Autumn Term
Christmas Party
We had a lovely 'party' this afternoon in Year 5. We had a few party games and some dancing before returning to the classroom to have some pizza and chips while watching Harry Potter. It was a lovely afternoon.
Our Bamboo Tamboo Performance
This week we came to the end of our Bamboo Tamboo workshops with Franco from Newcastle Music Service. The class have made fantastic progress from week 1 and I was very pleased with how well they performed. Below I have attached some clips from our final performance. Well done Year 5!
Festive Garlands
This week Hen Power and Equal Arts got in touch to ask if we would like to make some collage trees that would become part of a festive garland that would hang in a local residential home as part of an initiative that they were running with Seven Stories. We were happy to help and got stuck in making our festive trees using the resources we had available in school.
More Bamboo Tamboo
We are making great progress with Franco in our Bamboo Tamboo sessions. Mrs Gill is very impressed with how well we are doing learning the new rhythms and working as a team.
Cyber Bullying Workshop
Today, Hannah from Bigfoot Arts Education hosted a class workshop on cyber bullying. First, we discussed different kinds of bullying: physical, verbal, emotional and cyber. Next, we talked about the activities we enjoy online and moved on to explore the issues and problems caused by cyber bullying using drama freeze-frames. Hannah reminded us how to keep ourselves and others safe online by acting safely, respectfully and responsibly at all times. We know that we should always seek help from a trusted adult about any concerns that we may have.
More Bamboo Tamboo
Franco was back in school on Thursday to continue working with us on our Bamboo Tamboo sessions. This week we passed some beats around the class before being given our beaters to use. This required lots of concentration as there were different ways to hit the bamboo so we needed to practise many times. We then started learning some different rhythms and splitting into groups.
Remembrance Day
Today we had a two minute silence at 11am to remember those who have lost their lives in war and conflict. We spent time in the afternoon thinking about the lives of the soldiers in WW1. The class were keen to share stories of their own from their own families. We read the poem 'In Flanders Fields' by John McCrae and talked about how it made us feel. The class talked about why we wear poppies and what they represent. We then created poppies using pencils, pens and pastels to cover a silhouette of a WW1 soldier.
Dance Dance Dance
Our fitness and dancing skills are continuing to improve. This week we danced to a variety of songs including Ant and Dec's 'Let's get ready to rumble'. It was very energetic but lots of fun too! It is great to see so many smiles from the class as they are doing the dances.
Livestream video from Kielder Observatory
This afternoon we had the opportunity to watch Adam Shore from Kielder Observatory give an hour's livestream session on an introduction to astronomy. He talked about the stars, planets and galaxies and showed us images and animations to help us understand the complex topics he was discussing. We had the chance to post some questions and he answered as many as he could. We look forward to the next session which will take place during this half term.
Bamboo Tamboo
This week we started our Bamboo Tamboo sessions with Franco. We were introduced to our new instrument and practised playing different rhythms and passing the beat. Anyone who was brave enough got to lead some of the rhythms too! We had a great first week and Mrs Gill is looking forward to seeing how we progress over the coming weeks. Watch this space...
Dancing for fitness
This week Chantal from CM dance academy came into school to work with us on our fitness. We completed various dance routines involving lots of different moves and really enjoyed taking part in the session. There were lots of smiles by the end of it despite feeling tired. We look forward to seeing what we will be doing next week. Watch this space...
The finished masks...
Here are our finished Maya masks. They look great! The pupils chose to create an event mask, a battle mask or a death mask. Can you identify the different masks from our photographs?
Harry Potter Adverts
This week in English we have been creating our own adverts to advertise the new Nimbus 5000 in Diagon Alley. We looked at the features of adverts before designing and creating our own using Pic Collage. The results look great and they will go up on display outside of the classroom.
Ancient Maya Masks
This week we have been focusing on art in the afternoons. It has been linked to the work we have been doing in history: Ancient Maya. The class investigated the different masks that the Ancient Maya wore and for what purpose. They discovered that they wore Event masks (e.g. weddings or birth ceremonies), Battle masks (to intimidate their enemy) and Death masks (to adorn the dead). They then designed and created a death, event or battle mask.
A visit to Diagon Alley...
This week the class have been writing descriptions of their journey through Diagon Alley. The pupils used their senses to describe their surroundings. I was very impressed with the results.
