08 January 2016
For all children in Year 1 to Year 6, the homework this week is Talk Time and is due Wednesday 13 January.
Which two charities should we support at school and why?
It’s time for children to think about our next two school charities. In 2014 and 2015, we have supported St Gemma’s Hospice and Cancer Research UK raising a total of £4370.02. We’ve helped these charities for two years now, so it’s time for a change.
We need you to have a discussion at home about which charities would be best for us to support. Following a class discussion next week, each class will nominate two charities to be considered by the School Council, who will make the final decision.
Once your child has decided on two charities, make sure they have clear, powerful reasons to support their views.
You might want to discuss whether we support…
- a local charity
- a national charity
- an international charity
- a children’s charity
- an animal charity
- a charity which helps a vulnerable group in our community
- a charity that has helped our learning, like Heart Research UK, NSPCC, RNLI
Our new school charities will be announced on Friday 15 January.
Science: Wow!
On Wednesday, Y5 enjoyed a morning jam-packed working scientifically. We saw some awesome reactions that made us gasp as well as taking on some observing, measuring and recording of our own mini experiments.
Here is some of our favourite ‘Wow’ science. Don’t worry… no Y5s were harmed during filming.
What happens when you heat custard powder?
What happens when you set hydrogen on fire?
School charities
Moortown Primary is a happy, healthy and caring place to be.
That’s why we support two charities for two years. In 2014 and 2015, we supported Cancer Research UK and St Gemma’s Hospice.
In 2014 and 2015, we raised £2,205.36 for Cancer Research UK and £2,164.66 for St Gemma’s Hospice. (The amounts are slightly different because of the different fund-raising events over the two years – some are specifically for just one of the two charities.)
Thank you for your support.
Two new charities will be chosen by pupils this month. There will be a Talk Time homework – your child will discuss ideas at home. Following this, each class will discuss ideas so make sure your child can talk about their preferred charities with reasons why they think Moortown Primary should support them. At the end of the discussion, two charities from each class will be nominated. The School Council will then consider the charities from this shortlist and finally agree on the two charities we will support in 2016 and 2017.
Spectacular Science!
Today, we were fortunate enough to visit the science department of Allerton Grange High School.
We completed six experiments using their specialist equipment in the labs; we mixed acid with magnesium and even made our own sparklers!
We also saw some awe-inspiring demonstrations of different chemical reactions. In one of them, Zach had his hands set on fire!
Most importantly, all the children returned to school enthused about science and hungry to learn more. This is great because our current topic ‘What’s The Matter?‘ and our next topic ‘Life‘ are driven by this subject.
This week, by Arran and Bailey
Arran and Bailey spent some time reflecting on some of our learning this week.
Topic
In Year 6, we have started a new mini topic called ‘What’s The Matter’. This topic involves Chemistry. In our first lesson, we learnt about ‘filtration’ and how to separate mixtures and solutions.
Here is some technical vocabulary that we have learnt:
- ‘Mixture’: A mixture is a combination of a solid and a liquid which won’t dissolve.
- ‘Solute’: A solute is solid that dissolves in a solvent.
- ‘Solvent’: A solvent is the liquid used to dissolve a solute.
- ‘Solution’: A solution is the combination of a solid and a liquid that have dissolved.
English
In English we have received a mystery letter from Alexander Wolf. The first few lines of the letter read: ‘Everybody knows the story of The Three Little Pigs. Or at least they think they do. But I’ll let you in on a little secret. Nobody knows the real story because nobody has heard my side of the story.’
Based on this letter we are writing a news report.
What’s the matter?
Our mini topic for the first two weeks is What’s the matter? In this Science-driven mini topic we will be looking at rocks, soil and fossils. Today, we’ve been investigating the properties of rocks. We conducted an experiment to see which rocks were permeable and which rocks were impermeable.
We used pipettes to add three drops of water onto a flat surface of a rock. We then observed what happened to the water. We were looking to see if it would soak into the rocks or just sit there. Why don’t you ask your child about the difference between permeable and impermeable rocks and how this experiment helped us to discover if rocks were permeable or not?
You could also explore whether other materials are permeable or impermeable – materials like raincoats, for example!
Welcome back!
2016 has hit the ground running in Y5. We welcomed each other back on Monday with a great circle time…
We’re working really hard on new English targets and are tackling measuring capacity in Maths.
Our new mini topic ‘What’s the Matter?’ started with lots of questions and hands on discovery as we explored which materials would conduct electricity.
Maths
Happy new year! It’s nice to see all the children happy to be back at school!
This week, we have begun adding numbers up to 20. We have looked at the method of ‘bridging 10’. The following is taken from a parent guide to addition from Oxford Owl. It is available online here: https://primarysite-prod-sorted.s3.amazonaws.com/abbots-hall/UploadedDocument/06bb6ca9993b4b29bf6b805cbb2b9ea4/OxfordPressParentSupportAdditionlines.pdf
Instant recall of number bonds to 10 is essential to make the group of 10 with ease. Please practise these number bonds with your child to secure this understanding. It can be as simple as saying ‘7’ and your child quickly replying with ‘3’. A good time to do this could be during car journeys or when walking to school together. Frequent practice will embed these number facts.
Thank you for your ongoing support.
Fruit kebabs
Year 3 have been practising their peeling and chopping skills today when preparing a variety of fruits to make their own fruit kebabs. We considered other aspects of selecting fruits such as seasonal availability, allergies and individual preference. Children were keen to try new fruits, both fresh and dried.
At a time of year when many people make healthy eating goals, we all agreed this was a great way to get one of your 5-a-day.
Mystery letter causes outrage in Year 6 English lesson
Happy New Year!
Yesterday, we read the classic fairy tale: ‘The Three Little Pigs’. Then, in the middle of our lesson, we received a letter from Mr A.Wolf. The letter explained how the wolf has been made out to be a villain when really the whole story was a misunderstanding involving a bad sneeze and a cup of sugar; some of us were more understanding of the wolf’s plight than others. We combined all of this to create our own version of the plot in which the wolf is not the villain.
There were some interesting ideas. Rav’s alternative plot included misheard song lyrics, heavy whistling and a tranquilizer dart, while Jaskirat’s alternative plot centres around the wolf having a bad couch and asking his neighbours for medicine.
Despite being aimed at younger children, we have used ‘The Three Little Pigs’ as a stimulus for some very creative and mature learning. The focus of our learning will be on news reports so we’ll be producing our own news reports based on our alternative plots.
You can help at home by encouraging your child to read the news (online or in the paper) and pick out how the writing might differ to what you would find in a narrative. Also, ask them about the plot they have devised in class and how it differs to the original story line. 