Week ending 14th October 2022

Maths
This week in maths we have continued with our unit on the four operations, focusing on the rules of divisibility, prime numbers to 100, identifying and investigating square and cubed numbers and multiplication of a 3- or 4-digit number by a 2- or 3-digit number (we did recap multiplying a 3- or 4-digit number by a 1-digit number first!)  For this the children need to be secure with their times tables but also how to lay out a multiplication calculation in columns.  Again, it is beneficial if the children can be secure with their times tables before they get to Year 6 in order to be able to understand this. As a result, maths homework this week will be putting these skills into practise.

French
In French this week (which took place on a Friday afternoon due to the Harvest festival) we focused on the learning question, “I can understand others introducing themselves” and “I can recognise and understand introductory questions.” For this they had to recap much of the previous language taught with regards to introductions/feelings and nationalities.

P.E. 
We had our second swimming session, and it was great to have all the children in the pool together in two groups. Again, they have almost an hour in the pool with their instructors and as per the first session this was full of smiles. We also began to build up some miles towards our ‘mini marathon’ inspired by the London marathon. We have signed up to complete this challenge over the next few weeks and will be totalling the miles as we go!

Harvest Festival
Our Harvest festival and Dingle Dangle Scarecrow day took place today and it was a poignant occasion, thinking it will be the children’s last harvest in primary School. The children joined in with singing and carefully and maturely helped our Reception children walking to church. they were each paired up and held hands together so they felt safe. It was a very touching moment. Well done Year 6. The children also looked brilliant, dressed up in their outfits! We had scarecrows, farmers, farm cats and cows! Thank you for your kind donation which will be distributed to families in our town. 

​English:
We have begun our 'practice writing' and we are writing poetry about hares in the style of Jackie Morris 'I am cat'.  The children have written creatively and with quite some flair using hyphenated adjectives, similes and metaphors as well as the power of three.  We hope to share some of their writing with you in our parents assembly next week.

Science
We had fun investigating chemical changes this week in science.  We found that when you mix bicarbonate of soda with vinegar the results are quite explosive.  The children learnt that this is because a chemical reaction is taking place in which new substances are formed and a gas is produced (hence all the bubbles).

History
We turned to our local area this week to think about the impact of the Industrial Revolution on Devon.  We learnt how the mining and export of copper and tin increased the economy of the area.  We also realised that it was around this time that Okehampton railway station opened and created a link between London and Okehampton and Plymouth changing the lives of people in the South West.

Life Skills
Miss Penny led the class in an exploration of friendship this week.  The children thought about what makes a 'good friend' and the children then used drama to create a video about friendship.

​ Thank you all for your continued support. Have a wonderful weekend and we will see you next week.