Spring 1

Week 5 & 6

What a fantastic end to a busy half term! Year 5 have continued to develop their skills in balance, core strength, and body control in gymnastics, progressing from floor routines to small apparatus and learning how to vault. Using the clay techniques they learned last week—rolling, pinching, smoothing, and coiling—the children successfully created Greek vases with handles; some even managed to craft matching lids. As mathematicians, we have been learning how to multiply a fraction by a whole number and how to find a fraction of an amount. Continuing our commitment to equality and equity, we participated in an inspiring anti-racism workshop that encouraged us to think deeply about our role in challenging prejudice. Finally, we explored the order of marriage rituals within the Jewish faith, considering the similarities and differences compared to other religions.

Week 4

This week we have put our green and blue thinking hats on, developing our creative and leadership skills. In P.E we created collaborative sequences where children linked different rolls and balances together, travelling seamlessly between them. Children considered the importance of collaboration, core strength and synchronicity to enable all members of the team to execute their own sequence with precision. Building on their knowledge of using clay last year, we introduced children to clay tools and the techniques of rolling, pinching, smoothing, coiling and creating pinch pots. They had the opportunity to practise these skills and to attach different shapes securely ready to create a Greek vase with handles next week.

Week 3

This week saw the conclusion of our myth writing. We really enjoyed applying our new learning of: modal verbs, adverbs of possibility and relative clauses into our narratives. In PE, we built upon our knowledge of balances from last year and created ‘sticky shapes’ in our own balances where each member of our group had a different number of contact points with the floor but had to remain connected to someone in the group. It was quite challenging at times, but also really fun to do. As artists, we explored Ancient Greek vases, focusing on their uses and the images on the surfaces depicting daily life. After that, we designed several of our own to a specific criteria.  After which we evaluated the design, making a final design choice,  to be the one we will make in the upcoming weeks. As mathematicians, we applied our knowledge of multiplying and dividing by 10 and 100 to help us solve problems and to be more efficient in our calculations.

Week 2

The highlight of this week was travelling back in time 300 years to the time of the Ancient Greeks, Year 5 spent a wonderful day competing for their city in the Ancient Olympic Games. Each city chose their finest sportsperson to throw the discus, compete in short distance running before the grand finale of the chariot race. We delved into the mysteries of the Trojan War to understand the significance of Odysseus’s adventures (our guided reading text) after his successful victory over Troy. We concluded our learning by indulging our tastebuds in Greek cuisine through an Ancient Greek banquet.

Week 1

What an exciting week to start the new year and the Spring Term with. During our PE sessions we began to explore how to incorporate hand apparatus into gymnastics and how to use the equipment artistically. To launch our Ancient Greek topic, we completed an activity where we had to be historians and gather information from the evidence in front of us, to infer how life may have been for the people at the time. We also investigated the features of a myth then began to innovate using our own ideas in a story-cube type activity before creating our own mythical creature and planning our own myth.