Goodbye 5B - you've been amazing! (21.7.22)

I can't believe the end of term has come so quickly but today was our last day together as 5B. We have had a great year together and you have all worked so hard. After all the disruption of Covid-19, you have worked so hard throughout the year and I am incredibly proud of all of you and will miss you all. I hope you have a lovely summer,

Love from Mrs Bendle :)

Our trip to Longbridge! (14.7.22)

We had a fantastic trip to Longbridge this week as part of this term's History and Geography topics. We had a walk round the shopping centre, looking at all the ways it has been regenerated since the Longbridge plant closed in 2005. We spent some time in Austin Park and found out a lot of facts and information about the history of Herbert Austin and his famous car factory by following the timeline path. We walked along to the bridge under the A38 where the public artwork 'Longbridge Colours' celebrates the area's long history with the car factory. However, the most successful and popular activity was interviewing shoppers to see where they had come from, how the got there and how often they visited Longbridge. We also carried out a survey to find the busiest shop - another very popular activity! We were really impressed by 5B's brilliant behaviour throughout the morning and received a lot of compliments from the members of the public that we chatted too. Finally, back at school, we spent the afternoon drawing sketch maps of the local area. 

Year 5 at the Commonwealth Games School Sports Day (1.7.22)

On Thursday 30th July, I took 23 children from 5B and 5S to a special sports day for local primary schools held at the Tudor Grange Leisure Centre to celebrate the upcoming Commonwealth Games which will be hosted in Birmingham the summer. I was so so proud of all the children - every one of them gave 100% and although we didn't win, we still had a fantastic day, cheering each other on and enjoying all the activities (especially the teacher's race at the end!) Well done all of you 

Comparing Life Cycles (23.6.22)

Over the last 2 weeks we have been learning about the life cycles of different mammals, birds, amphibians and insects. In Tuesday's lesson, we used Venn diagrams to compare the life cycles of these different animals, looking for similarities and differences - great work 5B!

Plant progress! (10.6.22) 

Back in March (as part of Science week) we planted 4 sunflowers seeds and 3 tomato plants and, as you can see from the photos, they are making great progress! Our tallest sunflower is now a whopping 66cm! Our tomato plants now have flowers, so we'll be adding different types of plant food to see which if it makes them grow a tomato more quickly. Hopefully we might get some tomatoes before the end of term!

Happy Half Term!

It was  busy week in school with lots of Platinum Jubilee activities happening. We had a brilliant plate painting workshop on Thursday morning - I was so impressed with some the plates that you decorated! Congratulations to Ruby and William, who won our Jubilee Art competition. Sadly, I wasn't in school today but I know you will have had a lot of fun taking part in the special singing assembly and picnic. I hope you all have a lovely half term and enjoy the extra bank holidays and jubilee celebrations with your families 

How is land used in different ways? (20.5.22)

We have now started our Longbridge topic and we spent Thursday's Geography lesson learning about the different types of land use. We had a range of pictures to sort out to help us identify how land can be used. This will help us in our next lesson, where we will be looking at the land use in Longbridge and starting to think about how it has changed over the years.

Don't forget that your entries into our Jubilee Art competition need to be handed in by Tuesday 24th May - good luck!

What are moon craters? (6.5.22)

This week in Science, we carried a fun (but slightly messy!) investigation linked to moon craters. We spent some time looking at what a crater is and why the moon has so many. Then we designed an investigation to answer the question - does the height of the drop affect the size of the crater?  We really focussed on taking accurate, repeat measurements in this lesson and there was some great team work from everyone - well done 5B!

How do we know that the Earth isn't flat? (29/4/22)

We have had some great discussions in 5B this week about how ideas about the Solar System have changed over time. In Guided Reading, we read about how people used to believe that the Earth (not the Sun) was at the centre of the Solar System and we were shocked to learn that Galileo was even arrested for suggesting the Earth actually orbited the Sun! Then in Science, after learning that some people used to believe that the Earth was flat (and why they might think that), we looked at evidence that proves that the Earth is, of course, a sphere. I am very proud of the work 5B produced this week - as you can see from the photos, it's brilliant!

Happy Easter!

