Science
Our new unit of learning for this half term is Electricity. The children had to recall their previous learning, including remembering the scientific symbols for the components of an electrical circuit. They were then asked to make a working circuit – some chose to use bulbs, whilst others used buzzers or motors. The children were then given images of different circuits using different components. They had to make predictions as to whether the circuit would work or not, and give reasons for their predictions. The children then constructed each circuit to test their predictions.
Computing topic
This week, 5/6B have continued to work on Scratch. They have developed their computing skills further by creating multiplication games, a bit like Times Table Rockstars. They needed to select the correct algorithms that would make the program ask random times tables and allow the player to see if they had the answer correct or incorrect. Quite a few children had to debug their algorithms as there were some issues once the game was in play. The children were able to add different variables such as sound and a score. Next time, the children are going to attempt to add different levels to their games.
Computing topic
We have been busy enjoying our computing topic so far this term. The children are currently working hard to create their own chat bot game. This is a game in which players can answer questions and score points. The children have recalled their knowledge of Scratch really well and remembered how to select a sprite (a character) and a background – some could remember how to build some algorithms. They began by creating an algorithm that allowed them to input a question and someone to input an answer. They used selection to choose the best algorithm. Some managed to add multiple questions, a score and sounds to their game. Ask your child how their game is going
!
Living and learning: I recognise the importance of personal hygiene including hand washing
This week in living and learning, we discussed the importance of keeping our hands clean – this has been particularly important over the last couple of years. We talked about what being healthy means and how to we keep ourselves as healthy as possible. Who is responsible for us being healthy? Ourselves? Parents? Doctors?
How do we know when we are ill? The class contributed to a Jamboard and listed ways in which we can tell if we are ill. We noticed that the symptoms we suffered, were out of the ordinary.
We continued the lesson by learning about allergies and vaccinations and how these can make us feel unwell and also fight against illness.
A huge thank you!
Last half term, we set the children a maths challenge in which they had to learn some number facts or some multiplication tables. We asked the children to collect sponsors and see how much money we could raise for our school charity (Leeds Autism Services) and our school. You have absolutely gone above and beyond what we anticipated. The total so far that we’ve raised is £2318.15! This is just amazing and we can’t thank you enough – you are a very generous school community. This huge total will be split between the charity and school. Keep an eye out for more fundraising this half term, but again, thank you so much.
Super swimmers
We have two super swimmers in school, competing at city and regional level. They recently won gold medals in the 200m Freestyle and 200m Individual Medley at the Yorkshire Swimming Championships. Keep a look out for them in the future. A massive well done from everyone at school!
World Book Day!
What an interesting day! I don’t think I have ever taught Spider-Man or Gangsta Granny before. The children in 5/6 B didn’t disappoint with their fabulous costumes for World Book Day – they all looked great. During the reading lesson today, the children explored different texts and talked about their favourite authors. They created new book covers for their favourite books and rewrote blurbs, including some quotes. Some children created some excellent character profiles. We also enjoyed listening to an audio book.
Reading Journals
Children have been showing their love of reading by completing their weekly homework reading challenge. This is a great opportunity to share stories and recommend good books. At home, continue to share stories and discuss the themes.
Living and Learning: Safety Week
Last week, all pupils took part in our themed ‘staying safe’ week. From online safety workshops to visitors from Dogs Trust, years 5 and 6 had great opportunities to learn, interact with and ask for advice about many aspects of safety. Here’s a quick run through of what our safety week looked like:
Staying Safe Online Workshop
With constant developments in technology and the growth of social media platforms, this workshop was a real favourite for our pupils. We learnt all about the risks to look out for whilst using websites, social media platforms and mobile apps to ensure we are staying safe online. The workshop was fantastic and the pupils’ learning really thrived, with their opportunity to ask questions and raise any concerns being met with useful and accurate responses.
Road Safety Workshop
Although our pupils felt pretty confident on how to stay safe on the roads, there were a few shocks and surprises to us all! As our Year 6 pupils are close to starting their high school journeys, it was super important to learn about the risks of walking to school/catching the bus in the morning. We all need to make sure that when we are crossing any roads, we should: ensure our mobile phones are put away; make sure we don’t have two headphones in; and make sure we are looking both ways, more than once, before making a decision to cross.
We also took part in other safety areas across the week, such as fire safety, Dogs Trust and our online safety day.
This was a fantastic and productive week for all involved – thanks to all the visitors that came in and gave us their time to help us learn.
Living and Learning: Safer Internet Day
Children spent the day thinking about topics such as consent, digital footprints, secure passwords, phishing and age restrictions.
Children were shocked to discover that Whatsapp now has an age restriction of 16 years old. At home, talk about why this has changed from 13 and why most social media apps and websites have an age restriction of 13 years old.
Children took a quiz to find out how big their digital footprint was. From incognito to big foot, year 5/6 had it all. Whether it’s posting online or sending messages to friends, this all counts as part of your digital footprint.
