We are still working hard in Primary 5 even with the excitement of the holidays approaching!

We are continuing to learn the songs for The Peace Child – our Christmas concert and the rehearsals are going really well so far! We can’t wait to share it with you next week!

In class, we are continuing our work on division and time in Maths. These are both tricky concepts.

In literacy we have been writing comic strips as part of our work on direct speech, we looked at the features of comics and graphic novels first to help us. We will use the comics to help us write stories  with a focus on direct speech.

Mrs Brown – P5B

Dear Parent/Carer,

I hope you find the following information useful.  If you have any questions please do not hesitate to contact me.

General Information:

We had a very busy but enjoyable first term in Primary 5. Our Fairtrade topic was interesting and really made us think about how our food gets to our supermarkets.

Thank you for your continued support with homework, particularly the Fairtrade shopping task.

Homework will continue to be issued on a Monday and should be returned on a Friday. Reading homework will be issued separately and should be completed for the following week.

The children will take part in 3 PE lessons per week and these will be on Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. PE kit can be kept in a cupboard in the classroom.

The children will continue to earn DOJO points for positive behaviour and choices within the classroom. House Points will be awarded in the playground and when they are lining up.

We continue to add information to our class BLOG and this will be updated weekly. Our BLOG can be accessed via the school website.

Learning focus this term:

This term we will be learning about Body Systems.

Through our topic we will be learning about/to:

• The effect of alcohol, drugs and poor diet on the body
• The function of the major organs in the body
• How tissues and organs formed
• What the sensory organs are and how they help me
• How my body responds to external influences

Core Literacy:

• We will develop our writing by working on the tools for writing, including using paragraphs correctly; identifying direct speech and continuing to develop the use of sentence openers, connectives and punctuation
• We will be using our topic as a stimulus for writing in a variety of different styles, such as report writing, fact-files and posters
• Children will be given opportunities to develop their listening and talking skills through a variety of class based activities, including cooperative group work
• During class reading lessons the children will use Blooms Buttons and Book Detective strategies to check their comprehension
• This term we will be aiming to finish our class novel, War Horse by Michael Morpurgo.

Core Numeracy:

• Pupils apply their times table knowledge to written multiplication and multiplication problems
• Pupils will use written and mental strategies to complete division calculations
• Pupils will develop their understanding of time, including telling the time on an analogue and digital clock; reading timetables and calendars and calculating duration

RME/ Health and Wellbeing

This term our RME focus will be Buddhism. We will be revising Cool in School and positive behaviour as part of our Health and Wellbeing curriculum.

As a Health Promoting school we actively encourage and teach our children to make healthy choices, to enable then to become healthy, active and emotionally resilient young people of the future.

We are delighted to be able to continue to deliver 2 hours of PE a week as well as opportunities for children to be active in our fabulous new grounds.

We would appreciate your support in promoting a healthy and balanced diet, both in your child’s morning snack and in their packed lunch.  We would discourage any type of fizzy juice in school or energy drinks.  Children are encouraged to bring in a water bottle, which they can use during class time and refill during the day.  There are water fountains situated throughout the school for daily use.

Please encourage your child to participate in the Active Sports Clubs that are on offer at lunchtimes and after school, as well as any school based clubs that take place throughout the year.  Keep looking in school bags for further information.

A reminder that all children who cycle or scooter to school must wear a safety helmet and ‘walk’ their bikes whilst in the playground. There are bike racks available.

Class Birthdays

We always celebrate if a member of the class has a birthday however we would request that birthday cakes are not brought into school to share with the class. In school, we have children with allergies who may be at risk from some ingredients. The cutting up and distributing of birthday cake also cuts into valuable learning time.

Playground toys:

We have a playground equipment for children to play with during lunchtime.  Please do not bring in your own toys – except for Golden Time on a Friday – so that we can be sure that all toys in the playground belong to the school.  Many thanks for your support.

Golden Time toys:

Children can bring a ‘toy’ to school on a Friday to play with during Golden Time. Please remember that the school cannot take responsibility for the safety of these toys and therefore we request that your child does not bring in expensive/ electronic items without your consent.  We appreciate your support with this matter.

Mobile Phones:

Children may bring a mobile phone to school however these will be stored in a locked classroom cupboard until home time and cannot be used during class time.

Book & Blether:

Please look out for further information on the dates and times for  Book and a Blether.  These are a chance for parents/carers to spend time with their children promoting reading.

I look forward to working in partnership with you this session.

Kind regards

Mrs Brown

 

In literacy we have been learning to write instructions. We watched a video on how to make a snowglobe, we took notes and then used these to write a list of what we needed and a set of instructions to explain how to make it.

We we have also been developing our grammar with a focus on speech marks. There are a lot of rules to remember!

In Maths we are now working on division and continuing to develop our understanding of 12 and 24 hour time.

In science we have been learned no how to classify plants. Today we went outside to look for moss, ferns, conifers and flowering plants. We learned that plants make food through photosynthesis and drink water through their roots.

We had lots of fun dressed up for Children in Need today. I think you’ll agree everyone looked fantastic!

We have been using different tools to help us develop and extend our writing. To help us use more creative vocabulary we have been using thesauruses.

In Science we are continuing to learn about different animals and plants. Today we used flowcharts to classify different species of vertebrate. It was confusing at first but we worked hard to develop our skills.

In writing we wrote sensory poems. We had to think about things we could hear, see, touch, taste and smell.

In PE we have been doing gymnastics. When we were on the climbing frame we were working on strength and stability. We have also been working on holding a balance and jumping and landing correctly. On the ropes we are also improving our upper body strength.

 

In maths we are continuing to develop our multiplication skills and we have been working on x10 and x100. Some of us having been applying this skill to help us to multiply by more complex numbers like x25 and x50.

Today we were learning about Rememberance Day. Rememberance Day marks the date that the Treaty of Versailles was signed to end WWI. We also learned that on the first Christmas of WWI each side stopped fighting and played football. We have been selling poppies to help support the armed forces, did you know poppies come in different colours and that they look different in different countries?

As part of Outdoor Learning Day, we took our Maths learning outside.

We used an orienteering map to locate markers hidden around the school grounds. Beside each marker was a multiplication sum and a letter of the alphabet. We had to solve the multiplication problem and collect the letter from the orienteering marker. Each letter we collected helped us to spell out a sentence. The sentence we eventually spelled out was related to our recent Science focus.

We had lots of fun outside today!

 

Welcome back to Term 2!

We’ve had a busy start to Term 2 so far.

We are continuing on with our Vertebrates and Invertebrates topic as part of Science. Today in Literacy we had to apply reading, writing and ICT skills to enable us to create a factfile of an animal of our choice .

Using a list of questions we agreed on as a class, we had to use the internet and books to gather information. Initially we wrote this into our jotters as notes. We then used our notes to create a factfile.

 

Yesterday in Art we were considering autumnal colours as well shape whilst we created a leaf print picture. Part of the fun involved collecting leaves beforehand during the Daily Mile.

What a quick term it has been!

 

As part of science, we are continuing learning about animals. We are using our researching, reading and writing skills to create fact files about an animal of our choice  we will have to think about how to organise the information, fact vs opinion, and scientific vocabulary.

In writing, we watched a short film called, ‘The Silent Blue Book.’ It was an animated but it didn’t have any words. Our task was to write the story we thought it should have.

We are also continuing our Fairtrade topic, we have been bringing in lots of examples of Fairtrade products from home, thank you for all your help! We have specifically looked at chocolate this week and Fairtrade Cocoa Beans.