We had a great last week in 5B, working hard but also having a lot of fun as you can see from the photos of this week's PE lesson where we played seated volleyball with beach balls!

I hope you all have a lovely break over the Easter holidays and I'm looking forward to seeing you all back on April 25th for our last term in Year 5!

Sunflower update!

As part of British Science Week, we planted seeds on Tuesday 15th March. As you can see from the photos, they are making excellent progress. Our sunflowers have all started to grow, with the tallest one measuring 12cm after just 2 weeks! Our tomato seeds have also germinated and started growing but nothing has appeared in the pot that contained some fertiliser (yet!)  Picture 4 shows our sunflowers a week ago - it's amazing how much they have grown in just one week!

Shakespeare Week (25.3.22)

We celebrated Shakespeare week by studying one of Shakespeare's most famous plays, Macbeth. We started the week by researching William Shakespeare to find out why he is still so famous and important today. Then we looked at the the first scene where Macbeth meets the three witches and we wrote a short narrative based on the scene. We finished the week looking at the spell that the witches cast later in the play. Here it is if you want to practise reciting it at home!

British Science Week!

This week the whole school has been celebrating British Science Week (BSW) and the theme for this year is 'GROWTH'.

We planted our sunflower seeds for the school competition to see which class can grow the tallest sunflower and we also planted tomato seeds to help us investigate the question 'Do plants grow bigger if you feed them?' We will be taking measurements of all the plants each week as we go the spring and summer term. We watched some fantastic clips from the BBC's Green Planet and some amazing time lapse videos of seeds germinating and growing.

Don't forget the BSW poster competition (hand in by April 1st) and Science Week quizzes should be returned by Tuesday!

Have a great weekend  and enjoy the sun 

Another Busy Week! (11/3/22)

Even though it's only the second week of this half term, it has been another busy week in 5B! In English, we have finished reading our class text and we have started to write our guides about how to care for a house with chicken legs and in Maths we have been learning about how to add and subtract fractions with different denominators. In Science, we have been learning all about the Solar System and in Geography we have been researching Mexico. Have a great weekend!

World Book Week 2022! (4.3.22)

We love our current class book,  'The House With Chicken Legs' and as our next piece of writing is going to be about how to care for a house with chicken legs, we decided to make our own! So this week (and to celebrate  World Book Day) we had great fun designing, building and decorating our very own houses with chicken legs.  We have already started to gather ideas and vocabulary for our writing and I can't wait to see the finished houses next week! More photos to follow ...

Investigating water resistance! (10.2.22)

We had a brilliant lesson on Tuesday afternoon when we investigated the question - do all objects fall through water in the same way? Each group had a piece of plasticine, which they made into different shapes and we investigated how long the shape took to fall through the water. We discovered that if the plasticine was squashed into a flatter, wider shape it fell more slowly because there was........... more water resistance. I was really impressed with the great team work and accurate measuring!

Next week is our last week of this half term - don't forget that I am going on the Year 6 residential trip so 5B will have the pleasure of being taught by Miss Harris for the week! Have a great weekend 

Fabulous Fractions! (4.2.22)

Even though it was 'No Pens Day', there was still lots of great Maths learning taking place in 5B on Thursday. We had a great time playing equivalent fractions board games and matching pairs and it was lovelt to hear you all talking about Maths and having so much fun. We also did some drama activities linked to our class text and made lots of time for some circle time games and chat 

What will Marinka do next? (27.1.22)

We have reached a fantastic part of our class book, The House With Chicken Legs this week. There have been so many twists, revelations and a jaw-dropping cliffhanger yesterday that we really don't know what might happen next! We spent a great lesson on Tuesday getting into role as Marinka, doing some drama activities and trying to put ourselves in Marinka's shoes to help our writing next week. Keep on bringing in any cardboard recycling (boxes and tubes) as we will be making our very own chicken leg houses in a few weeks. In addition, if you have any old magazines at home, please bring them in to help with your Art lesson next week 

When did the Mayans live? (21.1.22)

This week in History, we investigated when the Mayans lived. We found out that the Maya civilisation began over 3000 years ago and they were still around when the Vikings were living in Britain. We ordered some of the important Mayan events and inventions and discovered that they were very advanced and skillful. They had built huge cities, pyramids and invented a solar calendar and a system of writing a very long time before the people living in Britain did - the Maya really were a clever bunch!

