Hello, and welcome to another weekly Year 5 update. We’re already half way through the term! Two weeks to

This week, your children have been up to the following:

• In literacy, we have continued to read The Boy At The Back Of The Class. Next week, based on the book, we’ll be writing formal letters.
• In maths, we’ve either started looking at decimals, or we’ve learning about angles inside shapes.
• We’ve had a great time this week taking part in STEM week. We conducted an experiment to find out whether humans are like sharks (there is a connection between the length of a shark and its age – are we the same?), we tested our teamwork skills using a whiteboard marker and some clothes pegs, and scientists from Johnson Matthey visited to help us conduct an experiment about carbon capture.
• In PE, we have been improving our fitness through circuits, and then working on our basketball skills.

Spelling words

This week, we’ve been learning to spell words where ‘ei’ can make an /ee/ sound. They are: caffeine, conceive, deceive, either, neither, perceive, protein, ceiling, receive and seize.

Pencil case equipment

This is a gentle reminder that all children should be bringing in the equipment they need for lessons. Pencil cases should contain pencils, a rubber, a pencil sharpener, short ruler and a glue stick. Mr Burrows has given out between 20-30 pencils this term in his class alone!

Please also remember that we run a stationery shop at playtimes in the Year 6 classroom, where children can buy all these items for a small amount of money (glue sticks are the most expensieve, at £1).

Fidget toys

We understand that fidget toys can help with concentration in the classroom, but increasingly we are finding that they are not being used properly. We ask the following of you:

1. Please monitor what comes to school in terms of fidgets. Some children seem to have access to a huge range of toys, which act more of a distraction than anything else.
2. If you would like to make sure that your child has access to a fidget toy in the classroom, please negotiate this with your child’s class teacher.

PE

PE will be on Monday and Friday this week, and they will both be outdoors, so please make sure your children wrap up warm on both those days (though hopefully not too warm!).

We hope you have a lovely weekend, and we will see your children bright and early on Monday morning.

The Year 5 team