| Year 5R |
Autumn Term 2008
(9.11.08) Urgent request for Tag Rugby Members- Only 6 children returned with requests for tickets for the Wembley tournament on Friday! I need to order 20 tickets to get the £15 per ticket special offer. PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE! Further money for tickets must be handed in by Monday or we will lose this opportunity. Thanks MW. URGENT MESSAGE FOR TAG RUGBY CLUB MEMBERS (6.11.08)
We have been provided with a special package of tickets that enables one representative from your child's family to attend the tournament and indeed the Barbarians v Australia match in the evening. As things stand the children will be given a tour of the stadium between 3 and 4 p.m before taking part in the tournament from 4 - 5 p.m. Then they will be given time in some of the recreation areas before watching the international match at 7.45p.m. Yes - it will be a late one! This one parent per child ticket costs only £15 but allows the parent to not only watch the tournament, but also to stay on to watch the Barbarians take on the Australias as well! As I understand - during the tournament, parents can sit with the children as the stadium will be practically empty, but will have to move to their allocated seat if they wish to stay on to watch the match. i.e. Parents will not be able to sit with the children during the Barbarian match. However, parents are free to come and go as they please throughout the day. For example, you might wish to come along just to watch the tournament and not the Barbarians match. This is fine! There are in the region of 80 schools taking part ages 9 to 16, with Year 10 starting off their tournament at 11a.m that day. THEREFORE, IF YOU WOULD LIKE A TICKET TO SEE YOUR CHILD PLAY AT WEMBLEY FOR JUST £15.00, PLEASE SEND IN A CHEQUE MADE PAYABLE TO 'ST.MICHAEL'S SCHOOL' BY TOMORROW!! OF COURSE, WE ARE SURE THAT IN SOME FAMILIES THAT BOTH MUMS AND DADS WOULD LIKE TO COME. IF YOU WOULD LIKE AN ADDITIONAL TICKET, PLEASE WRITE A NOTE WITH THE CHEQUE AND IF DEMAND IS SUFFICIENT WE WILL ENDEAVOUR TO SEE IF WE CAN GET FURTHER TICKETS SIMILARLY PRICED. IF THIS IS IMPOSSIBLE, ADDITIONAL PARENTS MAY HAVE TO PAY THE FULL PRICE WITH TICKETS PRICED FROM £30. We apologise if the information is a little vague at the moment, but we are receiving this information in dribs and drabs from the RFU. By sending in a cheque for £15 with a request note, we can at least get the ball rolling and show the RFU that we are willing and able. Something that we feel - in a nutshell - is the message they are conveying to us. Again...apologies for the short notice. Please feel free to speak to Mr. Whiting in the top playground prior to school tomorrow for further details. NB: ALL CHILDREN WILL NEED BOOTS WITH STUDS TO TAKE PART IN THIS TOURNAMENT. THOMAS BLOOR Children's writer Thomas Bloor will be visiting Year 5 on Monday 17th November 2008. Thomas will be carrying out a workshop based on the theme of transformation or metamorphosis (Werewolves, Greek myths, Kafka etc.) and how his Worm in the Blood trilogy fits into that tradition. He will be do a short reading, talk about stories and story writing. He will also be asking the children to carry out an exercise using shoes as a starting point, in which they invent a character and then begin to imagine a dramatic transformation scene involving their character. The session will end with a Q & A session on writing and time will be allowed for signing books. (15.10.08) Writing the book review for the storybox project.
(12.10.08) Mrs Smith would like children to take part in an exciting poetry recital competition. For details follow the link. Come on 5R have a go! http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/teachers/offbyheart/ (6.10.08) Homework Project - Children should be furnished with information regarding the character aspect of their project over the next day or two. A copy of which will be posted on this website. (6.10.08) Tudor Day Trip for Year 5. We are all getting very excited about our brilliant day out to the Globe and Bloomsbury Theatres. Please ensure your children bring coats and have packed lunches containers that are disposable. May we remind you that NO spending money is required as there is simply no time for trips to the shops. Teachers attending are Mr. Whiting, Mr. Ross, and Mrs Ronelle Smith our history teacher this year. We will also have the pleasure of the company of two Learning Support Assistants in Traci and Dina. No parent helpers are required. Look out for photos of the day on this site soon. (1.10.08) Homework Project: On the homework sheet we stated the following for this week: Draw a floorplan or map to scale to represent the box/house/setting within the story. Make and fit internal fixtures such as furniture, setting, features related to story. Use mm and cm to measure things carefully. Write a page recording details of the project so far. When we said to scale it really depends on what you think your child is capable of. The most important thing is that characters are proportionate to the objects and setting around them. More able mathematicians might be encouraged to measure themselves compared to other objects, walls, etc in their room at home and calculate approximately how much bigger or smaller they are in relation to other things as preparation. This will ensure that we don't have characters draw towering over a door or tree!
