Blog
Summer 1 Week 1
We welcomed the year 5 children back after Easter and have started our English learning looking into the story of Hamlet written by Shakespeare. They have enjoyed listening to the beginning of the story and Hamlet's anguish at learning the truth over his father's death!
Next week, we will be writing a soliloquy
During maths this week, we looked at sequences of numbers, counting up and down in 10, 100 and 1000. Not only this, but we recapped negative numbers and looked at a variety of questions about this which include temperature, comparing and ordering numbers and identifying number sequences.
Next week, we will look at equivalences in fractions, decimals and percentages.
Our project learning this term is all about history and learning what it was like during the Tudor times! The children learnt about shields, the Tudor rose and what they wore during this time period!
Friday 22nd March
We wrote our letters to the government this week during English as the children are trying to persuade them to act on climate change! They included the features of AFOREST (alliteration, facts, opinions, rhetorical questions, evidence and the rule of three!) There letters were amazing and we are now waiting to hear back!
In maths, children have been focusing on units of measure, in particular weight, volume, length and money where they were converting between smaller and larger units.
During project this week we came to the end o our Art project where we all created one big picture of The Great Wave by Hokusai a Japanese painter.
Spring 2 - Week 1
This week in Maths, the children have worked really hard to calculate the perimeter and area of shapes. I was super impressed with their efforts and resilience. We started easy with rectilinear shapes and towards the end of the week we challenged ourselves to work with triangles and irregular shapes.
In English, the children started their new genre of persuasive writing. Our focus for this week was persuasive adverts. The children recapped the features of persuasive writing and created their own adverts to persuade other children (and parents) to join HCFS.
This week, the children participated in Multimedia Week. They got to program microbits to be used for an anti-poaching collar, created brilliant pieces of music using Chrome Music Lab and Riffusion, learnt about binary codes and finally drew shapes by using commands on Microsoft Logo.
09.02.24 - Spring 1 Week 5
This week the children wrote their fables assessed piece. The children came up with lovely ideas and moral lessons at the end of their writing.
In Maths, we have been exploring fraction. I was blown away by their hard work and how quickly they grasped how to multiply fraction, including mixed number fractions. Well done everybody!
In Project, we learnt about ancient Egyptian art and what their significance for ancient Egyptians.
Falcons class have also started their swimming lessons and they are not only having a lot of fun but are also growing in confidence in their swimming abilities.
2.2.24 Spring 1 Week 4
This week, the children have been looking at fables that have a meaning or moral to the story. They have explored language features such as similes and metaphors.
Next Week they will plan and write their own fable.
During maths, we continued our topic of geometry and focused on angles. They learnt about measuring angles using a protractor, finding the missing angles in triangles and squares and finding the missing angles in shapes.
Next Week we move on to adding and subtracting fractions using different denominators.
In project, we looked at Egyptian hieroglyphics where they wrote their name and used the method of batiking to create a piece of art work.
Spring 1 - 12.1.24
Maths - we looked at a variety of addition and subtraction reasoning problems where multi-steps are involved in answering the question.
Next week - we look at coordinates - take a look at this website for more information.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/articles/z96k9qt#zq6jtcw
English - we started reading Short which is a fiction book made up of really short stories. In particular, we focused in on horror stories and looked at certain features such as expanded noun phrases and relative clauses.
Next week - we look further into different sentence structures and finish the week with writing the middle and end to a short story.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/articles/zbvqkty#zvbf46f
Project - we are learning Art and History skills using the Ancient Egyptians as a focus and kicked the week off with making and moulding clay Sphinxes! Take a look at some of the painting in action from Kestrels this week in our Gallery.
Spring 1 - 05.01.23
Welcome back everybody! We hope you have had a lovely Christmas break and are all ready for the exciting learning taking place in Spring term.
Even though we were only in school for one day this week, the children have already produced some amazing learning.
In our Science lesson, we explored shadow puppets and how the distance of a light source can impact the size and definition of the shadow. The children wrote their own scientific methods for the investigation and worked brilliantly in groups to carry it out.
We also completed a reading comprehension activity and an arithmetic paper to get the children back into routine.
