Future 'Bake Off' contestants?

Year 5 have been enjoying themselves learning about Fairtrade.

Having discovered the value of buying Fairtrade products and that chocolate can form part of a healthy diet, we researched chilled chocolate desserts. We then designed our own desserts, taking into account taste, texture, colour and visual impact. We made our chocolate desserts very professionally. We were involved in sharing out the ingredients, including chocolate, strawberries, popping candy and squirty cream, as well as using sharp knives and graters. Well, you can imagine, the smell in the classroom! Once we had all evaluated our desserts, we really enjoyed eating them!

We also used the work we have been doing in English to design a persuasive poster to encourage other people to buy our product. What a week!

British Science Week 2017!

We really enjoyed our Science Day based on the topic 'Change'.

We made bread rolls, with different groups altering the recipe so we could investigate why we need each of the ingredients. We enjoyed tasting the different rolls and could really tell the importance of each ingredient!

We explored changing colours, using paper towels and water coloured with food dye.

After playing 'Worm Hunt' on the field (trying to find different coloured pieces of wool, not real worms) we talked about the importance of camouflage and have created our own butterflies to camouflage into out classroom habitat!

Trinity Sculptures

We have been learning about the Trinity and have expressed our understanding of the Trinity through sculpture.

World Book Day!

Look at these beautiful collaborative art pieces we have produced based on the book 'Journey to the River Sea'.

Terrific Scientific - Experiment 2 - Water

We have been investigating if the water that comes out of our taps in Northleach is hard or soft water, using a water hardness testing kit.

We also carried out an investigation to find out if warm water sometimes can freeze faster than cool water. We will send our findings to The University of Southampton so they can use them in their scientific study. We are looking forward to seeing how our results compare to results from around the country.

Terrific Scientific - Experiment 1 - Taste!

We are taking part in the BBC's Terrific Scientific campaign.

Our first investigation was based on 'Taste'. Did you know that not everyone's sense of taste is the same? Some people are supertasters, which means that they find bitter tastes more unbearable than others.

To carry out this investigation we put blue food dye on our tongues and counted the number of big pink bumps (fungiform papillae) which contain our taste buds, we could see within the circle. By counting the number of fungiform papillae we had, we were able to determine whether we were supertasters, tasters or non tasters.

We had great fun and are looking forward to seeing how our results compare with other children from around the country!

Spring Term Communication Letter

Dear Parents/ Carers of Year 5 Pupils,

Welcome back and happy new year! We hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and are ready for another busy term. Thank you very much for your kind messages, cards and gifts.

Spring Term Curriculum

Here is an outline of some of the areas of learning that we will be covering in class this term. 

Maths	Division (whole numbers) Different types of numbers Decimal numbers (reading, writing, ordering, rounding) Calculations involving decimal numbers (+ - x ÷) Percentages and fractions Word problems
English	Fables Play scripts Performance Poetry Non-chronological reports Persuasive texts Reading- our class text is ‘Journey to the River Sea’
Science	Properties of Materials and Changes of Materials
R.E.	What is God like? How does believing in God influence people’s lives?
Computing	Programming and debugging
P.E.	Dance and Gymnastics (Tuesdays) Invasion game skills (Thursdays)
Topic (History, Geog, Art, D.T.)	Saving the World – work will include learning about climate zones, the water cycle, land use, trade links and improving our geographical skills D.T. will include designing a chocolate pudding

How you can help at home

Homework – Please note change of day

Year 5 children will continue to receive one English and one Maths homework weekly. However, as a change from last term, we will ask for English homework to be handed in on Tuesdays and Maths homework to be handed in on Wednesdays. We will set some MyMaths homework tasks as part of the Maths bubble homework. If you do not have access to the internet at home children are welcome to use laptops at school to complete these tasks during Friday lunchtimes.

If your child has any trouble with homework, all they need do is come and ask us (where possible before the due date).  It is also appreciated if you could help encourage children to take responsibility for their own homework. 

In addition, the children will continue to learn a spelling rule each week. They will receive a list of spellings that follow this rule every Monday and will need to learn these for a weekly spelling test on a Friday.

Please find attached to this letter the half termly spellings the children need to learn at home (and what they scored when tested on these spellings last week). These will not be taught in lessons and will be tested at the end of the half term. Thank you for your support with this – it makes a big difference.

Reading

Please continue to read regularly with your child. It is so important as children become more fluent with their reading that they understand what they have read. Please ask them questions about the characters and plot to check their understanding and encourage them to express their own opinions about a story/book. Please also encourage them to read aloud with appropriate intonation and expression, paying careful attention to punctuation marks used by the author.

Planners

The children are using their planners very well to record their daily reading and their homework tasks. Children will record in their planners their spelling test score and their times tables club score every Friday. Please could you check your child’s planner at the end of each week and sign the bottom of the page. Your child should take responsibility for asking you to check and sign it. We will collect the homework planners each Friday.

P.E

The children will continue to have their Thursday P.E. session with Jon and will also have an indoor P.E. session on Tuesday afternoons. Sometimes our timetable has to change so P.E kit should be in school each day please. As the weather is unpredictable it would be useful for the children to have both outdoor trainers and plimsolls (or clean trainers) as part of their kit so that we can use both the hall and outdoors. Joggers and jumpers may also be needed.

Planners, reading books.

Please have all of these in school each day. Thank you.

Please don’t hesitate to come and see us if you have any questions.

Yours sincerely,

Mrs Michelle Parkin and Mrs Marika Hortop

Christmas Cards

We are very proud of the Christmas cards we have created!