maths continues to go from strength to strength. I am very proud of the resilience they showed during our challenging units on fractions, decimals and percentages. I absolutely loved their poems based on Alan Bold's poem 'The Malfeasance' and they produced some fantastic brochures on Brazil.  The children showcased their map reading skills once again in Geography and enjoyed learning all about Brazil. It was great to see them drawing on previous knowledge they had remembered from our topics on climate zones and rainforests. They had a great time making and eating their Brazilian chocolates! In our Science lessons the children have had lots of opportunities to work scientifically and also developed their group work skills. The music they created in computing was brilliant and they have continued to show maturity during our PATHS and Heartsmart lessons, especially when tackling challenging issues. 

Well done everyone, we have had a lovely start to the Summer Term. Let's continue to do ourselves proud in the final weeks of Year 5 and continue to prepare for your transition to Year 6. I can't quite believe that our year together will be coming to an end in a few weeks, I have loved teaching you and I have every confidence that you will all flourish in Year 6

Spring Term 2 NEWS!

We have been busy again, even though it was a short half-term. We have had fun, learnt lots of new things, grown in confidence, shown resilience and worked as a team. I can't believe that we are already approaching Summer Term.

The children's writing has gone from strength to strength and they have produced some excellent biographies. I was very impressed with their diary writing based on Howard Carter discovering Tutankhamun's tomb. They had some fantastic ideas and remembered lots of key information. I was pleased with how they are carefully checking their work and trying to include a variety of grammar techniques and sentence structures. We will continue to challenge ourselves with this in the Summer Term and continue to work hard on the presentation as well as the content of our writing. World Book Day was fantastic again this year. I loved all of the children's character designs and it was wonderful to see so many of the children sharing and talking about books.

Maths was challenging this half-term with lots of work on fractions and multiplication and division. Throughout the children displayed a willingness to challenge themselves and showed resilience.

The children have been very enthusiastic about out History topic on the Ancient Egyptians. They have loved finding out about the Egyptian life and did an amazing job of their homework projects. It was amazing once again that they had the opportunity to share these with you all. They had worked so hard on them and their proud smiling faces said it all in the hall! They also did a great job designing, building and evaluating shadufs in D.T. Computing was fantastic too, the children did a magnificent job of creating their own stop motion animations based on the Easter story. Both in rhythmic gymnastics and in our tennis lessons the children have shown fantastic teamwork and communication skills. We all enjoyed visiting our local park and using the amazing facilities, allowing us to have some great games of tennis and basketball. We even had the opportunity to have fun with our friends in the play area. The children behaved beautifully and were a credit to themselves. We even had a visit from Leigh Leopards and the Challenge Cup - we were all very excited!

A highlight for me was visiting the Lowry theatre on the last day to watch 'The Boy at the Back of the Class'. We all enjoyed this live theatre experience and gained a great deal from this experience. It was a first time visit to the theatre for some of the children!

As you can see we have been very busy in Year 5. The children continue to amaze me daily and I am very proud of them all. Great job everyone! Can't wait for Summer 1!

Spring Term 1 NEWS!

It has been a busy half term again in Year 5. The children have once again worked their socks off and I am proud of every single one of them!

In English their writing has gone from strength to strength. I have loved reading their adventure stories based on our class reader 'The Explorer' and their thought provoking kindness poem. It has also been wonderful to experience sharing our class reader 'The Explorer' with the children - we are all intrigued to find out what is going to happen to all of the children and if they will meet an explorer along the way.

The children have once again shown resilience with their maths work. They have worked hard on mastering fractions and improved their reasoning and problem solving skills. In Science they have enjoyed learning about life cycles and watching their bean plant grow. They have been developing their skills when recording data either in a line or bar graph. Skills that we are going to continue to develop this and next term.

The children's singing skills have continued to improve during their music lessons with Mr Wilkinson. Mrs Bent has once again been impressed with the children's developing knowledge in French and their fantastic printing skills in Art. Their rainforest inspired prints were amazing. The children have continued to give insightful responses and show empathy during our Heartsmart and Picture News lessons. The introduction of our PATHS lesson has also helped them to develop their socio-emotional skills and roles when working within a team. They have also loved the introduction of 'Pupil of the Day'. 

In P.E the children loved developing their basketball skills and we finally managed to master our dribbling skills by the end! We are hoping for a visit to the park this half term to showcase these skills on the basketball courts. After a reluctant start the children grew in confidence during our dance lessons and showed great self-belief when performing their street jazz dances to the rest of the class.