Autumn 2 Week 6
We had a guest visitor pop in today from the University of Hertfordshire where he is busy completing his PhD in robotics. He came to Year 5 and explained his invention which is in it's prototype stage of development. The invention is to eventually help stroke patients rehabilitate their hand. The children were thoroughly engaged and asked lots of amazing questions.
English - We have come to the end of our unit where we wrote an explanation text on how their invention of another transportation device works. They used a checklist of all the features taught (expanded noun phrases, adverbials, relative clauses, subheading)
Maths- This week, we looked at converting units of measure. We looked at converting units of length, weight, capacity and times. They used their knowledge of place value to understand when they were dividing and multiplying by 100 an 1000.
Next week: we are focusing on a variety of topics, statistics, rotation and FDP
here are a couple of videos to support your child.
Timetables - Maths - Learning with BBC Bitesize - BBC Bitesize
How can you transform a shape? - BBC Bitesize
Autumn 2 Week 5
English - we have continued to explore explanation texts, looking at features evident such as present tense, third person, subheadings, technical vocabulary, labelled diagrams etc. We focused on cause and contrast adverbials this week. Cause and contrast adverbials are adverbs that indicate why or how something happens. Examples include: because, therefore, meanwhile, however and since. They finished the week by writing an explanation text about how their moving mechanical design from DT works.
Next week: we will plan writing our explanation text.
Maths - we have focused on the four operations (add, subtract, multiply, divide) this week and looked at answering word problems based on them. Some children had extract challenge with this and accessed IXL on the chromebook to further their understanding.
Next week: we will look at conversion of measurement and time. Choosing appropriate units and converting between units - KS3 Maths - BBC Bitesize - BBC Bitesize
Autumn 2 - Week 4
Maths - This week, the children worked on multiplying and dividing numbers by 10, 100 and 1000 and to support their understanding, the children used place value charts. They worked really hard and by the end of the week they were able to apply their knowledge and skills to reasoning problems.
English - This week, we started our new unit on explanation texts. We have been exploring the language and structure features of this genre of writing and the children have been practicing them by improving a set of instructions.
Project - This week, the children used their designs from last week to work with their groups to make their final moving model of their animal. I was absolutely blow away with their team work skills and the independence they showed when building their models.
Autumn 2 Week 3
Checkpoint week! The children have successfully completed checkpoints which have included a reading paper, SpaG and Spelling paper and 3 maths! They all worked incredibly hard and have done really well.
Maths - Next week we look at and revise multiplying and dividing by 10, 100 and 1000 including decimal numbers. Please take a look at this website which will support your child with this learning.
Divide decimals by 10, 100 and 1,000 - Maths - Learning with BBC Bitesize - BBC Bitesize
Multiply decimals by 10, 100, 1000 - Maths - Learning with BBC Bitesize - BBC Bitesize
English - We will start our new topic which is explanation text writing. Each week, we will focus our attention on a specific feature relevant to this topic of writing. Next week, we will look at instruction text and identifying imperative verbs along with time adverbials.
Further help on imperative verbs: What are imperative verbs? | TheSchoolRun
Time adverbials
Autumn 2 Week 2
English : Year 5 have completed their Cinquains this week. They looked at the story "Where the Poppies now Grow" summarised it into six sections and wrote cinquains about each part. They used thesauruses to encourage better use of vocabulary and some are fantastic! I have shared a few for you to read on our class page.
Next Week: Check Point Week so please login to IXL, Spelling Shed, Education City and TTRS to practise!
Maths: We looked at prime, composite and cubed numbers this week. They used their knowledge of this to answer more worded questions that required multiple steps in order to get the correct answer. Further information about this can be looked at on this website: Prime and Composite Numbers (mathsisfun.com)
Next Week: Check Point Week so please login to IXL, Spelling Shed, Education City and TTRS to practise!
Autumn 2 Week 1
The children in year 5 have had a really positive week back to school.
English: We are looking at poetry over the next two weeks and in particular, writing Cinquains. This week, we took our inspiration from a famous WW1 poem called "In Flander's Fields". Children worked as a class, group and individually to construct a cinquain with performances that you can see on our class page. Take a look at this website that will help you child understand features of a Cinquain: How to Write a Cinquain Poem – Kenn Nesbitt's Poetry4kids.com
Next week we will explore another text and take our inspiration to create our final assessed Cinquain.
