Canaries Newsletter
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Spring Term 1
Welcome back to Spring Term 1. We hope that you have all had a wonderful Christmas break. Mrs Gosling and I are excited to welcome the children back to term 2 of the school year. Over the next 6 weeks we will be learning:
Literacy - We will be focusing on a poem called The Highwayman by Alfred Noyes. Lessons concentrate on the teaching of writing with a sharp focus on the craft and construction of sentences. Each sentence stacking lesson is organised into three learning chunks following The Write Stuff Fantastics, Boombastics and Grammaristic rainbow. We will be constructing our poem using jigsaw pieces that give a clear sense of all the parts of the writing that constitute the complete poem. Later in the unit, the children will write their own poem, based on Highway Rat by Julia Donaldson, including their own repeated refrain like we see in The Highwayman.
Reading – Canaries will continue to read with an adult on a 1:1 basis throughout each week. Selected children will continue with Literacy Gold throughout the following term. Please could I encourage your child to read at least 3 times a week at home. This helps to strengthen their vocabulary, comprehension and confidence, helping them to become more successful and motivated learners.
Spelling – Spellings will be sent out each week on a Monday. This term the children will be tasked with learning 10 spellings per week, and our spelling test will take place on a Friday. Some children will continue in Mrs Gosling’s group learning the high frequency words. A spelling practice sheet will be sent home as normal.
Week 1 focuses on creating nouns using -ity suffix
Week 2 focuses on creating nouns using -ness suffix
Week 3 focuses on creating nouns using -ship suffix
Week 4 focuses on homophones and near homophones
Week 5 focuses on homophones and near homophones
Week 6 focuses on homophones and near homophones
Week 7 will be an assessment of the terms spellings.
Maths – This term, our year 5 children will be focusing on fractions following the White Rose Maths scheme, in line with the National curriculum. We will learn to find equivalent fractions, convert, recognise, compare, add and subtract fractions.
Science – Canaries will be learning about living things and their habitats. Our sequence of lessons is as follows:
1.Life Cycles of Plants and Animals in our Local Area.
2. Life Cycles of Mammals and Amphibians.
3. Life Cycles of Insects and Birds.
4. Reproduction in Plants.
5. The Work of David Attenborough and Jane Goodall.
We will be describing the differences in the life cycles of a mammal, an amphibian, an insect and a bird. Moving on to describing the life process of reproduction in some plants and animals.
History – During our history module the children will learn about the Transatlantic Slave trade. By the end of the unit the children will know that the Transatlantic Slave Trade was established to provide slave labour from Africa to work on plantations in the Americas. The ‘middle passage’ or ‘Atlantic passage’ was the journey taken in slave ships from West Africa to America, where enslaved Africans faced horrific conditions. The treatment of enslaved Africans was extremely cruel and the Abolitionists in Britain were campaigners, who tried to persuade Parliament to end the slave trade. In 1807 the slave trade was abolished, and 1833 when slavery was abolished throughout the British Empire.
Spanish – Canaries will be learning about La Clase (The Classroom) in Spanish. By the end of the unit the children will be able to recall from memory a selection of nouns and indefinite articles for common classroom objects, they will have learnt how to use the negative in Spanish and will be able to describe what we have and do not have in our pencil case. We will also be looking at responding to simple classroom commands.
Computing - In computing our focus will be coding. The coding lessons are structured around the PRIMM approach:
Predict - what this code will do
Run- the code to check your prediction
Investigate - trace though the code to see if you were correct
Modify - the code to add detail, change actions/outcome
Make - a new program that uses the same ideas in a different way.
We will begin to simplify code, create playable games, understand what a simulation is, program a simulation and to know what decomposition and abstraction are in computer science.
P.E – This term the children will be swimming. P.E. will take place on a Wednesday morning at St James Swimming pool. The children will walk to and from the swimming pool, so please encourage your child to wear a coat, especially as it is still the winter period. Please ensure that your child comes into school with their swimming kit, hair is tied back and earrings removed. Normal P.E. kit is to be worn throughout the school day; black joggers/shorts, white t-shirt and a black jacket.
Thank you for your continued support.
Mrs Bussey and Mrs Gosling.