The children have especially enjoyed our rainforest topic in Geography. They can now confidently locate the rainforests of the world, describe the layers of a rainforest and talk about the key features and the importance of the rainforest.

I am looking forward to Spring 2 and all of the exciting things we will be doing. We will also have Miss Potter (student teacher) joining us form Edge Hill University. The children are differently maturing and growing as both learners and individuals. It is lovely to see!

Autumn Term 2 NEWS!

Wow! Another busy half term in Year 5. The children have once again worked their socks off, showed their resilience, grown in confidence and had lots of fun. A great start to the half term was seeing all of the children's amazing Space projects and sharing them with you all in the hall. They were fantastic! I was extremely proud of the effort that they put into them and the confidence they showed when speaking about them to lots of adults.

The children have worked hard in English and are really improving both their vocabulary choices and sentence types. We are also getting better at checking the basics and making sure that our work is well presented. It is crucial that they continue to do this.They created some wonderful non-chronological reports on a variety of unusual creatures and wrote some great thought - provoking poetry based on Refugees, which linked nicely with our class reader 'The Boy at the Back of the Class'. I enjoyed reading their explanations on climate zones and it highlighted their knowledge and understanding from our Geography lessons. 

They worked hard their Maths lessons, especially when we moved onto Fractions. They have pleased me with their continued progress on their times tables and their willingness to practise at home. They are continuing to develop their reasoning skills and use prior mathematical knowledge to help them to problem solve. 

They all worked hard during our forces unit in Science and enjoyed working scientifically when investigating, friction, air and water resistance. It was great to see them build on the Mars Rover work they did in Autumn 1 again this half- term with our second computing unit on the Mars Rover. Their pixels work was fantastic along with their 3D CAD designs of their own rover.

It has been lovely again to see the maturity and sensitivity the children continue to show during our RE, Heartsmart and wellbeing lessons. They are always willing to listen to others, encourage and share their own thoughts. The children gain a great deal from these lessons and it is heart-warming to see it put into action!

The children continued to develop their French language skills and enjoyed the topic greatly as it linked back to their space work in Autumn 1.  In Music they showcased their growing ukulele skills with Mr Wilkinson. P.E was lots of fun this half-term and give us a great opportunity to show our resilience and team work skills during our dodgeball and invasion games lessons.

As you can see we haven't stopped in Year 5 this half-term and the children have shone brightly both in their learning and attitude. The term finished with a super Christmas party and our beautiful KS2 Christmas Carol service in church. It was lovely to have a packed church one more and for the children to perform and talk about the meaning of HOPE at Christmas. A lovely end to a lovely half-term.

Autumn Term 1 NEWS!

Wow! It has been a very busy first half term in Year 5. It has been lovely to get to know the children better. The highlights for me this half term are  our Science work on Earth and Space and to see the children working really hard on their presentation and handwriting. I am really looking forward to seeing their Science projects after half term and for them to share them with everyone when we all get together.

The children have started to grow in confidence and show their maturity and 'kind hearts' through our R.E discussions, Heartsmart lessons, Picture News, puberty lessons with HHKids. They are always willing to share their thoughts and feelings and are very respectful of each others opinions and views.  They have developed their historical thinking during our topic on the Mayans and thought carefully about how we know so much about a civilisation that were around over 1000 years ago. They have tackled the challenging job of reading binary code in Computing with resilience and patience and have enjoyed finding out more about the Mars Rovers. The children's spoken French has continued to improve along with their drawing skills in Art. They have enjoyed learning to play the ukelele in Music and have adapted well to this by drawing on the guitar skills that they learnt in Year 4 during their Wider Opportunities lessons.

The children worked hard during our Place Value units in Maths and have shown a good understanding, especially when faced with larger numbers. Their reasoning and problem solving skills continue to develop. I am also pleased with their continued practise on their times tables. In English we have focused on narrative writing this half term with the purpose of entertaining. The children produced some excellent short stories based on an abandoned fairground and are really challenging themselves with their vocabulary and sentence choices. In P.E they continued to develop their gymnastics skills and improve their rolls, jumps and vaulting. The thing that pleased me most during these lessons was the children's perseverance, encouragement of each other and their growing ability to self assess their skills.

As you can see it has been a busy start to Year 5 and as we head into another busy half term I know that the children will continue to make me proud as they grown in confidence, resilience, work together as a team and challenge themselves.