Maths: This week, we looked at rounding numbers and using a number line to learn about negative numbers. Take a look at this website that helps children solve rounding problems. How to round numbers - BBC Bitesize
Next week we will learn about Prime, Cube and Composite numbers.
Autumn 1 Week 7
Interfaith Week - this week , we have learnt about 6 different religions, Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism and Christianity and completed a variety of activities throughout the week. On Thursday, Year 5 and 6 got to sample a variety of different foods from different cultures and religions whilst sharing their traditional clothing with us too.
English - after half term, we are exploring poetry and explanation texts.
Maths - we looked at ordering fractions from smallest to largest along with converting mixed numbers to improper fractions.
Take a look at this website for more learning on this subject: https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/topics/zhdwxnb/articles/zwypqfr
After half term, we look at rounding numbers to then nearest 10, 100, 1000, 100000 and 1000000
Autumn 1 Week 6
13.10.23
English - This week we finished reading Part One of Boy in the Tower. The children created a bank of features and sentences that they will use when writing their assessed piece next week which will consist of their own chapter for Boy in the Tower.
Maths - We continued to practice division and multiplication calculations. The children are a lot more confident now and they were able to apply their skills to reasoning problems at the end of the week.
Fallen Fields - During our last session of this project, the children created a double page spread with all the information that they have learnt about WWI.
Autumn 1 Week 5
6.10.23
English - we read the next few chapters of the Boy in the Tower. The children are hooked on this story and have been very engaged with it's storyline so far. They were able to write the next chapter in the story based on their prediction.
Maths - We looked at long multiplication and short division this week. The children used bead strings to help them divide large numbers.
Fallen Fields - with this history topic, we looked at the role of men and women during the war and what jobs that took on during this time. They researched different jobs using chrome books and organised their information into a job advert.
29.09.23 Autumn 1 Week 4
Maths - this week we have been looking at factors and prime numbers. They learnt how to identify factors of a number using a number line and their existing knowledge of times tables. We understood the concept of prime numbers and identified prime factors of a number too.
Next week focus - using the formal written method to divide and multiply
English - We started reading Boy in the Tower this week and the children are really enjoying getting to grips with the story line and finding out more and more details as we venture into the story. For this topic, we have started to look at and identify features of a mystery and suspense novel by looking for short sentences, setting description, show but not tell. They are excited to know what' happening next week!
Next Week focus -To write an additional chapter based on a conversation between Ade and Gaia using correct punctuation and different sentence structures.
Project - We have continued our World War One topic and researched the important date of June 28th 1914. Have a conversation with your child to see what they can remember form that fateful day!
Next week focus - looking at the role of women during the war and sequencing specific events.
15.9.23 Autumn 1 Week 2
The children have expressed their love for learning all about World War One in our history project, Fallen Fields. This week, we looked into the cause of WW1 and studied primary and secondary sources whilst discussing which would be more useful to us as historians. We ended the week by looking at propaganda used at this time.
During maths, we have been experimenting with different mental strategies to add and subtract. They consolidated their learning by practising column method with carrying. Next week, we will look at addition and subtraction with multi-step word problems.
English lessons continued with report writing and by the end of the week, we moved our focus to creative writing by writing a setting and character description. Next week, we will continue to develop creative writing skills based on The Lighthouse story.
08.09.23 - Autumn 1 Week 1
We have had a fantastic first week back in Year 5! The children have settled really well in their new classes and seem very excited for the year ahead.
The children have enjoyed starting our new English topic - ‘The Lighthouse’, where we have been learning how to write a news report on a series of events.
In Maths, we have recapped number and place value concepts, including reading and writing decimals and rounding. The children have worked incredibly hard and have blown us away!
Our Science topic this half term is ‘The Human Body’. We started the topic by exploring the stages of human development. We also used a table to compare the gestation periods of different animals and the correlation this had to their litter size. We displayed our findings using a scatter graph. Next week, we will be learning adolescence and puberty.
Our project topic for this term is ‘Fallen Fields’. We introduced this unit of work by making poppies out of filter paper and paint.