Apologies for the late posting.  Heavy week and busy Friday.

Your children have been researching and planning biographies this week.  They were actually given a choice – research and write up a biography of somebody, or write their autobiography.  We thought the latter might be popular, but then we complicated it by saying that they had to write from the perspective of their 50-year-old self, imagining the things they might have done in that time.  Well, not surprisingly they seemed to consider 50 utterly ancient, and really couldn’t visualise looking back from 2064!  So they’ve all gone for biographies, and spent a couple of mornings in pairs researching ‘famous’ people – ranging from Mandela and Churchill through to the ubiquitous Ms Swift, Danny Loader, and a couple of influencers (who may or may not actually exist!).  The work was purposeful though, and they turned it into biographical timelines with pictures, and will write it up more formally on Monday.

Maths has reached the end of percentages and decimals.  Any practical references to percentages you can make this week would be useful – either just asking what 10% or 20% of something is, or remarking on an offer (15% off) or discount, would be great.  It seems there are a whole range of new stats cropping up in sport these days – whether it is XG measures or WinViz, there are lots of examples of percentages and probabilities.  Perhaps it’s best not to get into horse racing or lottery winning just yet, although we heard some stories this week…!  Probability is actually not taught formally until Year Six.

We have had a really good STEM week.  There were three main components.  On Wednesday afternoon we spent time developing hypotheses on why the dinosaurs eventually died out, and then did some research to find out the various theories.  The children produced posters on paper or presentations on Powerpoint.  They do love a good PP!  On Thursday we learned about pendulums, using nuts and bolts and wool to explore what makes the weight swing slower or faster.  We also looked at the mechanism of a (traditional) clock, and the role the pendulum plays in keeping a clock in time.  Yesterday we were honoured to have Johnson Matthey scientists leading a session on dissolution – with the children researching the time taken for sugar and salt to dissolve in different temperatures of water.  Many thanks to Djamela and Emily for their time and expertise.

We have unfortunately heard some inappropriate language this week.  It is something we have already worked to educate the children on, and we will be doing some more targeted work next week.  We understand that some children will get curious as we cover certain topics, but we need also to help them be mature about what we are telling them.  Please do contact us if you have concerns.

Best wishes as usual for the weekend.

The Y5 Team