Year Groups

On Tuesday 23^rd April, Dr Mandy Hartley from The Little Story Telling Company came to visit year 1 to deliver an exciting workshop about rockets and planets. She started by showing the children a size comparison of all the planets and stars in our galaxy. The children were amazed to learn it would take 1100 years to travel once round the biggest star in the galaxy!

Next, the children split into planet teams to complete a series of tasks. They made a playdough planet to the size of the picture given to them by Dr Hartley, found how many moons each planet had and identified the time it took to orbit the sun. Some teams even had time to learn how many hours were in the day on their planet. Did you know? Jupiter has 67 moons!

We learnt new facts about the planets including the heat of each planet, if they are gas planets and if we can see planets from Earth! Have a look and see if you can spot Jupiter this evening!

We played Top Trumps with the planet facts, which linked beautifully to our English lessons last week where the children created their own Top Trumps about the planets in our solar system.

The children shared some facts they knew about the different planets:

“Mars is red” Stephen

“It is 365 days or 1 year to go round the sun on Earth” Rafe

The children used reasoning skills to work out which planets would be the quickest or slowest to orbit the sun.

“The smallest planet has less weight so will be the quickest to orbit the sun” Auralia.

“Neptune will take the longest as it is the furthest away” Renelle.

We finished the workshop with some rocket experiments outside. We used water and alka-seltzer tablets in a film canister to create a mini rocket launch. Dr Hartley explained that the rockets were using the force of thrust to go through the air.

“I enjoyed when the rockets went flying up in the sky” Harrison.

English

Despite a shorter half-term, Year 3 have fit in so much learning! First, we learned about Recounts. This tasked the children with accurately identifying the features of a recount, leading them to plan and write their very own recounts. While most children wrote a recount of our Autumn 1 visit to Norwich Cathedral, covering their activities such as making their own stained glass windows and eating lunch in the cloisters, several others who joined us later in the year wrote a recount of an exciting cooking session they had! Following this unit, Year 3 moved onto biographies, linking to our Science topic of Mary Anning by writing a biography of who Mary Anning was and what she achieved. We have finished the half-term by writing a poem on World Poetry Day!

Maths

Year 3 began the term by learning about the formal methods for multiplication, trying hard to place one number in each box to help ensure our calculations were accurate. Following this, we learnt how to divide using place value counters; this involved exchanging tens for ones to make sure we could divide the numbers equally. Our main topic for Spring 2 was fractions. We learnt lots of new vocabulary connected to the topic; our daily retrieval meant the children could practice giving definitions for these words. Our lessons included comparing fractions, finding fractions on a scale and number line, adding and subtracting fractions and finally to find fractions of amounts.

Guided Reading

This half-term, we began with our two-week unit around the non-fiction text ‘A Rock is Lively’. The children enjoyed utilising their passion for gemstones and different types of rocks to answer many retrieval and inference questions, as well as improving their understanding with a vast variety of information from this text! Following this, linked to our Science Week activities with a focus on ‘time’, Year 3 then read a very similar text called ‘A Seed is Sleepy’. Written by the same author, the children had many opportunities to improve their understanding of seeds and their growth processes, standing them in good stead as they move through the school. Finally, we have just started our new fiction book ‘The Water Horse’, which we will continue after half-term.

Additionally, to find out how Year 3 celebrated a love of reading on World Book Day earlier this month, please click onto ‘special events’ or our very own Year 3 tab, in order to see some of the children’s marvellous double-page spreads.

Art & DT

In Art, we have been looking at our focus artist Georgia O’ Keeffe, a 20^th century artist who experimented with bold colours and different techniques when creating her beautiful pieces. In particular, we have carefully studied O’ Keeffe’s close-up paintings of flowers. The children have worked hard to emulate O’ Keeffe’s techniques by first creating a viewfinder which they used to pick a section of their flower to sketch, and then sketching two of these into their books. After evaluating which one they liked best and why, the children then sketched the outline of their flower at a larger scale, ready to be completed using our chosen medium of oil pastels. Once they had explored a number of techniques, such as sgraffito and dry blending, Year 3 then meticulously filled in their sketch using oil pastels to replicate the shades and tints of their flowers. As part of DT, the children finished the half-term by stitching their very own bookmarks! First, they sketched a design of what they would like to see on their bookmark; then, they practised the three different techniques of the running stitch, overcast stitch, and backstitch onto pieces of paper. Finally, the children threaded their needles and began sewing their design onto strips of Binca. Whilst this was a tricky task, the children worked hard and produced many beautiful bookmarks!

