YEAR 3
“We are really excited to be practicing for our Winter Concert,” enthused Xinyi and Seughee. “We have lots of lines to learn but it won’t be hard to memorise them.” “I am proud to be Chinese and the leader,” said Xinyi.
“This week I loved how we retold the story of Chinese New Year or Nian, using key words,” said Max. “I really liked working with Mika.” “We did a fantastic job together and our story was really good,” they both agreed.
“This week in Maths, we were learning about Time. Miss Wendy asked us to show her different times and we were really good at this. We can do o’clock and half past, which is easy peasy and now we can show quarter to and quarter past,” agreed Sasha, Maria and Yahel.
Jarek’s highlight was playing ‘clean the room, in PE. Ask your child to explain the game. Jarek also said “I liked learning how to convert digital times to analogue times. Our group can do it to the minute.”
YEAR 4
This week, in English, we read the script of the Diwali story, ‘Rama and Sita Defeat the Demon King Ravana’. With a view to preparing for our Winter Concert performance, we, again, paid particular attention to the characters of the story, setting, the development of the plot, the problems encountered by the characters, and how these problems were overcome. We also looked at why this story is a celebration of the victory of light over darkness, and why this story is so popular during Diwali celebrations.
During ‘Quick Maths’ sessions, we had fun, spending fifteen minutes every day doing mental arithmetic challenges: addition bonds to 100 (34 + 66 = 100); using operations to make numbers; writing calculations to make a known answer; and ‘Driving Test’. In Maths, we practised using the grid method to multiply a 3-digit number by a 1-digit number (352 x 3 = o). Once we had mastered this, we started using the ladder method to multiply.
In Science, we were introduced to classification keys and how to use them to classify plants and animals. We discovered that a classification key comprises of questions about organisms’ physical characteristics. Answers to these questions will either branch off to another question or identify the unknown organism. They’re fun and easy to use!
In our Topic and Art lessons, we spent time preparing for our Winter Concert performance, assisted by Ms. Nash and Ms. Sonia. This is a surprise, so we won’t divulge too much information to you.
This week, in our PSHE lesson, we watched the fifth and final video-clip, featuring Mojo and Katie. We were fascinated to see that Mojo’s attempt to launch himself into space in a rocket ship failed, causing him great disappointment. But, then, he realised that, by working on challenging things not matter what the outcome, his brain will continue to grow. We learnt that we should grow to love challenges!
YEAR 5
This week Year 5 have been working on fractions during Maths lessons. The children have been practising converting between improper fractions and mixed numbers. They also learned how to add fractions, firstly fractions with the same denominators, before tackling the more challenging task of adding fractions with different denominators. The class also worked well in small groups to tackle some challenging problems solving tasks.
In English, the focus was on using descriptive language to create interesting character descriptions. The class read the Egyptian story of Osiris and analysed the different ways that the author had shared information about each character. The children observed that this included things such as descriptions of the characters' appearance, manner, actions, speech and backstory. The children then began the process of writing their own character descriptions, trying to include expanded noun phrases and prepositional phrases to add detail to their writing.
In Science, the class explored the fascinating world of magnets. They considered some uses for magnets and turned designers and engineers as the built their own magnet locks. There were some clever and thoughtful designs produced!
