Our Year 5 Class       

A very warm welcome to our Year 5 class page. In Year 5  we look forward to the challenges and responsibilities of being in the upper juniors. During the year the children continue to develop their independent learning, research and team work skills. 

Our Year 5 Class 2024-2025

Class Information

Who's who?

Mrs Monaghan - Year 5 Class Teacher

Mrs Bent - HLTA 

Miss German - Teaching Assistant

 Things to remember:

• Please remember that homework is due in by WEDNESDAY each week.
• PE lessons for Spring 2 will be on a Tuesday (indoor) and Friday (outdoor). Please remember to write your child's name on all of their uniform and sports kits to avoid confusion.
• Reading is encouraged both in school but also at home. Reading for enjoyment is as important as reading to learn. It is important that the children read a range of books/comics/newspapers at home and develop their comprehension skills and vocabulary. This will help consolidate the reading work we will be doing in class. In Year 5, we feel it is important for the children to develop a love of reading as this gives their 'imagination wings'.
• We will be following the RWI spelling scheme this year and supplementing this with Spelling Shed. The children will be encouraged to use this at home as well as in school. The children will also be bringing home a list of the key words that they are currently working on. Please practise these at home(little and often).
• It is important that the children still continue to practise their times tables regularly at home. TTRockstars is a fantastic tool for this as well as 'Hit the Button'.

This half term.... Spring Term 2 (February - April 2025)

English 

In English this half term we will be looking at two different genres of writing and purposes for writing. We will start by looking at biographies (writing to inform). We will create a scaffolded biography on David Attenborough. This will link nicely with our rainforest work last half term. We will be using the 'Little People, Big dreams books for inspiration. The children will then create their own biography based on an inspirational figure form either the past or the present. 

After this we will focus on diary entries (writing to entertain/inform) We will look carefully at the style of diary entries and the structure. The children will then create their own diary entries based on a famous historical figure from Ancient Egypt or an archeologist who discovered treasures from Ancient Egypt. This will link nicely with our History work on the Egyptians.

We will use the Writing Rainbow to help support our writing again this half term and continue to develop our stamina and overall presentation. We will continue to challenge ourselves with our vocabulary choices, use a range of punctuation and vary our sentence structure. It is crucial that the children continue to proof-read their work carefully and check carefully for the basics and that their sentences make sense.

We will continue with our class reader 'The Explorer' by Katherine Rundell.

'Fred, Con, Lila and little Max's plane is on the way to Manaus when it falls put of the sky. Now, lost in the Amazon rainforest, they must figure out the basics of survival: water, shelter, food. Do they wait for rescue, or find a way to rescue themselves?

Throughout the term we will develop our comprehension skills and think carefully about our reading VIPERS (vocabulary, infer, predict, explain, retrieve, sequence or summarise) It is important that the children read a range of books/comics/newspapers at home and develop their comprehension skills and vocabulary. This will help consolidate the reading work we will be doing in class. In Year 5, we feel it is important for the children to develop a love of reading as this gives their 'imagination wings'.

In our spelling lessons we will focus on our key words. 

In Spring 1 the children were struggling with the spelling of silent letters and homophones so we are going to do some consolidation work around these this half term. 

The children will be re-tested on their 'challenge words' the week before we break up for Easter. Please continue to practise these regularly at home.

We will be doing lots of sticky learning around our grammar consolidating our understanding of: 

• adverbials and pronouns
• relative clauses

We will also have a different grammar focus each week. For this half term these will be:

• semi colons
• present perfect tense

    
Maths     

This half term we will be focusing on multiplication and division. It is crucial that the children continue to practise their times tables regularly as this benefits them greatly in their maths lessons.

Multiplication/Division:

• multiplying a 4-digit number by 1-digit number
• multiplying 2-digit numbers
• multiplying 3-digit numbers by 2-digit numbers
• multiplying 4-digit numbers by 2-digit numbers
• dividing 4-digit numbers by 1-digit numbers
• dividing with remainders
• efficient division
• solve problems with multiplication and division
• multiply unit fractions by integer
• multiply non unit fractions by an integer
• multiply mixed numbers by integers

It is crucial that the children continue to practise their fraction work at home. we will also be doing this in our sticky learning morning activities.     

All of these activities will give the children the opportunity to develop their reasoning and problem solving skills. We will also continue with our daily reasoning questions with our partner and counting activities. These help the children to develop their mathematical thinking.

