Year 6 Football club
At the beginning of this half-term we started to run an after-school football club for Year 6 pupils. So far we have had a great turn out, with around 12-13 players turning up each week for training.
After half-term we hope to begin training towards playing competitive matches against other schools in the area.
New players are always welcome. Please speak to the school office for details on how to sign up.
Class 5/6A News
A huge thank you to all parents, grandparents and family members who attended our ‘Watch us while we work!’ session on Thursday morning. It gave parents a chance to see our work on the 6 times table, get to grips with “im” and “in” prefixes and discuss the impact of climate change on Greenland, the Solomon Islands and the East Yorkshire coast.
Daily use of Times Table Rockstars is really beginning to pay off for our students. Year 5 are currently working on 4-digit by 2-digit multiplication in Maths, and rapid recall of these calculations helps to make these problems much easier to solve.
Writing has seen us begin to prepare for writing a persuasive letter to the UK Climate Minister, Graham Stuart, to get the government to do more to prevent the effects of climate change impacting our lives. We have explored techniques such as rhetorical questions, emotive language and exaggeration to help the writer put across a strong argument.
Copernicus and Galileo are our featured scientists this half-term, and we have researched key facts about the two astronomers how they came to the conclusion that the Solar System is heliocentric (has the Sun at its centre, whilst all other planets orbit around it). We also held a lively in-class debate as to whether the Earth was spherical or flat.
In Topic, we have been looking at the impact of coastal erosion on the East Yorkshire coast over the past 13o years. Using an online mapping tool we have been able to measure the impact of erosion on locations such as Skipsea, Hornsea and Great Cowden between 1890 and present day; as well as how the use of defence mechanisms such as groynes aim to slow down the impact of erosion.
In Latin, we have revisited masculine and feminine nouns, and can identify these by their endings. Nouns which end in an ‘a’ are feminine, with those ending in “us” being masculine. We could then use this knowledge to make expanded noun phrases and describe objects. For example ‘hortus magnus est‘ would translate as ‘the garden is big‘.
P.E saw us take on a circuit training session, including skipping, basketball, hockey dribbling, shuttle runs and fitness equipment.
Finally, a huge well done to everyone in Class 5/6A who were crowned the Times Table Rockstars Battle of the Bands competition. It was a close run contest between ourselves and 5/6C, but we just managed to edge them out in the end. We amassed over 150,000 correct answers over the course of one week which is truly outstanding!
Have a great weekend!
Mr. Robson
Living and Learning: Speak out, Stay safe!
Our living and learning lessons this week have been about staying safe and knowing how to ask for help. This has tied in with the NSPCC programme of ‘Speak out Stay safe’ which is a programme that promotes safeguarding. The children have discussed that there are various reasons why they might ask someone for help, but that it is their right to ask for, and receive help. Of even greater importance is the fact that abuse is never a child’s fault.. The children were confident at identifying who their own trusted adults are and felt comfortable that they could ask for help. We also talked about how to start a conversation with a trusted adult, as this can sometimes be the hardest part. To conclude we created lists of people, places and objects that make us feel happy and safe.
Help at home: talk to your child and find out who their trusted adults are. Do they know who to go to if they need help or support? Ask them about the video. Can they remember who the NSPCC mascot is? What were the main points?
Living and learning: I know how to seek help.
Our living and learning lessons this week have been about being safe – this follows on well from our previous learning about assessing risks. The NSPCC promote the idea of ‘Speak out Stay safe’ which is a programme that promotes safeguarding. The children have understood the forms of abuse that can take place, how abuse is never a child’s fault and where to get help if needed. It also talked about big and small worries and how these can build up and cause a child to feel worried, upset or anxious. The children were confident at identifying who their own trusted adults are and felt comfortable that they could ask for help. We also talked about how to start a conversation with a trusted adult, as this can sometimes be the hardest part.
Below is the link to the NSPCC website if you would like any further information.
Help at home: talk to your child and find out who their trusted adults are. Do they know who to go to if they need help or support? Ask them about the video. Can they remember who the NSPCC mascot is? What were the main points?
Brrrrr! Exploring ice and frost
We’ve had a few very cold mornings recently and children noticed the frost on their walk to Nursery and on the wooden beams in the playground. We talked about frost, snow and ice and had lots of conversations about where children thought it had come from.
The frost glistened in the sunshine and children enjoyed scratching it with their fingers and making patterns.
There was a lot of excitement as we hunted around the garden to find some ice and we talked a little bit about how ice forms. We found ice in the water tray, on the ground where a puddle had been and in the guttering. We loved trying to break the ice in different ways and wondered where it had gone later in the day. Some children noticed that it was sunny and we talked about ‘melting’.
Later, we collected different objects from around the garden and put them in some water. We left them over night and children were very excited to check them again in the morning to see if anything had happened.
Geography: investigating issues in our locality
This week in KS1, the children have been collating the results of their fieldwork around Scholes village. We discussed and recorded which was our favourite place in Scholes and made a graph to show these results.
