We have had a brilliant week this week celebrating our 'Week of Hope'.
We started off with a language day. The children visited a pet shop and used the French they had been learning to buy a pet! Great fun. On Tuesday, we had a Science day where we learnt all about the circulatory system as part of our Human Anatomy topic. We made the most of the nice weather by getting onto the playground and drawing a diagram of how blood cells move between the lungs, heart and organs carrying oxygen around the body. Wednesday was Art day and every child created a feather to go on a huge pair of wings in the hall bearing the message 'Until you spread your wings, you won't know how far you can fly.' Yesterday was our sporting day! We had a fantastic KS2 sports morning with all children giving their best in all of the races and throwing events. We then went swimming too - what a tiring day! Finally today, we enjoyed our wonderful music concert and I'm so impressed with everyone in Ash Class and all their performances. It's time for a restful weekend now but do enjoy the Summer Fayre if you are visiting. Next week looks relatively routine, but don't forget that 'move up morning' is on Thursday and the children will get to visit Year 5 and spend the morning with Mr Foreman in preparation for September. It was lovely to see all of the children dressed in rainbow colours today to show that everybody is different and that's wonderful! The weather might have been grey, but inside it was bright.
We've been very physically active this week as we've had 2 PE sessions with SAINTS plus our usual weekly swimming lesson. It's all good training as next week we have sports day! We're looking forward to welcoming parents to this event, the first opportunity we have had for a long time. Not only that but we also have our music concert on Friday so there is lots to look forward to. It's also our Festival of Hope so the children will be doing lots of exciting curriculum activities. This week, the children have completed 2 Maths and a reading assessment. As always, they gave these their best effort and everyone took it in their stride. Aside from these, the children have started researching their own location in Chile so that they are ready to write their own version of A Walk in London next week. In Geography, we learnt about Chile - where it is, what its climate is like and what natural resources it has. In Science, we looked at different types of teeth and used this knowledge to identify whether x-rays of different animals were from carnivores or herbivores. I hope you all have a lovely weekend. This week, we have had our expected visit from our Ofsted inspector today and yesterday. The timetable was jam packed and we had opportunity to show off the very best about North Tawton Primary School. All of the children in Ash Class were friendly, welcoming and polite, excellently behaved, and keen to talk about their learning and experiences at school. Well done to everyone involved.
Looking ahead, next week is assessment week so we will be undertaking a reading paper and two Maths papers. Once these are completed each morning, we'll be carrying on with our normal activities in Maths and English, along with our usual afternoon subjects. Something to look forward to next Friday is Rainbow Day! This is our celebration of inclusion and is all about being proud of who we are. We will still have PE so please could children come to school in their PE kits but bring their rainbow outfits to change into (or wear in addition). Please do have a lovely weekend and see you next week! Miss Radbourne Firstly, a big well done to all of the children for sitting their Multiplication Check this week. All went in confident, calm and tried their best. Great work!
In English this week, we read a lovely book called 'A Walk in London'. It's about a girl, her Mum and their trip to London. A cross between fiction and non-fiction, the book shares wonderful illustrations and fascinating facts about the city. We will be using this text in a variety of ways throughout the coming weeks. Maths has been spent learning all about angles! The children can explain the difference between acute, right and obtuse angles, and compare and order them too. In Geography, we started a new topic all about natural resources. The children really enjoyed our first lesson where we learnt what a natural resource is, where they are found and why they are found in different places. We will move onto learning how the use of natural resources has changed over time next week. Science involved learning about organs and what they do. We conducted a short investigation to explore how we know our heart and lungs are working! In PE, the children were learning the best techniques for jumping over hurdles. They did well today in the heat! In Computing, we have been using Scratch to programme shapes. Finally, in Life Skills, we had some great discussion around why it is important to use medicines and household products safely and how we can reduce risk from them. Make the most of the sunshine while it lasts and have a lovely weekend. Welcome back after half term!
We've only been in school for four days this week but we've managed to squeeze a lot in. The children have worked particularly hard writing their own versions of 'Cinderella of the Nile' in English. We had 'Cinderella of the sea', 'Cinderella of WW2' and 'Cinderella of the snow'. Great adaptations! In Maths, we have completed a unit on Statistics. We practised reading and interpreting, as well as had a go at drawing, bar charts, pictograms and line graphs. Next week, we will be looking at properties of shapes. We've drawn our History topic about the Vikings to a close and next week we will move onto Geography. We'll be learning about natural resources and looking at the different natural resources in the UK compared to Chile, South America. We will also be starting our new Science unit all about human anatomy. We are also completing our Year 4 Multiplication Check next week. Well done for all of the hard work practising at home! Have a great weekend. We have had a very busy and exciting week in Ash Class.
