This week, the children have been reflecting on their time here at North Tawton Primary School in order to write a piece for the leavers' book that they will all receive at the end of term.  This book is once again being paid for by the FONTS so thank you once again to the small team of volunteers that raise money to make things like this possible.
We are now in the last few weeks of term and we are starting to look forward to our transition to secondary school.  We had a visit from Mrs Hachipuka, the current head of Year 7, who answered the children's questions which were mostly food and playtime related!!  She encouraged them to look at their website, particularly the transition information: https://www.okehamptoncollege.devon.sch.uk/year-6-transition-information.html
In our RSE lesson today, we thought a bit more about the changes ahead and the responsibilities that children will soon have and the increased independence they will have.
We have been looking back on our learning over the last year, and indeed the whole of primary school, in preparation for the end of year assessments we will do next week. I have set revision homework on fractions and reading comprehension using the end of section questions in the study guide.
Miss Ruby has really enjoyed teaching Sycamore Class this week.  She was impressed with their behaviour at swimming and impressed with their maturity during their DT lesson using tools to make their playground models.  (See the pictures in the gallery)
The class shared our new Team Points song which was written by Kenzie and performed brilliantly after only one day's practice.  The video and words are attached below.
Until next week... 


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Good afternoon everyone.  It has been an active week for year 6 this week.  They went swimming on Tuesday - they all really enjoyed this and were really well behaved and a credit to the school.  Miss Penny was impressed with their confidence in the water.  Thank you to Miss Ruby and Mrs Robins for taking them.  We also had Quad Kids on Thursday (an inter-schools athletics activity run by OCRA) and then our normal PE lesson today with Saints.  We also managed to fit in: finishing our story chapters, maths lessons on angles + an arithmetic test, investigating living things in science, guided reading, spelling, French, RSE(puberty) and RE!!!! They really are working hard.  Our RSE lesson today was about puberty.  If children want to use websites to find out more encourage them to use the websites recommended below as searching randomly may bring up inappropriate or just incorrect information.  I will post the website links below.
On Monday, we will be having a visit from the head of Year 7 from Okehampton college to talk to them all about transition.  Next week, we will spend more time preparing for our leavers' assembly and  leavers' book as well as preparing for assessments in the following week.  For homework, I have asked children to use their revision books to go over any areas that they feel less confident in, in maths and reading.  This might include fractions, as well as prime numbers, square numbers, cube numbers, multiples and factors as it has been a while since we covered those things.  In reading they might like to look at inference and language choice as these are sometimes the sort of questions they find more difficult.  They also have 10 spellings to learn for next Friday.  I would like children to bring their revision books every day next week and then if we have any time we can do a bit of revision in class.

"Have we only been back for a week?" one of the children asked me today!  I know exactly how they feel.  We have crammed so much learning into one week that it feels like we've already been back much longer. 
The children completed their work on ancient civilisations with an interesting debate on which civilisation was the best and why.  This was an opportunity for them to, not only develop their critical thinking, perspective and judgement about historical events, but also to practise their oracy skills which are getting stronger all the time.
We have used drama this week to plan the next chapter in The Story of Antigone and started our practice writing stage of the sequence.  Earlier in the week, the children had a go at writing a 'crow's eye view' of a battle in Ancient Greece.  These were very effective descriptions - children are making good progress in their writing.
We have begun our final science unit (Living things and their habitats) and children have already been exploring the orchard for living things.  This afternoon, they found a toad making one of the huge tractor tyres its home!
Today we had the first in a series of Relationship and Sex Education lessons which covered ground rules for our sessions and the anatomically correct names for boys' and girls' body parts.  I intend to deliver the next four lessons over the next four Fridays which cover puberty, relationships and human reproduction.  You may find the following websites useful if your child has questions:
www.childline.org.uk
www.nspcc.org.uk
www.nhs.uk/Livewell/puberty/Pages/Pubertyinfoforchildren.aspx
 www.kidshealth.org/kid/
www.bbc.co.uk/education/topics/z3xxsbk
www.thinkuknow.co.uk
The children enjoyed their PE lesson with Mr Stronge today which will be athletics this half term.  Additional to this, Mr Foreman has organised an afternoon of athletic activity for us next Thursday called Quad Kids.  They will need to wear PE kits to school, therefore on Thursday and Friday next week.  As you know we will be starting swimming lessons next Tuesday as well - I have attached a copy of the letter sent home this week. Please return the slip by Monday.  It's going to be an active week!
Children have been set revision homework on division in maths and retrieval in reading as well as spellings.  I have also given them a new homework topic web today and I will also post a copy on this website. I will set revision homework for the next few weeks until we complete our assessments week commencing 28th June.  I have encouraged children to use the revision books to go over areas of maths or reading that they need to as well as the revision I have set.
Have a great week - the weather looks set to be sunny- please remember to send children to school wearing sun protection and with a hat next week.