In all classes, the Peace Flame was our favourite spot. This was because the noise level was low, it was calm but also because there was no litter. We decided that litter was our least favourite thing about Scholes but luckily there was not much.
We also looked around the school grounds for litter. We noticed that the playgrounds with more bins had less litter and the playgrounds with less or no bins had the most litter.
What is the issue to this solution?
‘We could pick it all up!’
Living and learning : Speak out, stay safe
We talked about how to keep safe this week. Speaking to a trusted adult is very important. This NSPCC video, featuring Ant and Dec, talks about speaking out can help us stay safe. It also introduces Buddy, a mascot for this important message. (This is a YouTube link. Top tip for watching YouTube with your child: go to the settings cog along the play bar and turn off autoplay – this avoids an inappropriate clip coming up automatically, and helps to discourage your child from passively watching clip after clip.)
Supertato!
Supertato!
This week, in literacy we have been reading the book ‘Supertato’ by Sue Hendra & Paul Linnet. We have been retelling the story using actions and story maps.
Top tip for watching YouTube with your child: go to the settings cog (it’s along the play bar) and turn off auto play – this avoids an inappropriate clip coming up automatically, and helps to discourage your child from passively watching clip after clip.
Can your child retell the story Supertato to you at home? They could use the story maps below to help them – or even better, draw their own! Email us to let us how they did – your child will earn a challenge brick.
The children have also been busy doing lots of Supertato themed challenges. Here are some of the challenges they have been doing.
Challenge bricks – what is my child talking about?
Challenging activities are around the classroom for your child to complete to earn a brick. You might have seen them if you attended a stay and play recently – they are shown on blackboards in different areas of learning. The aim is to get a tower of bricks taller than SIX. Challenges include the learning we’re focusing on throughout the week.
Ask your child what challenges they’ve done this week.
At the end of the week, we talk about who has more and who has fewer bricks. If your child’s tower is more than SIX, your child will come home with a certificate.
Word of the week
Every week, we look at a new adventurous word. We call this our ‘word of the week’. This week our word of the week was ‘hero’ – linked to the story ‘Supertato’. We looked at the definition. ‘A person who is brave and good – often looked up to by others.’, drew pictures to represent hero’s and used the word hero in our everyday speech.
“I can see a hero – it’s Supertato” Georgie.
“My hero is Hulk” Jack.
“My hero is Rosie” Grace.
Maths
This week, the children have been developing their understanding of composition – the numbers within numbers.
We have been using the Hungarian number pattern (die pattern) as shown below.
These key representations help your child to underline the ‘5-ness’ of 5. The children now have a great understanding of pairs of numbers that make 5!
“3 and 2 more…5”
“3 and 3 equals 6”
Phonics
This week, the children have learnt the new digraph ‘er’ – a digraph is ‘two letters that make one sound’. They have also learnt the new trigraph ‘air’ – a trigraph is ‘three letters that make one sound’.
Before reading a word we always look for any digraphs (two letters that make one sound) or trigraphs (three letters that make one sound). Then, we say the sound it makes. Finally, we sound out the word and blend it together – using our phoneme fingers! This helps your child identify the digraphs before reading a word.
Poetry Picnic
Each week, we will be learning a new poem. We will recite this poem each day. By saying the poem out loud we can focus on the sounds and rhythm of each word or line. We talk to the children about how this can help us become better readers. This week’s poem is ‘A little house’.
We talk about how a poem sometimes has rhyming words and sometimes doesn’t. Can your child tell you the rhyming words in this week’s poem? We also talk about how a poem can have a fast rhythm or a slow rhythm. Can your child re-tell this weeks poem to you?
Reminders
Reception Coffee Morning – Tuesday 31st January, 2023
After dropping your child off, stay at school for an informal chat with Mrs Beesley, the Reception staff and get to know the other parents, too. We will be in the new area of school called ” The Hub” from 9- 10am. Come and join us.
Stay and Play (fiddly fingers) – Friday 03 February at 2.pm– 3.20pm.
This is an opportunity for you to come into school to find out about the Early Years Curriculum and watch your child learn in school.
There will be a sign-up sheet in the classroom/after school club on Monday 30th January.
PE – basketball skills
This half term in PE we are focussing on attacking skills.
Here’s what we’ve been learning:
Attack is offense in Basketball. On offense, there are many different tools available to your team. The goal of the attack is to break through the opponent’s defence and set up an uncontested shot. For this you will need strong fundamentals: dribbling, passing and shooting.
Maths: multiplication
This week in Year 2 we have been exploring multiplication. We are able to recognise equal groups, count how many objects are in each group and how many groups there are. We then use this knowledge to find the total.
We started by writing our equations out using repeated addition. We then wrote the equation as a multiplication.
(E.g. – 2 + 2 + 2 + 2 is the same as 2 x 4)
Help at home by arranging equal groups in the home for your child. You could use socks, coins or any other object that can be counted in 2s, 5s or 10s!
Top tip for watching YouTube with your child: go to the settings cog (it’s along the play bar) and turn off autoplay – this
avoids an inappropriate clip coming up automatically, and helps to discourage your child from passively watching clip
after clip.