As far as recording what they've done so far, there are maybe two means of approach. 1. Write a diary of all the ups and downs of the project so far. 2. Just write an explanatory piece of writing on how you carried out each stage. Cartoon style diagrams of each stage might be fun especially for lesser able children. At the end of the day we just want to see effort and attention to detail. Spellings should be accurate and include words from their lists. An effort to apply sentences from the sentence sheet we provided will also go down well. Hope this fun picture helps the children understand scale!!
(30.9.08) Tudor Trip - no parent helpers are needed for this trip as we have enough staff available. Children will need packed lunches and no spending money is necessary. We will return at approximately 4.30 p.m so please be available to collect your child from this time. (24.9.08) Just to let you know there will be a test focusing on a random selection of the children's spelling words within the next week. We have received most of the spelling sheets back now although some of these already have spelling mistakes! Be careful! :) (22.9.08) Mr. Whiting spent the weekend talking with Henry VIII to find out what really happened during his reign! YEAR 5 will be finding out soon too when they see the 'Terrible Tudors' at the Bloomsbury Theatre as well as through their history lessons.
(22.9.08) Sorry! We handed 4 (and not 3) pieces of paper out today. 1. Homework Writing Task. 2. Spelling words sheet. 3. 'Harwell Hall' story. 4. The spelling sentence sheet. Copies of some of these will be attached to this website soon. Don't be scared by all the info. Each child should look to do things to the best of the ability in the time available but please practise the sentences regularly at home. There will be a new spelling sentence sheet each half-term. NB: Instead of completing the spelling word sheet, you may wish to photocopy the one on the back of the original sheet instead. Confused?? We understand! Feel free to speak to us any time and we will do our best to help you. (21.9.08) Sorry, didn't get the spelling chart out to you as promised!!It will be out Monday together with a sheet that explains everything you need to know about the writing tasks. Also included will be a spelling sentence sheet for this half-term. In Year 5 we highly recommend that your child learns and applies these sentence structures within their homework where appropriate and also in any other written tasks that they may do at home. One of the benefits of the old approach from last year was the constant focus on sentence level work which enabled the children's writing to develop in maturity and coherency. These sentence forms will be studied in class but homework should compliment this not ignore it to ensure consistency and progress. The sentences will become more complex as we progress through the year. The more they practise at home the better. We would really like to see these sentence forms in their homework without - of course - suppressing their creativity. Anyway, make sure your child has 3 pieces of paper with them when they come home on Monday. Speak soon! AR
Class reps!! I'm not at all scary! Where are you? Please come and see me soon! AR
(17.9.08) Copy of letter sent out to children today re: school trip. (See printable version right) Dear Parent/Carers,
Year 5 normally visit the Globe Theatre as part of their studies of the Tudors this term. This trip has been highly beneficial in developing the children’s understanding of the works of Shakespeare and indeed the Tudor lifestyle. Not only do the children take part in an excellent workshop on the story of Macbeth, but they also have a fascinating tour of the Globe itself. With a trip to the souvenir shop, the whole experience lasts about 2 hours until lunchtime.
This year, however, there is an opportunity not to be missed at the Bloomsbury Theatre. The Birmingham Theatre Group will be performing a ‘Horrible Histories’ style production of ‘The Tudors’. Those of you familiar with the Horrible History books will understand how entertaining and fascinating they are to young children with all their gruesome details!! As a school we receive a reduced price per child. Here is a copy of the promotional statement advertised by Bloomsbury Theatre:
The Terrible Tudors
Therefore, we are looking to combine the two events to provide the children with a fabulous day out. The date for the trip in a lifetime is Thursday 9th October 2008. We will arrive at the Globe Theatre in time for the workshop and tour at 10.30 a.m. After a short lunch break at 12 noon we head off to the Bloomsbury Theatre in time for the 1.30 p.m performance of the Tudors. To ensure time is allowed to travel between the two venues and to save on some cost, we will not be visiting the Globe Theatre souvenir shop. We will be travelling by coach. The return time has yet to be confirmed, but it is likely to be about 4.30p.m. This is to be confirmed later. The cost of the trip which includes transportation, Macbeth drama workshop, a Globe Theatre tour, and tickets to see ‘The Tudors’ is £24.00. We need this by Friday at the latest so that we can confirm the booking. Sorry for the late notice but it was beyond our control. If you have any difficulties with the payment for the trip, please do not hesitate to speak to one of us. We will inform you soon if we require any additional adult help. (This needs to be returned with the slip attached to the letter) Creative Reading (17.9.08) You may be wondering what the 'books read' column is all about on the right-hand side of the homework project sheet. Regular reading this year is very, very important and this column is just a little reminder to ensure regular reading is taking place at home. Here is a copy of a letter placed on last year's Year 5 website about the importance of reading effectively. The same can be said of this year. May I share my thoughts on what seems to be a growing trend in Year 5 classes in recent years. Many children continue to struggle grammatically, structurely, and creatively; especially in story writing. It is essential that reading and writing are united in any approach to literacy development and not perceived as separate entities. Everyone knows that in order to write, you must first be able to read. So it stands to reason: if you would write well, you must read well. And I don't just mean you can read per se, or even read fast or eloquently. You must read creatively. 