Here is Mason's description:
Excitedly, as the wall jumped back into place, all that could be heard were witches and wizards chatting about potions. As I moved further down the bizarre street, I heard people whispering “Nimbus 2000” “fastest in the world” Wow! What would it be like to ride on that?
I came across an ice cream shop. I struggled to resist the glorious, irresistible ice cream. Above my head I spotted a snow-white owl as bright as a shooting star. It was flying over the alley and landed safely on a huge tiger pumpkin. Further down the alley, there were midnight cloaks and pointy hats. Diagon Alley was a sensational place to visit! The giant himself, Hagrid, caught up to me and we headed to the first order of business for the day…
A visit from Studio West
Today Ms Wigham, the Head Teacher from Studio West, came to see the class to tell us all about what happens in her school. She gave us lots of information about the types of lessons that pupils would do, how the school was different to other schools and what it would be like if they were to go there. The class had lots of questions to ask Ms Wigham about homework, lessons and careers. Ms Wigham was impressed with the engagement from pupils and the great attitude and behaviour they showed. Well done Year 5!
Body percussion
This week we started some work on Body Percussion in music. We listened to some music and started to move to the beat using our feet before attempting some different rhythms using our hands and feet. It was tricky at first to maintain a steady pulse but there was definite progress within half an hour and Mrs Gill was impressed by how quickly some people picked up the different patterns. We will continue to work on this in music and hopefully we'll be body percussion experts by the end of the year! Watch this space...
Smile, smile, smile
This week we thought about World Smile Day. We talked about the things that makes us smile and how we can make other people smile. The class had lots of suggestions that they use to spread a little happiness including telling jokes to make someone laugh, being kind and helpful and doing a random act of kindness. We enjoyed passing a smile around the class too!
National Poetry Day
Today was National Poetry Day. To celebrate this, the class listened to one of Mrs Gill’s favourite poems: The Register by Michael Rosen. The class loved the poem and found it very funny. There were giggles throughout the reading especially every time the snails were mentioned!
They also read ‘Quick! There is a poem’ by Tony Walsh. The class acted out and read different lines of the poem in small groups, performing this as a whole class. The class enjoyed creating a freeze frame to represent each line. Take a look at the poem here and see if you can match our photos to each line.
Healthy Eating Week
This week is National Healthy Eating Week. Today we thought about the different food groups and talked about our favourite healthy foods that we enjoy eating. We had lots of variation in class including sushi, dragonfruit, pineapple, mango and lots more... Some children mentioned healthy foods that they hadn't liked in the past but now enjoyed and it was lovely to see that the children enjoyed trying new things. We also talked about the importance of keeping active too. The best way to show this was to go outside and do some exercise on the MUGA. It was cold when we first went outside but after a few minutes of working out, we had all warmed up!
Friday 25th September
We've had another busy week in class. We have enjoyed starting our new novel in English: Harry Potter and the philosopher's stone. This week the class have written character descriptions thinking about adventurous vocabulary and interesting adjectives. I have been very impressed with their ideas and look forward to more magical writing in the coming weeks.
We have continued working on place value in Maths and even tried using Seesaw to complete some of our work on negative numbers which was a great success! In PSHE, the class produced some great 'Thought Bubbles' about themselves this week which are going to go on display in our classroom...watch this space for photos of their work.
Welcome to Year 5!
It is lovely to teach the class for a second time at Newburn Manor. The class have settled in really well and have started working hard straight away. It has been great to see their enthusiasm in lessons and their eagerness to learn. We have started work on place value in Maths and the children have also completed some activities on Mathletics in class. This is linked to the work we have been doing in Maths and children can use this at home too. They should all have a login but please let me know if you need another copy. This week the class have started looking at a non-fiction book all about Ancient Maya. We will be studying this in history this half term and the children had many questions they would like to research over the course of the topic. Our Science topic this half term will be 'Space' and they will be studying this with Mr Vyle on a Friday each week. Next week we will start reading Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone which the class are very excited about. I can't wait to see some of the work they produce. Later in the year we will be looking at many different topics including 'Amazon Adventures', 'Vikings' and 'Food for thought'.
Please keep checking this page to see what we have been doing in class. I will upload some photos and add information each week to keep you informed of Year 5's hard work. Watch this space...
Mrs Gill