05 February 2016
For all children in Year 1 – Year 6, the homework this week is talk time and is due in on Wednesday 10 February.
I can prepare a speech (School Council elections).
or
I know the importance of voting.
It’s time for children to consider if they would like to stand for election for our new School Council. With two representatives from each class, chosen democratically by their peers, all children at Moortown Primary are encouraged to take an active part in pupil voice.
Elections for our new school council will take place next Thursday 11 February with our polling station and ballot boxes at the ready. Candidates will have the opportunity to give their election speech to their class on Wednesday 10 February.
What makes a good school councillor has been considered by our current school council.
- ‘Communicating with others – pupils and adults.’
- ‘Having good listening skills to know what to contribute in meetings.’
- ‘Thinking of realistic ideas to suggest in meetings.’
- ‘Considering other people’s views even if you don’t agree with them.’
Hints for your speech include:
- What skills and abilities would a good school councillor have?
- What are you particularly good at that would help you to be a great school councillor?
- What do you think would make the school better? What could you do that people would really like?
- Think of things that are realistic, maybe that you could do yourself, rather than having to ask other people to do?
Thank you to our current school councillors for all their ideas and contributions over the last year. We hope you have enjoyed this role and responsibility and you are welcome to stand again for election.
Good luck to all children who decide to stand in the elections.
If you choose not to stand in the election then you should consider the importance of voting.
How’s our Life topic going?
We’re all enjoying learning about ‘Life’. There’s been oceans of learning this week. We began by sorting animals according to criteria we chose ourselves:
- water, land and air
- colour
- deadly, not deadly
- vertebrate, invertebrate
We then had to try to sort them into which class they belonged to: mammal, reptile, amphibian, bird, fish, insect and plant. There were some animals we disagreed with and we had to learn more about these classes to be able to sort them correctly.
We’ve then focused on life in the ocean, looking at what different types of animals live there and finding out the similarities and differences in their life cycles.
05 February 2016
This week’s Practice Makes Perfect homework focusses on common spelling and punctuation errors.
To write spellings into a sentence.
Common mistakes from our English books are:
- incorrect use of their, there and they’re
- mixing where and wear
- incorrect use of the apostrophe for were and we’re
Along with this, we’d benefit from learning more about how to use its and it’s correctly and generally become more confident using apostrophes correctly.
The homework highlights these errors and provides a way of practising them.
This homework is due on Wednesday 10 February.
Measuring mass
This morning we’ve been measuring mass using rice, weights and balance scales.
Mindfulness in Reception
We’ve had a very mindful morning in Reception.
As part of our learning in SEAL (Social and Emotional Aspects of Learning), we’ve been considering different emotions and how to recognise these feelings in ourselves and others.
When thinking about the emotion of anger we thought about what someone would need to do if they felt angry.
One way to calm down and focus the mind is the starfish meditation and we all had a go.
Starfish Hand Meditation
This is a great way to divert and refocus the mind.
- Spread your fingers out like a starfish on one hand.
- Take your finger from the other hand and trace around your fingers and hand.
- As you do this, concentrate on only how it feels and let other thoughts float away.
- Continue until you feel relaxed and calm.
At the end of our PE lesson we had some focussed time and practised finger sticks. Finger sticks, another mindfulness technique, involves co-operation, trust, concentration and focus. There was some great partner work.
Meanwood Park orienteering
This week, linking with their learning about owls, Year 3 helped to create two of the owl markers for a new orienteering project at Meanwood Park.
Further details about the trail will follow once the rest of the owls, from other local schools, are ready and in place.
A moment of mindfulness
After a busy lunchtime, Year 2 had a moment of mindfulness to get focussed for the afternoon’s learning.
Starfish Hand Meditation
This is a great way to divert and refocus the mind.
- Spread your fingers out like a starfish on one hand.
- Take your finger from the other hand and trace around your fingers and hand.
- As you do this, concentrate on only how it feels and let other thoughts float away.
- Continue until you feel relaxed and calm.
Owl report
As part of our Life topic, we have written a report about owls as a class. We split into groups to write different paragraphs and this is what we came up with.
Owls
Owls are known for being wise like Winnie the Pooh’s friend Wise Owl. Interestingly, owls can’t actually turn their heads all the way around. Funnily enough, some schools have owls on their logo because they’re popular. Read this interesting report to find out amazing facts about owls.
Appearance
Interestingly, owls don’t have feet. They have sharp talons that grab their prey silently at night. They have brown, white and sometimes grey feathers which help them to camouflage. They have large, round eyes and pointed beaks.
Habitat
Interestingly, owls usually live near or in woods. They also live in the green wide countryside and nest in tall trees. This is because they need to stay away from large predators below. Shockingly, moist owls nest in long, green grass in the countryside so that they can hide from their prey.
Diet
Owls eat tiny insects, small birds, worms and mammals. Owls hunt at night because they are nocturnal. Owls eat their prey and regurgitate the indigestible parts. Owls eat smaller birds than themselves. Owls live in trees to try and find their prey.
BLAST!
Alright, Charlie is coming to Moortown Primary on Monday 08 February.
Alright, Charlie is a gender neutral, age-appropriate resource for young people which aims to raise the awareness of grooming and how to stay safe from unsafe adults for young people aged 8-11. The BLAST Project been developed in Leeds by a nationally recognised service working to prevent child sexual exploitation (CSE). It’s been funded by the Department for Education and will be available for all primary schools across the country from the end of March; however, schools in Leeds have been piloting the resource since September and so far it has received great feedback from parents, teachers and young people alike.
On the same theme, did you watch the horrific, but true, docudrama on BBC3 last week? Murder Games: The Life and Death of Breck Bednar tells the true story of Breck Bednar, a 14-year-old schoolboy who was lured to his death after being groomed online by Lewis Daynes while gaming. Whilst this seems a world away from primary school, Breck was only 14 years old. (Please note: it contains strong language and upsetting scenes.)
Check out our advice for staying safe on-line.
The last page of our age-related expectations contains age-appropriate skills your child should have in Year 5 and Year 6.
This week
Maths
This week in Maths, we’ve been looking at finding equivalent fractions. Equivalent fractions are two (or more) fractions that are the same size. We’ve compared fractions using fractions tables.
As you can see 2/4 are the same size as 1/2. Why not ask your child if the can spot any other equivalent fractions?
We’ve also started to look at using multiplication to find equivalent fractions. The golden rule for this is to always do to the numerator what you do to the denominator (ask your child to explain this).
English
In English, we’ve been looking at reports on animals. We spent this week practising writing a report on owls and next week we will be doing an assessed piece of writing based on the animals we saw at Animal Intuition. Animal Intuition was a workshop in school where we all go to handle a variety of animals we might not normally get to see.
Even Mrs Bald got a hold!
Life
During Science this week, we’ve been learning about different diets and food groups. We came up with our own actions to help us remember the name and purpose of the key food groups: carbohydrates, proteins, fruit and vegetables, fatty and sugary foods and dairy. Why not ask your child about their evening meals and what food groups they can see?