Food Tasting! (13.1.22)

On Monday, in preparation for writing a recipe, we tried Borscht - a traditional beetroot soup from Russia. The recipe features in our new class book, The House With Chicken Legs and before we start writing the recipe, I thought we all needed to know what Borscht tasted like! Some of us were more keen than other but we all agreed it will really help when we write our recipes next week!

In Geography, we used atlases to investigate where the Ancient Maya lived and located the countries in Central America - we'll be learning more about the Maya next week in History.

A couple of reminders:

PE is on Monday - please ensure you come to school in PE kit (a white T-shirt, black tracksuit trousers.)

Homework books and new homework grids have been sent home this week. Children may bring homework in each week throughout the half term or in one go by the hand-in date. In addition to the homework grid, children should also be reading and practising times tables and spellings each week at home.

Happy New Year and Welcome Back! (7.1.22)

It was lovely to welcome the class back on Wednesday for the start of the spring term. Even though we were only in school for 3 days, we have already started new topics and done some great work already! We are now learning about the Maya civilisation in History, our new Science topic is Forces and in English, we have started our new class text called The House With Chicken Legs.

One change this term is that, our weekly PE lesson will now take place on a Monday afternoon, so please ensure children come to school dressed in PE kit on Mondays, starting from next week (10th Jan)

Have a great weekend 

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE! (17.12.21)

We have all had a brilliant last week in 5B. We have worked incredibly hard on creating our bridges and celebrated the end of term with a fun-filled Christmas party on Thursday afternoon. I hope you all have a great holiday and see you all in the new year! 

Can we make a gas from a solid and a liquid? (9.12.21)

This week in Science, we investigated irreversible changes by creating a gas! We discovered that if you add Bicarbonate of Soda (also called Baking Soda) to vinegar a chemical reaction happens which produces a gas (carbon dioxide). The reaction caused our balloons to inflate which caused A LOT of excitement!

I was really proud of the class on Thursday for their excellent performance as part of this year's Christmas show - I can't wait to see the finished video! Have a great weekend - just one week to go! 

The Christmas Countdown is on! (2.12.21)

This week, as well as doing some great work in all of our lessons, we have been practising our Christmas song for our whole school recording next week. The Year 5 song is We Three Kings Of Orient Are - there is a link below if you would like to practise at home!

In English, we have written some excellent narrative poems based on The Highway Man and in Maths we have finished our work (for now!) on written division. In Science, we learned all about separating mixtures using filtering, sieving and evaporating and in History, we have been looking at different historical sources, which can help us to understand what the Vikings might have really been like. Finally in Reading, we are continuing with The Nowhere Emporium - you could have heard a pin drop in our class on Thursday when we learned that Lucien Silver has disappeared!

Have a great weekend - enjoy your advent calendars! 

Another busy week! (25.11.21)

It's been another busy week in 5B. We had our last swimming lesson on Tuesday - the whole class have made excellent progress over the last 10 weeks! We have been learning how to use funnels and filter paper to separate mixtures in Science, division in Maths and we have loved our lessons learning about the classic narrative poem, The Highwayman in English - see if you can impress someone at home by reciting the first verse!

Have a great weekend 

Does hot chocolate have to be hot? (19.11.21)

We continued to investigate dissolving this week by carrying out an experiment to see if the temperature of the water makes a difference when we are making 'hot' chocolate. We discovered that the temperature of the water makes a really BIG difference and the hot chocolate powder dissolved much more quickly when the water was hot, some of us found that in ice-cold water, the powder didn't dissolve at all and we definitely didn't want to drink it! 

An important announcement! (11.11.21)

We had very exciting news this week in 5B when we found that our new school council members will be Hope and Ammar!

I was so impressed with the speeches from all the children who put themselves forward and I know it will have been a tough choice for the children who were voting. I know that Ammar and Hope will do a wonderful job of representing 5B!

I have also included some pictures of our Science lesson, where we investigated which materials dissolve - remember to keep an eye out at home for any soluble and insoluble materials!