At home, it would fantastic if you could keep some of the children's previously learning 'bubbling':

• times tables
• written methods for addition and subtraction
• converting improper fractions to mixed numbers and visa versa
• adding and subtracting fractions greater than 1 with different denominators.

Science

Our topic for this half term is 'Materials'. During this topic the children will improve their knowledge and understanding and continue to develop their working scientifically skills. they will:

• compare and group together everyday materials on the basis of properties.
• give reasons based on evidence and from comparative and fair tests. 
• finding suitable material alternatives.
• finding good thermal insulators. 

Computing

Our topic for this half term is 'Creating Media - Stop motion Animation'

The children will have a fantastic opportunity to create their own stop motion animation based on the Easter story. They will develop this over the next 5 weeks.

1) Animation explored.

2) Exploring stop motion.

3) Planning their stop motion project.

4) Creating their stop motion.

5) Editing their stop motion project.

HEARTSMART - 

Heartsmart/PATHS- 

Visit the website www.heartsmartprimary.com for more information on what Heartsmart is all about.

'Don't rub it in, rub it out!'

This unit focuses on Forgiveness and learning how to process negative emotions, disappointment and hurt.

Don't rub it in, rub it out is about choosing to forgive, leaving the pointing finger in our pocket and accepting that we too need grace just as much as we give it away. Everyone makes mistakes. Don't demand perfection, instead, celebrate progress, that's what loves does.

We will also continue with our PATHS lessons this half term. These lessons support the children in developing their social emotional skills.

Music

Mel, from Wigan Music Service will come into Year 5 on a Thursday afternoon to teach the children music. This half term the children will be focusing on  Ukulele. The children will be able to:

• naturally hold a ukulele correctly
• play open strings (without looking)
• play accurately and in time with others.
• move accurately between chords and in time with the music.

History

Our topic for this half term is 'Ancient Egyptians' During this topic the children will answer a range of key questions:

• What can we quickly find out to add to what we already know about Ancient Egypt?
• How can we discover what Ancient Egypt was like over 5000 years ago? 
• What sources of evidence have survived and how were they discovered?
• What does the evidence tell us about the everyday life for men, women and children.
• What do Ancient Egyptians believe about life after death and how do we know?
• What did Ancient Egypt have in common with other civilisations from the time?

The children will create a homework project on the Ancient Egyptians to share with parents/carers at the end of the half term.

French 

Mrs Bent will be teaching the children French again this half term. The topic for this half term is 'French Speaking World.' The children will be learning to:

• recognise, read and respond to directional language.
• understand that French is spoken in many different countries across the world, and to read and give directions.
• identify features of countries in the French-speaking world. 
• use authentic materials to investigate climate data in the French-speaking world.
• ask and answer questions about the different countries in the French-speaking world. 

D.T

Our topic this half term is 'Mechanical Systems - Making a Pop-Up Book.' During this topic the children will be:

• Designing a pop-up book
• Following their design brief to make a pop up book
• Using layers and spacers
• Writing and illustrating
• Creating a high quality product suitable for a target user. 

R.E

Our key question this half term is 'Creation and science; conflicting or complementary?' During this topic the children will think about and explore a  range of questions leading up to the big question.

• What can we find out about the creation story in Genesis 1?
• What might many Christians see as important in Genesis 1?
• What relationships do scientists have with religious world views?
• How and why do some Christians see both science and religion as important?
• What are some different Christian views about the relationship between science and religion? 

PE

Our indoor P.E is on a Tuesday afternoon. This half-term our unit is 'Gymnastics'. During this unit the children will be focusing on a range of key skills:

• Physical: symmetrical and asymmetrical balances, rotation jumps, straight roll, forward roll, straddle roll, backward roll, cartwheel, bridge and shoulder stand.
• Social: work safely, support others, collaboration
• Emotional: confidence, perseverance, resilience, determination
• Thinking: observe and provide feedback, creativity, reflection, select and apply actions, evaluate and improve sequences.

 Our outdoor P.E is on a Friday morning. This half-term our unit is Basketball. During this unit the children will be focusing on a range of key skills:

• Physical: run, jump, throw, catch, dribble, shoot.
• Social: collaboration, communication, co-operation, respect.
• Emotional: honesty, confidence, perseverance, fair play
• Thinking: select and apply skills, make decisions, observation, tactics, feedback.

Our sporting value for this half term is Respect

Spring Term 1 NEWS! 

  
It has been a busy half term again in Year 5. The children have once again worked their socks off and I am proud of every single one of them!