'Well' means 'effectively' as well as 'creatively' in this instance. What is creative reading? It first must create mental alertness by inspiring your imagination. How else will you stay awake or remember what you've read? Next, creative reading should train your eye in style, layout, and grammar; and not just phonetically or for the content. Creative reading provides the ammunition for creative writing. A gun lacks fire without its bullets and vice-versa! I'm not saying that every reading session should involve creative reading all of the time!! No! No! To enjoy the content of a good story or piece of non-fiction is vital too. But the earlier we can train a child to be the creative reader; the better the writer and subsequent speaker of the English language they will become. The same principal is evident in music. If a child learns to read music as a language as soon as they can pick up a fiddle or a drumstick, then the easier it is to become the fully accomplished musician. It - like creative reading - becomes second nature. Many children in Year 5 can read very well indeed and have excellent comprehension skills when it comes to dissecting the content for meaning. However, when asked to interpret the stylistic and grammatical elements a sudden mist descends in front of them. 'Nough said! We shall look to improve this as teachers. Is it something parents can help with too? I hope so! Michael W Homework Projects - Importance of the writing tasks (16.9.08) The most important aspect of the writing/spelling within the project in Year 5 is that the children take seriously the advice given them. It is a project that cannot be done half-heartedly as it contains a half-term's worth of tasks essential for progress. It is a project that every child should do to the best of the ability. It should be neat and show effort. Every word should be checked for spelling before handing it in. We will not see the booklet until just before half-term so it is important every task is done carefully so that progress is made. Sentence structure is crucial without suppressing their creativity. This is being covered in class weekly. Last year's homework focused on this significantly. We will be sending home examples of sentence structures we want the children to practise at home. They should show evidence of these in their project where appropriate. Regular practise of these forms really helps!! Copies of these sentences will also be placed on this site later this week. What about spelling and tests? Children should promptly collect all of their synonyms and begin practising how to spell them with -ed and -ing suffix endings where appropriate (the verbs). Randomly throughout the term we will test the children on a selection of these words until hopefully by the end of half-term they achieve a good standard. Results will be sent home. At first, it does not matter too much if your child scores poorly in the first test, as long as they show improvement in the subsequent tests leading up to the final test just before half-term. There will probably be about 4 random tests. Vocabulary and sentence level work is essential this year. We really recommend that the researched vocabulary words are handy to see near your child's desk at home throughout the year so that these words become embedded in their head! The same can be said of the sentence structure sheets mentioned earlier. Children must learn their times-tables regularly and not just the basics. All of you were provided with examples of the types of questions that you child will be asked. Groups will be identified soon. Again tests will be carried out randomly over the year. The homework sheet provides you with a guideline to which tables will be focused upon and when. For example, the first test will be concentrating on x 6 and x 9 sometime in the next week or so. Again results will be sent home so that time can be spent improving before the next test later in the term/year. That is all for now. Please come and say hello if you want anymore help or advice. NB: If you would like to utilise any of the spelling homeworks from last year to aid your child, many are available to download in the 5W archive file for 2007-2008. (15.9.08) The homework for this half-term was handed out today. Please don't panic! All the information you need will be given out to the children and posted on this website every week. This week the children should only focus on collecting their spelling words (make sure there are no easy one please where possible) and start their project as suggested on the sheet. DO NOT try to do anything ahead because info on how to complete these tasks will be sent out weekly. I will be posting further information later this week to explain how this homework works! Bye for now! P.S Where are my class reps?? |
(16.11.08) 
(6.11.08) Tag Rugby - Yes it's true! 17 lucky children from Year 5 will be taking part in a tag rugby tournament at Wembley Stadium on Wednesday 3rd December 2008. They will be playing against teams of similar ability. Further details of this amazing event will be with you soon, but for now we have a special urgent message for parents who might want to come along.
The following advice on how to write the book review is a guide and is by no means compulsory. How your child goes about the review is entirely up to them. However, a good standard should be achieved if these guidelines are followed.
(18.9.08) Have your children written down all their spelling words for this half-term? I have decided to send out a chart for the children to fill in their words. This chart should be returned to me by Monday please so I am aware of what words to include in tests. 
At the beginning of every week we will provide the children with information and guidelines on how to carry out the written tasks. It is important that you collect these. Copies of which we will place on this website.