We were lucky enough to be visited by a brilliant storyteller to accompany our learning in History about the Vikings. He told tales of seafaring adventures to lands far from Scandinavia, and explained all sorts of fascinating information about Viking battles, weapons and life. There was opportunity at the end for the children to try on the helmets, use the shields and see how heavy the chainmail was! It really brought our learning to life and we had a great morning. In Life Skills, we have finished our learning about how to keep our bodies and minds healthy by focusing on keeping our teeth clean! We explored how difficult it is to remove plaque if you don't brush your teeth regularly (replicated with cornflour on a yoghurt pot) and every child was offered a free toothbrush and toothpaste to take home. Another highlight this week was designing, making and evaluating torches in D.T. The children worked through the whole process of creating a product. They had to think about a brief and establish what features their torches would need, consider which materials they would use to create them and finally assemble them. Great problem-solving skills shown by many. Finally, today, we've finished off the week with a sporty day. We had our weekly SAINTS P.E. lesson followed by taking part in an OCRA Quad kids event. Fantastic running, long jumping and javelin throwing! Another week flies by!
The children have worked really hard this week practising their times tables. I've seen some great increases in score on TTRS and the times table check! Please keep up the hard work at home. In English, we've been practising using a thesaurus to find better words to use in writing. They will put this into practise when they write their own version of Cinderella of the Nile. In Maths, we've been telling the time and learning how to convert analogue times to digital times (both on a 12 and 24 hour clock). We had a great History lesson discussing whether the Vikings were actually the first people to discover the Americas. Plenty to keep us busy this week! Keep up the regular reading, spelling practise and especially times table practise please. Have a lovely weekend. We've been busy again this week!
A big focus this week has been learning to tell the time in Maths. We started by revisiting how to read o'clock, half past, quarter past and quarter to times. We then moved onto telling the time to the nearest 5 minutes, and from there telling the time to the nearest minutes The more chance children get to practise this, the better! Why not challenge them to tell you the time over the course of the weekend? I shared a link on Dojo to a great website with a telling the time game that they could play at home as well. Next week, we will move onto converting between analogue and digital time (12 and 24 hour clocks). On the subject of Maths, well done to those children who have worked hard this week to improve their score on the Times Tables Check! There were a few children in particular who I could see have worked really hard at home. TTRS is a great online resource for practising this but please support your child to learn the tables they find a bit more challenging. Now for a quick summary of our learning in other subjects. In English, we have started a new text called 'Cinderella of the Nile'. We compared it with the well-known fairytale version of Cinderella to look for similarities and differences. In History, we learnt about a treaty signed between King Alfred and the invading Viking chief Guthrum. Science involved understanding how animals and plants are adapted to survive in hot and cold environments. We had a really interesting Life Skills lesson where we looked at how much sugar is in drinks. The children enjoyed seeing this visually and we had some great discussions. Another week has flown by, especially since this one was shorter with the bank holiday Monday!
We've been working really hard on handwriting and presentation this week and I've seen an improvement in effort from all of the children, so well done. In English, we have used the skills of persuasive writing to write a letter encouraging people to cycle to school rather than drive. Next week, the children will be planning and writing their own persuasive letters. We've been adding and subtracting money in Maths, and understanding how to find change from an amount. Have a look at the photos. In History, the children learnt all about what happened at Lindisfarne when the Vikings invaded in 793 and sequenced the events that happened. Today, we made the most of the nice weather and went outside onto the playground to design some times tables playground games! We had snakes and ladders, hopscotches and some original games. The children were practising the times tables they find most tricky. Take a look at the photos below. What a lovely first week back! The sun has been shining, everyone has been smiling and we've had a great week of learning.
One of the highlights this week was our first swimming lesson at Okehampton pool. The children were confident in the water and I could see progress even from the start of the lesson to the end. Our other PE activity this week was on the field with our new coach Mrs Edwards where we practised throwing and catching skills and then applied this to a game of rounders. Take a look at the pictures below. In English, we are spending a couple of weeks writing persuasive letters. We have looked at some techniques used in persuasive writing such as emotive language, rhetorical questions and speaking directly to the reader. Next week, we will be putting this into practice by writing a letter trying to persuade to cycle to school rather than drive. Our new topic in Maths is 'Money', and this week we have learnt the different values of coins and notes and discussed how to estimate by using rounding. We are learning about the Vikings in History, which leads on nicely from the Anglo-Saxons as they were next to invade Britain! Science holds lots of finding out about 'Adaptations' and how animals and plants cope with their environment. Please could I remind you that children are expected to read daily and record this in their reading folders. They also need to do daily times table and spelling practise too. Have a lovely bank holiday weekend and enjoy the nice weather. |
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July 2024
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