This term we are concentrating on fractions, decimals and percentages in our maths lesson!  Science is concentrating on materials and their properties; from this, we can decide which materials are more suitable for use in specific areas.  For example, which material would you insulate a wire with, which material would make a good handle for a frying pan and which material could you build a thermos flask out of…? 

Geography is focusing on the Caribbean island nation of St Lucia and comparing it and the UK in terms of climate, trade and population.  We will then move into examing what Fairtrade means and how it effects trade in this country.  In Religion and Worldviews (the new title for RE), we are looking at what a ‘humanist’ is and what they believe in – or not as the case may be. 

By far, the most hands-on lessons in Year 5 this term will be DT.  Here the children will be examing free-standing structures like towers, skyscrapers and bridges.  Can they understand how and why these structure stand upright and reconstruct that in a creation of their own…?  That’s why we requested all those finished kitchen/toilet tubes.

History has moved forward to the next dynasty in British history – the Stuarts.  Their era contained some of the most exciting and horrible events since the Norman conquest; namely the Great Fire of London, the Black Death and the English Civil War.

I’ll let Benny, explain about our English lessons…

Benny’s Blog:          

In English, we have been building up to writing our own tension / suspense story. We have been interpreting the descriptive language used in our class novel, ‘Black Powder’. We had to draw what we interpreted the characters to look like, and we used relative clauses and other descriptive language to describe the various characters and locations such as The Stranger and Cowdray House. 

Aside from our class novel, we have been describing our bedrooms in detail and reading our descriptions out  to the class. They were really good! Overall, even though we are only into the spring term by a few weeks, English is getting really exciting! Even though some lessons like Science and D.T. have more interactivity and practical activities, English is really engaging. Though other subjects are also favourites, English is also equally fun because of our variety of writing tasks and our thrilling novel.

And finally, just the perfect way to release all that spent up energy from Christmas – scream and shout and slap your thighs... it’s the haka!  That rather intimadating face-off ritual from Maori culture made famous by the New Zealand international rugby team.  In PE, the children will be examining the different moves and, in groups, devizing their own version – with a few extra superhero moves thrown in too for good measure.  Scary faces ready!