Happy St.George's Day!

The start of our week begins with St.George's Day, patron saint of England. It's a chance for us to get out the flags, showing the St.George's cross, and find out some information about our own culture. This site has some really good information, which is easy to read and understand.

http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/customs/stgeorge.html

The homework challenge for the Year 5's this week, will be to write an information sheet about our Patron Saint. You can handwrite it, type it on the computer, draw pictures, cut them out from magazines, find them from other websites and any other ideas you can think of. It MUST be written IN YOUR OWN WORDS and not just copied from a website or book. The sky's the limit!!

Science

Well, has your child been washing their hands a bit more frequently recently? Well they should be! We started investigating how micro-organisms can be spread and we looked at what they look like under a microscope – ‘disgusting’ – ‘urgh’ –‘yuk’ were just a few of the reactions we had!

The sites from last week are really useful, especially http://www.buginvestigators.co.uk/ . If you click on the on-line games, there are some fantastic experiments that you can try with the guide ‘Andy Biotic’ (I know, I thought it was terrible too!)

http://www.childrensuniversity.manchester.ac.uk/interactives/science/microorganisms/
Click on the ‘What are micro-organisms?’ section on the left hand side of the screen for interactive animations of where you might find micro-organisms in and around your house. You’ll even start to help out with the cleaning when you read this one!
http://enjoy.underwired.com/portfolio/sites/thebugstopshere/index.shtml this site explains how to rid your house of those germs. It is sponsored by a well-known bleach manufacturer, but once you get over that bias, it is a really good site to use!

Do you know the best conditions for growing mould are? Why not have a go at growing some of your own at home? I suggest putting whatever you are testing into a plastic bag, so that you don’t cause too many smells and germs to spread!

Numeracy

This week in numeracy, Year 6’s will continue to work on their revision, using the SAT Attack books which you will have seen at home in the last few weeks. The links on delicious and over the last few weeks will still work really well, and provide a fun way of revising.

The year 5’s will be covering two areas in particular – measuring of capacity and angles. There are many sites which can help to support this, but probably the best way of learning about capacity, is to ‘play’ about with cups and a variety of containers in the bath! (Even though they are 9 and 10, they still secretly love playing with the water!!)

Measuring Angles

http://www.sums.co.uk/playground/ss6/playground.htm this helps you to practice using a protractor to measure angles. Remember to put the ‘cross’ in the centre of the protractor, exactly on the point of the angle. This will help to make your measurement as accurate as possible.
http://www.hittingthetarget.com/hittingthetarget.php I love this! Learning angles through sports is a great interactive site which helps you to see the real life problems which you need to know angles for. It might even help to coach some budding Beckhams out there!
http://www.subtangent.com/maths/measures1.php click on measuring angles
http://www.primaryresources.co.uk/online/angle.swf guess the random angle
http://www.echalk.co.uk/Maths/angleEstimator/EstimatingAngles.swf this works best if you work in pairs. Make sure you click on HIDE the angle first, then reveal it to find out how accurate your measurement was.
http://www.amblesideprimary.com/ambleweb/mentalmaths/protractor.html one that we have used before on the interactive whiteboard in class.

Solving Problems using angles

http://www.echalk.co.uk/Maths/PrimaryNationalStrategy_Yr6/DfES-MathsActivitiesforyear6/sailing.html once you figure out the setting options, this is actually quite a good game to practice using your angles
http://www.bbc.co.uk/keyskills/flash/kfa/kfa.shtml This made me laugh, even though it was ‘a bit hard!! Make sure you have the volume turned up for this one!!
http://www.innovationslearning.co.uk/subjects/maths/activities/year6/angles/game.asp Brilliant!
http://www.hqprimary.co.uk/gorilla/ if you can do this, you are fantastic! See what the lowest number of attempts that you can make is.
http://www.sums.co.uk/playground/ss4/playground.htm a little bit easier, measuring the angles of turns up to 90 degrees.
http://www.lgfl.net/lgfl/leas/haringey/web/teachers%20section/KS2/ICT/Links%20&%20Resources/documents/clowns.swf burst the balloons by selecting the correct angle to turn.
http://www.oswego.org/ocsd-web/games/bananahunt/bhunt.html how many bananas can you find?
All of these maths games can be found by clicking either on the actual links, or by going to http://www.mathszone.co.uk/ where you can find lots of other examples for number work.

Year 5 Key Objectives for Numeracy
We will be assessing how many of the ‘Key Objectives’ the children have achieved in numeracy so far, and I came across some sites which may help to practice some of them.

http://www.freewebtown.com/weddell/mw/x10x100/x10x100.swf to be able to multiply and divide a number by 10 and 100
http://www.primaryresources.co.uk/online/negnumorder.swf to order a set of positive and negative integers (numbers)
http://www.freewebtown.com/weddell/mw/decimals/tenths-hundredths.swf to use decimal notation for tenths and hundredths
http://www.freewebtown.com/weddell/mw/rounding/nearest1.swf to round a decimal number to the nearest whole integer
http://www.amblesideprimary.com/ambleweb/mentalmaths/fracto.html to relate fractions to division and the nearest equivalent fractions
http://www.freewebtown.com/weddell/mw/add_sub/sub%20large%20nos.swf to calculate the difference between two large numbers
http://www.freewebtown.com/weddell/mw/short_multiplication/3x1contents.swf to carry out short multiplication
http://www.freewebtown.com/weddell/mw/division/3x1%20division.swf to carry out short division
http://www.freewebtown.com/weddell/mw/shape/area/area.swf to understand that area is measured in square centimetres. (cm2)

Revision

With just 3 weeks before the SATS to go, we are having the last push on those basics. One area that we have noticed in particular, is how many children are struggling to finish with the time given. We will be looking at ‘technique’ this week, and how we can maybe speed up what we are actually writing down. On Tuesday and Wednesday this week, the Year 6 children will be having a practice run in the hall, under test conditions, just so they are used to the format for May. This may seem very formal, but all schools across the country, have to follow these strict guidelines, to ensure that everyone has the same chance.

Maybe, you could help out at home, by having at look at some past papers and seeing just how much the children actually have to get through in the time given. You can download the papers from http://www.st-josephs-pickering.n-yorks.sch.uk/past_test_papers.htm

I have also updated the Bookmark site, and it you click on http://del.icio.us/amworrall/sats there are a few more sites which can help with your revision at home.

Here I Am

This week, we move on to the RELATE section of our Energy topic. We will learn about the wonder
and power of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost; the friends of Jesus being enabled to use their energy for their own good, and for the good of others.

The Pentecost story continues in the Church. The changing and transforming power of the Spirit is at work. Each year, Christians remember and celebrate the coming of the Holy Spirit on the first
Pentecost day. They ask for the gifts of the Spirit and pray that they will be changed and transformed by the energy and power that the Holy Spirit gives so that they may bring peace, joy, love and forgiveness to the world.

Maybe you could have a look to see what information you can find out about Confirmation.

Reminders

Could we remind all parents that as the weather is now much better, that all children must have correct PE kit (white t-shirt, blue shorts and black pumps) for all lessons. We still have a large number of winter outdoor kits in school, so any encouragement to take those home would be appreciated!
There may be lots of pieces of information that we need to pass to you over the next couple of week, so it is important that you check and sign your child’s diaries each week. Many thanks to the parents who already do this every week!

That’s all for this week!
5/6 team.