Hello everyone, my name is Mr Hayward and I am the Year 5 class teacher. This year, I will be working alongside Mrs Haywood and Mr Westwood. We are all forward to supporting the children throughout the Spring Term of Year 5 and seeing their knowledge and skills grow throughout this year. 

In Year 5, your child is expected to demonstrate increased independence in all areas of the curriculum. They need to become an excellent communicator, who is able to talk about his/her learning and can explain the processes and strategies he/she uses. Working efficiently and collaboratively, will allow your child to maximise his/her potential.

This class page aims to share with you examples of children’s work, photos of the children immersed in their learning. You will also find lots of exciting class news, so please ensure you keep your eye on our class page. 

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to ask either myself or Mrs Haywood and we will do our very best to help you. 

Mr Hayward, Mr Westwood and Mrs Haywood

Summer Term

Learning Summer Term

English

This term we will be writing a dilemma story linked back to Mr Tumnus in the Chronicles of Narnia. We will then write our own dilemma story linked to The Tale of the Three Brothers from Harry Potter. 

Reading

We are now reading a wonderful book by R.J.Palacio called Wonder. This book is a really excellent read and having read the first few chapters this week the children are looking forward to getting our teeth into more of the text. It talks about the struggles that a ten-year old can have moving to a new school. It has been one of our favourite books in year 5 for the last few years.

Maths

We are now working our way through fractions and will soon be expanding this with decimals and percentages.

Humanities

We are now looking at biomes. This part of geography links really well with previous topics and combines recalling previous knowledge about countries we have studied to how the environment is affected by human interaction.

Science

This term we will be conducting lots of experiments in line with our topic about properties and changes in materials. We will look at how changes in states of matter, mixtures and reversible and irreversible changes.

Wider Curriculum

Music

We are looking at Ukulele again and how we can use it to play along as an ensemble. We will extend this by writing our own chord progression and melody line.

Art

We are now going to look at printmaking inspired by the work of William Morris and others.

Design and Technology

We have several projects to complete this term which will include creating a pop-up book and designing an effective bridge.

Computing

This term in computing we will be using computer tools to generate 3D models and concept maps.

Orienteering

We are now looking to improve our map reading skills and with the warmer weather will be able to guide ourselves around the school grounds.

Spring Term

Learning Spring Term

English

Using inspiration from the famous tale 'Beowulf' we are writing our own story called 'The Saga of Bjorn' a Viking who is looking forward to battles against a mythical creature. The children have some excellent, engaging ideas, I cant wait to read their stories. Next we will be moving onto a travel Brochure about Italy. and finally we will be writing a setting description and a dilemma story based on the characters from the book 'The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe'.

Reading

We have started this term reading ' The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe' written by C.S. Lewis. This is a story about four children who wonder through a wardrobe and enter into 'Narnia' The book cites their adventures meeting the White Witch and Aslan. It is a classic story read by many. We are thoroughly enjoying this book, and hate leaving the story on a cliff hanger at the end of the chapter.

Next we will be reading 'The Nowhere Emporium' by Ross MacKenzie. This is a story about a magic shop that appears and disappears throughout the world and across time periods. We follow a boy called Daniel who becomes an apprentice to Lucien Silver. This is another brilliant book and I look forward to reading it with the class.

We have also ben looking at improving our retrieval skills when reading through shorter texts.

Maths

We are now looking at multiplication and division. We are investigating factors and common factors. Next we will be looking at prime numbers, square numbers and cubed numbers before looking at formal written methods. This term we are also beginning to look at fractions. We have enjoyed working on these so far and are continuing to learn to compare and calculate fractions.

Humanities

We are looking at Early Islamic Civilization. 

Science

We are looking at Life Cycles and Reproduction, where we will be looking at life cycles of plants and animals. And discuss how they interact across different living organisms.

Wider Curriculum

Music

we are looking at Latin Rhythms, we are learning several different rhythms including Samba, and we will then compose our own short section to perform on untuned percussive instruments.