In English their writing has gone from strength to strength. I have loved reading their adventure stories based on our class reader 'The Explorer' and their thought provoking kindness poems. It has also been wonderful to experience reading 'The Boy at the Back of the Class'  alongside the children - we are all intrigued to find out what is going to happen to Ahmet in the end.

The children have once again shown resilience with their maths work. They have worked hard on mastering fractions. We will continue to keep this going in Spring 2. In Science they have enjoyed learning about life cycles and watching their bean plant grow. They have been developing their skills when recording data either in a line or bar graph. Skills that we are going to continue to develop this and next term. 

Mrs Bent has been impressed with the children's developing knowledge in French and the maturity shown in R.E. The children amazed me with their fantastic portraits in Art and have excelled in our hockey lessons in P.E. The children have especially enjoyed our rainforest topic in Geography. They can now confidently locate the rainforests of the world, describe the layers of a rainforest and talk about the key features and the importance of the rainforest.

I am looking forward to Spring 2 and all of the exciting things we will be doing. The children are continuing to mature and grow as both learners and individuals. It is lovely to see!

Autumn Term 2 NEWS! 

Wow! Another busy half term in Year 5. The children have once again worked their socks off, showed their resilience, grown in confidence and had lots of fun. 

The children have worked hard in English and are really improving both their vocabulary choices and sentence types. We are also getting better at checking the basics and making sure that our work is well presented. It is crucial that they continue to do this. They created some wonderful non-chronological reports on a variety of unusual creatures and wrote some great thought. 

They worked hard their Maths lessons, especially when we moved onto Fractions. They have pleased me with their continued progress on their times tables and their willingness to practise at home. They are continuing to develop their reasoning skills and use prior mathematical knowledge to help them to problem solve. 

They all worked hard during our forces unit in Science and enjoyed working scientifically when investigating, friction, air and water resistance. It was great to see them build on the Mars Rover work they did in Autumn 1 again this half- term with our second computing unit on the Mars Rover. Their pixels work was fantastic along with their 3D CAD designs of their own rover.

It has been lovely again to see the maturity and sensitivity the children continue to show during our RE, Heartsmart and wellbeing lessons. They are always willing to listen to others, encourage and share their own thoughts. The children gain a great deal from these lessons and it is heart-warming to see it put into action!

The children continued to develop their French language skills and enjoyed the topic greatly as it linked back to their space work in Autumn 1.  In Music they showcased their growing music skills with Mel. P.E was lots of fun this half-term and gave us a great opportunity to show our resilience and team work skills during our dodgeball and in our OAA lessons.

As you can see we haven't stopped in Year 5 this half-term and the children have shone brightly both in their learning and attitude. The term finished with a super Christmas party and our beautiful KS2 Christmas Carol service in church. It was lovely to have a packed church and for the children to perform and talk about the meaning of HOPE at Christmas.  A lovely end to a lovely half-term.

Autumn Term 1 NEWS! 

Wow! It has been a very busy first half term in Year 5. It has been lovely to get to know the children better. The highlights for me this half term are our Science work on Earth and Space and to see the children working really hard on their presentation and handwriting. I absolutely loved seeing their amazing Space projects. They had worked so hard on them and I proudly watched them share them with you all!

The children have started to grow in confidence and show their maturity and 'kind hearts' through our R.E discussions, Heartsmart and PATHs lessons, Picture News and  puberty lessons with HHKids. They are always willing to share their thoughts and feelings and are very respectful of each others opinions and views.  They have developed their historical thinking during our topic on the Mayans and thought carefully about how we know so much about a civilisation that were around over 1000 years ago. They have tackled the challenging job of reading binary code in Computing with resilience and patience and have enjoyed finding out more about the Mars Rovers. The children's spoken French has continued to improve along with their sewing skills in D.T. They have enjoyed learning to play the clave sticks in Music.

The children worked hard during our Place Value units in Maths and have shown a good understanding, especially when faced with larger numbers. Their reasoning and problem solving skills continue to develop. I am also pleased with their continued practise on their times tables. In English we have focused on narrative writing this half term with the purpose of entertaining. The children produced some excellent short stories and are really challenging themselves with their vocabulary and sentence choices. In P.E they continued to develop their dance and tennis skills. The thing that pleased me most during these lessons was the children's perseverance, encouragement of each other and their growing ability to self assess their skills. It was great to see them put their tennis skills to practise at Pennington Park. Their behaviour outside of school was exemplary.

As you can see it has been a busy start to Year 5 and as we head into another busy half term I know that the children will continue to make me proud as they grown in confidence, resilience, work together as a team and challenge themselves.