RE

In RE, Year 3 have been learning about Islam and what Muslims believe about God. This has been a very interesting and detailed unit in which the children have discussed who the Islamic god Allah is, how Muslims show their dedication and belief to Him, and why prayer is an important part of their religion (see the pictures of the children trying out the Islamic position for praying). It has been excellent to see the children enquiring about the similarities and differences between Islam and religions they have previously learned about, such as Christianity and Hinduism. Please find details of our previous March visit from Janet Marshall, in which she discussed many aspects of Islam and developed the children’s interest in exploring a new faith, under our Year 3 tab.

Computing 

In Computing, Year 3 have continued to consolidate their prior knowledge of Scratch and how it is used, and further developing this. This has involved adding more than one character to their game and including a variety of motions, operated by a number of keys on the laptop rather than by just a click as practised in Spring 1, in order to have more than one character at once. The children have greatly enjoyed their learning in Scratch, and have learned a range of skills which will benefit them as they move into their next year group.

Music

Children have continued to have great fun learning the ukulele! They have learned a variety of picking patterns and are beginning to create rhythm in their strumming with up and down strokes. Pupils are practising songs using the C chord and now introducing Am.

MFL

Year 3 started the term learning about Spanish colours, this led to asking our learning partners if they liked certain colours and being able to reply with yes or no. The children had great fun designing their own Little Miss or Mr Men characters, which were named using Spanish names and of course colours! Our second topic was about equipment found in the classroom. We played Bingo! to practice this new vocabulary and using our retrieval skills the children decorated pictures of equipment using their knowledge of colour vocabulary.

Science

This half-term, Year 3 have been enjoying their exciting topic on Mary Anning! As we are sure the children will tell you, Mary Anning was an underappreciated fossil hunter of her time, and made many significant discoveries which helped scientists and researchers to develop our knowledge to be as extensive as it is today. Our lessons have included producing a timeline of Mary Anning’s life and taking part in a fossil excavation with our visitor. We have also explored Mary Anning further, in links to our Science topic, with our biography in English, before finishing the half-term by producing some beautiful double-page spreads about Mary Anning and her accomplishments. Please find details of our previous March visit from Janet Marshall, for which she portrayed Mary and explored her history and her achievements with the children, under our Year 3 tab. Additionally, our dinosaur-centred activities during Science Week and Year 3’s wonderful contributions to the science fair can also be found under our Year 3 tab.

PE 

In PE this half-term, we have been practising our sending and receiving skills. The children have enjoyed lessons where each week they have developed their balancing skills individually and in pairs, which has not been easy when they have also be incorporating equipment into this! Additionally, Year 3 and 4 have been very fortunate to have some excellent sixth-form students from DESA visiting as part of a 10-week placement; this has involved teaching the children many skills and engaging in a variety of activities with a focus on co-ordination, teamwork and communication. This will continue into the summer term, which the children are very keen to explore further!

Geography

For our Geography unit this half-term, Year 3 have been studying land use. First, we explored what urban and rural areas are across the UK, and what defining characteristics these areas had; the children were then able to create a mind map of how land is used across the country, and what the features of urban and rural areas are. In our next lesson, the children developed their understanding of which areas in England are most suitable for growing wheat, and breeding pigs and sheep. Finally, the children really enjoyed creating a sketch map of Toftwood as the concluding lesson of our unit, focusing on their knowledge of the local area and how to present this on a map using OS symbols.

