Class News

Term 3.1 spellings

This half-term, our spellings are linked to the rules and strategies we’ll be learning in class:

• alternative graphemes: sh (ch, ss, ti, s)
• alternative graphemes: k (ch)
• adding prefixes: mis, re
• adding prefixes: sub, tele, auto
• spelling patterns: gn, kn
• homophones: piece / peace, main / mane, fair / fare

Each Friday, you’ll be tested on 8 of the words from the list below.

Living & Learning: Health and Prevention

Year 5 have been learning about germs and how to prevent spreading them.

We started off the lesson by taking part in a quiz. Did you know that the kitchen is normally the most germiest room in the house? And, there are 100,000 microbes in a sneeze?

The children then discussed cross contamination and how quickly germs can spread. We talked about the need to wash our hands to help prevent this spread. We could use soap or hand sanitiser.

Help at home: Discuss other ways we can stop germs from spreading.

Summer term after-school clubs

Super swimmers

UPDATE 26.04.24

Our team have qualified for the Nationals. What a great achievement – well done to all the children.

Our Year 5/6 swimming team competed in the English Schools’ Swimming Association North East Primary Schools’ Team Championship at the Grammar School at Leeds. A special thank you goes to one team member who joined the team late on.

All the children performed brilliantly throughout the afternoon competing against schools from Yorkshire. We are proud to announce the team came away with two silver medals in the freestyle (missing out on 1st place by just 1.2 second) and mixed stroke races.

Here are part of the team celebrating their success.

Following the team races, there was chance for the children to compete in individual races. In their breaststroke, backstroke and freestyle heats, the children came away with four 1sts, two 2nds, one 3rd and one 4th place.

The children were a credit to the school – supporting each other and giving 100% in every single race to get some great results.

A huge well done to the whole team.

Science – How does the distance between the object and light source affect the shadow created?

Enquiry question: How does the distance between the object and light source affect the shadow created?

Scientific enquiry type (how we are being scientists): I can set up a fair test.

Predictions: What do you think? Have a go at home!

I predict the shadow will become ______ when we move the light source closer.

I predict the shadow will become ______ when we move the light source further away.

What will we need to answer our question?

• torches
• opaque object
• pencil
• ruler

What will we measure?

We will measure the width of the shadow.

What will we change?

The distance between the object and the light source.

What will we keep the same?

The distance between the object and wall.

Here’s our fair test. We drew around each shadow with a pencil and then measured the width with a ruler.

Our findings:

Conclusion: The larger the distance from the light source to the object, the smaller the shadow became

Summer 1: Week 1

Welcome back! We hope you all had a happy and healthy break.

This half-term our topic is called Life on Earth.  Over the next couple of weeks, we’ll be learning more about life cycles. We’ll closely observe caterpillars to help us understand the different stages of a life cycle.

Yesterday morning, a parcel arrived at school… It was 5 tiny caterpillars!
DT
On Wednesday morning, we used hand drills to make a bug hotel. We also used saws, hammers and screwdrivers. After that, the creative area has been really busy. They’ve really enjoyed making lots and lots of holes with the hand drills.

Phonics
This week, we’ve started Phase 4. In this phase children will use the phonemes learnt in Phase 2 and Phase 3 to read and spell words with four or more phonemes and words ending in suffixes:
–ing, –ed /t/, –ed /id/ /ed/, –est

Here are some examples:
CVCC words: tent, damp, toast
For example, in the word ‘damp’, d = consonant, a = vowel,  m = consonant,  p = consonant

CCVC words: swim, plum, spoon
For example, in the word ‘plum’, p = consonant, l = consonant, u = vowel, m = consonant

CCVCC words: stamp, crept, twist
For example, in the word ‘stamp’, s = consonant, t = consonant, a = vowel, m = consonant, p = consonant

CCCVC words: strap scrub strong
For example, in the word, ‘strap’, s = consonant, t = consonant, r = consonant, a = vowel, p = consonant

CCCVCC words: strand strict sprint
For example, in the word, ‘sprint’, s = consonant, p = consonant, r = consonant, i = vowel, n = consonant, t = consonant 

They’ll also learn to read and write 18 new tricky words.

Help at home: Practise reading and writing this week’s tricky words.
said    so    have    like

Poetry Picnic
This week’s poem was called Pitter Patter.

Some more fantastic learning…

Geography Topic – Explorers

This half-term,  in Year 2, we are being geographers. This week we have been learning the names of the seven continents and five oceans. The children have enjoyed learning two songs to help them remember. We have also enjoyed exploring google earth and looking at a globe.

Oceans song

Continents song 

How can you help?

Google Earth is a brilliant tool to help develop children’s understanding of space, place, scale and interdependence. Zoom right in on your home and then zoom out to reveal the area of Leeds that you live in. Zoom further out to see what city you live. Zoom further for the county. A little further and you might start to spot some national parks. Further still and you can see the country that we live in. Keep zooming and you’ll see the continent we live in (though this isn’t labelled).

Quizzing your children about some locational knowledge will help them to remember important information.

• Which continent do we live in?
• Which country do we live in?
• In which hemisphere is our country located?
• Which county do we live in?
• Which city do we live in?
• Which part of Leeds do we live in?
• Which four countries make up the United Kingdom?

We are Geographers

This half term our topic is Geography. We are learning all about the 7 continents and the 5 oceans. The children have been learning these songs to help them remember and they love them.

Continents song click here. Oceans song click here.

We will be going on to learn about hot and cold areas in the world and then focussing on Kenya. We will compare the physical and human geography ofNairobi and Kenya to Leeds and the UK. We will use all our knowledge and everything we have learnt to write a report at the end of the term.

Here is the vocabulary we will be learning.

Help at home by listening to the songs and talking through the vocabulary so your child knows what we will be learning. You can also talk about countries you may have visited and find them on a map.

Class novel – The Worst Witch

In Year 2, over the next few weeks, we will be reading The Worst Witch, by Jill Murphy. We will link reading and writing learning with it too, as well as enjoying immersing ourselves in the story. We already love Mildred and her cat!

Help at home by talking about what has happened so far.

Science: biology

This half term, we are starting our science learning as biologists. We return to learning about plants (including bulbs and seeds) and what they need to survive.

Here is the vocabulary we are learning.

First of all, we investigated different seeds and bulbs. We used hand lenses to observe them closely. We thought about how the seeds and bulbs were the same and different and used this to group them.

Help at home: have a look at foods at home. Are they grown from a seed or a bulb?