Geraldton (Year 5)

Miss Miles

Class Teacher

Term 4

 

Early Morning Work

For the first half-an-hour of the day, Year Five focuses on developing key skills in English and maths. The children work through a daily maths task to improve their mental agility and to consolidate and recap key maths skills. They will also have a handwriting task, which always has a spelling, grammar or punctuation focus. This is also when we listen to the children read and have some group work going on. Every child will be heard read once every other week in KS2, which also includes reading comprehension and guided reading tasks. On Fridays, the children will be tested on their weekly spellings.

 

English

English is taught Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday mornings with the aim of developing reading, writing and speaking and listening skills. English units are usually taught over a two-week period. Where possible, these units will link in a cross-curricular way with the class topic. Guided Reading as a class or in groups occurs once a week and then in small groups during Early Morning Work. During this term, Geraldton Class will cover the following genres:

  • Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare (2-week unit): Play Scripts
  • Wolf Brother by Michelle Paver (2-week unit): Quest Stories
  • The River by Valerie Bloom (1-week unit): Poetry
  • FArTHER by Grahame Baker-Smith (1-week unit): Reading Comprehension
 

 

Maths

Maths is taught daily. Maths units vary in length and are split into weekly blocks. The children build on their previous knowledge to extend their understanding of different aspects of mathematics. With the challenges which are always on offer to them, they also have the opportunity to apply their knowledge when solving mathematical problems and puzzles. Geraldton class will cover the following units in Term 4:

  •          Fractions (2-week unit)
  •          Decimals and Percentages (3-week unit)
  •          Perimeter and Area (1-week unit)
 

 

Science

Science is taught once a week, through both practical and theoretical activities. The children will develop their skills as a scientist through investigations, developing their predicting and concluding skills and gaining an understanding of controlling variables. The children are taught, and should then apply, key scientific vocabulary in relation to the current science topic. The science topic for the following term is related to space and they will be learning the following in this term:

  •          To describe the movement of the Earth and other planets relative to the sun
  •          To describe the movement of the moon relative to the Earth
  •          To explain and demonstrate how night and day are created
  •          To understand that the Sun, Earth and Moon are approximately spherical and how we know
 
 

 

PE

PE is taught twice a week. During this term, PE is taught on Tuesday and Friday afternoons. On Tuesday, the children will have multi-skills. In multi-skills, the children will be developing their core stability, strength, stamina, power and speed in a variety of different activities. On Friday, the children will have hockey. In hockey, they will be developing their control of the ball, their passing, their ability to receive passes, their shooting, their defensive skills and their game tactics.

 

PSHE

PSHE is always taught each term and is often based on discussion tasks. Where possible, we try to link PSHE with Philosophy and encourage the children to explain their understanding in detail and answer challenging questions which don’t have a right answer. In Terms 3 and 4, we will be exploring the themes of ‘Diverse Britain’ and ‘Be Yourself’.

 

 

Geography

In Terms 3 and 4, we will be exploring the theme of ‘Our Wonderful World’. Our key question this term is: what makes our world a wonderful place to live and how can I protect it? Within this theme, we will be exploring the following:

  • The importance of different biomes across different continents
  • The location of the world’s major rivers and mountains
  • The physical and human features the Arctic and Antarctic
  • The importance of the Arctic and Antarctic Circles.
  • The appeal of living near rivers in different places
  • The impact of the water cycle in different geographical locations
 

Religious Education

RE is taught once a week and will focus on key beliefs of Christianity. We will be exploring the Easter story and thinking about what Jesus did to save us and the meaning of his sacrifice to Christians. In addition to this, we will be making connections between how Christians celebrate Holy Communion and the sacrifice that Jesus made and the importance of Christians showing that they are happy to make a sacrifice in their lives in order to help others.

 

 
 

Art

This term, we will be having Art lessons once a week and we will be exploring the artist Vincent Van Gogh. We will be thinking about the composition of his pieces and his use of colours and brush strokes within his work. During this unit, we will be making clay tiles inspired by ‘Starry Night’ and also using acrylic paint to paint either the school or church, in the style of ‘The Church at Auvers’. In addition to this, the children will be exploring a chosen piece of his work and using this to inspire their own work.