In English this half term, we have been focusing on the topic of Myths and Legends. We have compared the two and found that legends are more based in truth and myths have more magical and mystical elements to them! Throughout the half term, we have been developing our story writing techniques and have been particularly focusing on creating settings for our very own myths. The children enjoyed using similes and effective adjectives to describe their own imagined lands! We have also been looking at using speech to add interest and move the story forward. The children have loved this topic as they can really let their imagination run wild!

In guided reading lessons, we have been reading Beowulf, which is an Anglo Saxon mythical story. The text contains some archaic language which can be tricky to understand but the children have enjoyed trying to decipher what it means and have even been inspired to use it in their own writing! The story of Beowulf is quite different to anything else we have read in Year 4! A lot of the children have enjoyed the change of pace and have been so engaged with the story and predicting what might happen next.

This term in Year 4, we have been learning about multiplication and division, length and perimeter, shape and fractions. The children have been building on their prior knowledge by implementing what they already know about fractions and applying it into their Year 4 work. The children were able to extend their mathematical vocabulary by explaining what improper, mixed and proper fractions are. We have looked at how to add and subtract fractions using the same denominator. Also, the children were able to use a fraction wall and a number line to find equivalent fractions. This can be very difficult but the children showed amazing determination and resilience.

The children particularly enjoyed learning about lines of symmetry in our shapes topic. They used a mirror to work out if a shape had a line of symmetry or not. As an extension activity, we challenged the children to find shapes around the classroom that had any lines of symmetry.  

This term in Year 4, the children have been learning about what a sacrifice is. This children have learnt about a variety of sacrifices such as giving up time and money in order to help someone else. All children were able to identify what different sacrifices have in common which helped them to answer our big question. The children particularly enjoyed their role play activity where they decided how they would sacrifice their money to give it to organisations that need it most. All children were able to explain why they thought their organisation needed the money and how they would spend it to help others.

Year 4 have had a fabulous time cooking fish cakes; learning the D&T cooking skills of peeling and coating. We started by peeling and cutting potatoes into chunks, before boiling them and mashing them. We added this to tuna and grated lemon peel, finally flavouring it with parsley. We then scooped a handful of this mixture to press into a fish cake. We then practiced the skill of coating these fish cakes in breadcrumbs to learn to how to create a coating. The fish cakes went in to the oven for 20 minutes and we were able to take them home to taste them. They were delicious!

This term in year 4 we have been learning how to edit pictures. The children have been writing Myth and Legend stories in English and have designed front covers for their stories by using their newly learnt picture editing skills. They have really enjoyed learning how to layer pictured on top of each other and learning how to use filters to change the mood of their picture.

In our English lessons, we have covered a range of topics including explanation texts and nonsense poems. The children seemed to particularly enjoy our topic of nonsense poems where they created their own poem in the style of The Michael Rosen Rap and then had the opportunity to perform their creation to the rest of the class! They were also excited to research their favourite animals in order to write their own explanation text! They loved explaining where their chosen animal lived and what they eat. They were able to include a lot of the grammatical features that we have learnt about, including fronted adverbials, cause and effect conjunctions, expanded noun phrases and separated all of their writing into paragraphs with headings!

During our whole class reading lessons, we have been reading and discussing The Butterfly Lion by Michael Morpurgo. The children loved the story and we have had some wonderful discussions about how the main character, Bertie, might have been feeling at certain points in his life. We were all very surprised by the ending and had lots of ideas about it! Once we had finished the book, the children all created a book review explaining what the book was about (without revealing any spoilers) and what their favourite part was.

In Maths, the children began the new year by finishing off our multiplication and division topic. We looked at multiplying and dividing 3 digit numbers by 1 digit. We also developed our ability to find factor pairs of certain numbers. This is a very valuable skill in maths and will continue to help us with all of our maths topics. We then moved on to looking at length and perimeter and found that the children could recall a lot from their learning in Year 3 – which is fantastic!

During our Geography lessons, we discovered some budding geography experts in Year 4! Our focus was all about mountains and mountain ranges in Europe. The children enjoyed finding out about all the different types of mountains and how they were formed. They also loved using Google Maps to explore different locations and then mark them on their own maps.