Have a great weekend 

What a great start! (5.11.21)

We have had a great first week back in 5B. We have started our new book, The Nowhere Emporium (which we love!) and in Geography this week, we used our atlases to locate and explore the UK's counties and major cities.

Have a great weekend 😊

More hard work in 5B!  (15.10.21)

As we head towards the end of our first half term, 5B are working harder than ever! In English we have been perfecting our skills of persuasion by writing letters which will hopefully persuade me to award everyone in 5B a pen license! I have been very impressed with your persuasive skills so watch out at home! I am looking forward to awarding pen licences on Monday - I think lots of you will be very happy! We had another great history lesson on Wednesday where we discovered what the life of children was like in Anglo-Saxon times.

Tuesday's swimming lesson was a great success with so many of the class making great progress with their swimming skills. Finally, we are heading towards then end of our class text, The Boy at the Back of the Class. We can't wait to find out if Ahmet is going to be reunited with his family - we're keeping our fingers crossed!

Have a great weekend 

Another busy week in 5B! (7.10.21)

We started the week with an excellent Science lesson on Monday, investigating which cup was the best thermal insulator. We took measurements to see which cup would keep a hot drink the hottest and a cold drink the coldest! We'll be looking at the results next week. We had our 4th swimming lesson on Tuesday and it's great to see how much progress the children are making already. We also took part in some food tasting this week which was very exciting! Ahmet, one of the main characters from our class text is a refugee from Syria and his favourite fruit is a pomegranate and as not many of the class had eaten one before, we all got the chance to try one - thank you to Oscar, Lara and Aimee for bringing them in!

Happy Historians! (30.9.21)

We have had a very busy week in 5B. On Monday, we tested a range of everyday materials to see if they were magnetic or could conduct heat or electricity. In English we have been writing diary entries based on our class book, The Boy at the Back of the Class and in Maths I have been very impressed with our work on written addition. BUT my favourite lesson this week was History, where we all took on the role of archaeologists to see what we could discover about Anglo-Saxon artefacts. We studied pictures of objects discovered in the Staffordshire Hoard and we used our detective skills to try and work out what they were. In our next lesson we will be learning more about the objects, the discovery of the Staffordshire Hoard and why it's a bit of a mystery - click on the link below if you want to find out more!

Have a great weekend 

Swimming success! (23.9.21)

Everyone came into school feeling very excited and eager for 5B's second swimming lesson on Tuesday. It is lovely to be starting swimming lessons again after they had to be postponed last year. I'm really looking forward to seeing the progress you make over the next few weeks.

Here are a few reminders for next week:

Long hair should be tied back.

Make sure your remember a towel (clearly named if possible)

If you come into school wearing your costume, please remember your underwear!

Have a great weekend and don't forget your kit on Tuesday!

What a great start! (9.9.21)

5B have made an excellent start to the new term and have been working hard already. We have been recapping place value in 4-digit numbers in Maths and we have started our new class reader (The Boy at the Back of the Class) in English. In Geography, we have been looking at the Oceans and Seas of the World and next week we will be starting to learn about the Anglo-Saxons.  I am really impressed with the way that the class have come back to school after the holidays and I am really looking forward to the rest of the year already!

Sadly no photos of the children this week but here are some pictures of some of the excellent work completed this week! 

Have a great weekend - don't forget that swimming is starting on Tuesday 

Welcome to the new 5B! 

Hello everyone! I am really excited to welcome you back to school on Monday and start the new school year together. I hope you have all had a lovely holiday and feel ready to start Year 5. Mrs Brotherton and I can't wait to welcome you back.

We will be doing swimming on Tuesday mornings for the first half term. This will take the place of our weekly PE lesson. Our first swimming lesson will be on Tuesday 14th September so there will be no PE lesson on the first week back.  On Tuesdays please come to school in SCHOOL UNIFORM (not PE kit) and please remember to bring your swimming costume and a towel to school with you - you will be getting changed at the swimming pool - don't worry I will go through all of this on Monday!

Enjoy your last few days of the summer holiday - I'm looking forward to seeing you all bright and early (8.35am) on Monday morning!

Mrs Bendle :)