Art

We are now making observation sketches, consolidating previous learning about techniques, and learning new skills to make an effective final piece.

Design and Technology

We made electronic cards at the start of the term, where we investigated existing products, planned our own design and made the card. There were some excellent examples finished by the children, they did an excellent job.

Computing

This term in computing we have been looking at databases and how they can be used to gather and analyse information. 

Lichfield Cathedral Trip

This term we we able to go to visit Lichfield Cathedral. We thoroughly enjoyed our trip. The guides were exceptionally impressed with our behaviour and our knowledge. 

World Book Day

We were very fortunate to be able to join a zoom call with the fantastic author Michael Morpurgo. He told us about how and why he has written some of his books and linked it to charity work he is involved in, where he helps highlight the importance of wildlife.

Orienteering

We are now taking part in a school wide set of activities around orienteering. So far we have had enormous fun and look forward to increasing our map reading skills.

Autumn Term

Learning Autumn Term

English

So far this year we have already read and thoroughly enjoyed 'The Boy at the Back of the Class' by Onjali Rauf and Beowulf by Michael Morpurgo. We will also read a wide array of other engaging texts which I am sure the children will love, which will include myths and legends, non-fiction texts to present new information and some poetry. We have just started to read 'The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe' by C.S.Lewis. I have been really pleased with how engaged the children have been when reading and how they dislike when finish a chapter and move onto a new lesson. They have loved reading the class novels so far, and we planto keep up this energy with the books we read in the spring term.

We have completed some excellent pieces of writing based on 'FArTHER' a picture book by Grahame Baker-Smith, we have written a historical essay about the Anglo-Saxon Kings during the invasion of the Vikings and now we are writing our own version of the Beowulf story. Next, we will be writing our own story called 'The Saga of Bjorn' where we will use all the skills we have learned in the Autumn Term and apply them to our own narrative.

Maths 

This term in maths, we will look at some of the building blocks for future learning. This will include a detailed look at place value to deepen our understanding of number. And next we will move onto looking at the four operations, where we will consolidate known written and mental methods, and also learn new strategies. This will help us to become more confident and efficient mathematicians.

We are currently looking at how to read graphs and then will be moving onto Multiplication and Division.

Science

In Autumn term we studied Earth and Space. We will look at some of the fundamental building blocks of physics and see how the Earth interacts with other objects in our Solar System. This is always a favourite topic among our year 5 students. We also looked at forces and how different forces impact our lives. We were able to conduct an experiment where we made a carriage and a zip-wire to see how friction works to slow down or speed up a moving object.

Humanities

In history, we have studied the Vikings. We will find our who the Vikings were and make our own opinions as to whether they were really brutal invaders. Then we will be focusing on significant figures such as: King Guthrum and Alfred the Great (the King of Wessex) plus many more. We will then compare some of the rulers of this period and decide who ruled England the best. We have also looked at Italy. We have used our geographical skills to analyse certain parts of the country and looked at how the geographical landscape effects the life of the people who live there. We have also made comparisons between the River Po, and the River Severn.

RAF Cosford

We recently went to RAS Cosford for some special STEM workshops. The children thoroughly enjoyed themselves whilst using and creating a variety of things using technologies. They made us so proud, mostly due to their behaviour and manner. We even had a teacher from another school approach us to say how welcoming our children were to other children when using the interactive displays. We also got to see a special scientific talk , with one of our student being used as part of the demonstration. It was a really great day for all of us.

You can see some photos below.

Rosa Parks Inspired Artwork

Today we have been learning all about Rosa Parks and to pay homage to her bravery we have made some Rosa Parks inspired artworks. We have really enjoyed using different techniques to make some effective art pieces. 

You can see some photos of us below.

Well Being Day Sports

Today we have been able to take part in sports activities and enjoyed a variety of invasion games led by a sports coach and Miss Oliarnyk.