In Art, the children learned about Islamic patterns. The children researched different elements of Islamic art such as calligraphy, geometric patterns, vegetal (relating to plants) and repetition of patterns. They particularly enjoyed discovering that most Islamic art will have a small deliberate mistake to show that nobody is perfect! After creating their final design, the children then made a printing tile out of string, card and other found items and used it to print a repeating pattern into their books. We have all enjoyed this topic as we have been able to use a range of different mediums such as pencil, string, cardboard and paint! The final task involved evaluating their work by recognising what worked well, what could be improved next time and what they had learned throughout the project.

In Science, the children have loved learning all about electricity and creating simple circuits out of bulbs, wires and cells. We even tested which switch works best in order to switch our light bulb on the quickest! The children are looking forward to applying their new found skills to creating electric boar d games next half term!

On Thursday, Reverent Laura delivered a workshop to each Year 5 class to support our enquiry question of ‘What does the Resurrection mean to Christians?’ The children started off by looking at a photograph of Jesus’ tomb, whereby the children discussed the photo, which depicts the Resurrection. The children commented how bright the picture was.

Reverent Laura asked the children why Good Friday had that name – the children thought it was because it was the end of the week! She explained that the day got its name because Christians believe that God loves us and is willing to die for us. The children discussed the meaning of names and Reverent Laura informed us that Jesus’ name means he saves. The children were very curious as to what their name meant and used the tablets to find the answer!

The last part of the workshop involved discussing the 5 meanings of Easter Eggs. The children were really fascinated that Easter Eggs are hollow, which illustrates the tomb being empty! Overall, the children discovered that the Resurrection is so important to Christians because it demonstrates a new life, a promise and a gift.

Year 5 have had a busy spring term! In English, we have focused on stories from other cultures (Cloud Tea Monkeys). This story is all about a young Indian girl (Tashi), who works on a tea plantation with her mother and aunt. Unfortunately, Tashi’s mum gets sick and Tashi has to work longer shifts to earn money to pay for a doctor so her mother can get better, however she is faced with the awful overseer, who kicks her basket of tea leaves over and laughs in her face. The children have learnt how to use reported and direct speech and have used this to produce a newspaper report.

In Maths, Year 5 studied geometry, perimeter and area and statistics. The children have confidently identified different angles (acute, obtuse, right angle and reflex), have measured angles accurately using a protractor, have explored the area of compound and rectilinear shapes and have inputted data onto a line graph. The children have made outstanding progress with these skills and we are very proud of their perseverance!

In DT, we have planned and cooked a vegetarian curry this term. The children evaluated this and commented that if they were to do it again, they would add meat. In addition to this, we have also had a debate about whether we should eat less meat! The children were all very passionate about their response!

In RE, we are answering the big enquiry question “what difference does the resurrection make to Christians?” The children have explored what the resurrection is, what Christians celebrate on Good Friday and Easter Sunday and have made comparisons across the different gospels.

In PE, Year 5 had a cricket coach deliver weekly lessons to each class. The coach has taught the children about accurate bowling, catching, fielding and batting. The children thoroughly enjoyed developing each skill and commented that they loved playing a whole class game. The classes worked hard on their team work skills. Well done!

On Friday 1^st March, Year 3 were lucky enough to have Janet Marshall visit! Janet, a frequent visitor to Toftwood through the ‘Journeys for Learning’ organisation, came to talk to the children in preparation for our latest RE unit about Islam.

Each class had a session to uncover what Islam is and what Muslims believe in. Their learning included many discussions of who Allah is, what values are most important to Muslims such as wanting to love and care for everyone, and what the Quran is.

The children were encouraged to make links between Islam and other religions they have learned about, including Christianity and Hinduism. The children greatly enjoyed exploring a new faith and seeing the clothes Muslims wear, the rituals they follow when praying, and what the festival of Eid is. We were very impressed with the children’s excellent listening skills and how well they participated in the discussions with Janet. Well done, Year 3!