Blackfell Primary School

Welcome to Year 5 Autumn Term 24-25

Year 5 Science

Year 5 are really enjoying their science topic, Earth and Space. This week we have been discussing the question: why does the sun appear to move across the sky? Using a globe to represent the Earth and the light from the window to represent the sun, we looked at which countries are in daytime and which are night. We spun the globe to see what happens as Earth spins on its axis and related this to day and night and the number of hours in a day.

Hot seating

In Year 5 today, we really enjoyed hot seating. Our lesson was based on the novel Room 13 and focussed on the character, Fliss. We wrote questions we would like to ask her and discussed how we could make the questions more open to find out more about the character. After writing our questions, we took it in turns to be in role as Fliss in the 'hot seat'. We can't wait to find out what happens in the story next.

Year 5 Mental Health Day

Today is World Mental Health Day and to help raise awareness, we have have come to school in our yellow accessories. Bows, bandanas, bracelets and even nails were yellow. To mark the occasion during the day, we took a break from the screen and enjoyed doing some drawing and colouring. While we did this, we listened to some of our favourite music. It was a lovely, chilled end to the morning.

Finding Common Factors

This week, Year 5 have been learning about factors in maths. We made our own Venn diagrams and used them to help us find common factors. In our groups, we worked out the factors of both numbers before deciding which section of the Venn diagram each number should go in. Great maths and super teamwork!

Year 5 Disco

Year 5 had a great time at the disco this week. There was lots of singing and dancing; we are great movers. During the evening, we were also treated to some hotdogs, crisps and a drink. Well done to Bella who won the dancing competition!

NSPCC Workshop

Year 5 and 6 enjoyed taking part in an NSPCC workshop where we looked at some important topics including bullying and abuse. We discussed different scenarios to acknowledge when something is and isn't ok such as keeping secrets or sharing videos. By the end of the session, we were able to recognise when we might need to speak out and where we can go for support.

Year 5 Visit to The Beacon of Light

Year 5 have had a brilliant day visiting The Beacon of Light for the 'Coals to Goals Heritage Day'. We enjoyed learning about local heritage; in particular the mining industry. We took part in 4 different activities over the day. For the first session, we learned about the life of a miner and what it was like to work down the mine. We were all shocked to find out that children our age would have been working for 10 hours a day down the mine. Our teacher for the session, Bill, showed us some of the equipment that they used in the mines including a Davy Lamp and a yard stick. He also taught us two colliery folk songs. The second activity was a heritage trail. During a walk around the Stadium of Light. we had to look out for the different statues and monuments that link to the the history of both the colliery and the football club. After lunch, we spent some time learning about the history of the club including the club badge. We saw how the badge and strips have changed over the years and had the chance to design our own. Finally, we played some games in the sports hall. Our favourite was 'collect the coal' where we worked in teams to race to collect as much 'coal' as we could.

PSHE Friendships

In PSHE this week we have been discussing friendships. Through discussion, we know that friendships can have their ups and downs and that this is normal. In Year 5, we enjoy the friendships of others and we had some really good suggestions for what makes a good friend. We also talked about what to do when there is conflict within our friendships. In pairs, we looked at some scenarios where friends had fallen out. We wrote some advice for how the children could resolve the issues they were having.

Making Sun dials

In the lesson today we learned about sun dials and how they were used to tell the time. In pairs, we made our own sun dials and took them out to mark the shadows. Over the week we will mark the shadows at different times of the day to see how they changed.

Black History Month in Year 5

During Black History Month, Year 5 have been learning about the achievements of black people in the past and present day. As our science topic is Earth and Space, we chose to study the American astronaut, Mae Jemison. Mae's greatest achievement was being the first black woman in space. She is also an inspirational teacher, doctor and dancer. We enjoyed creating timelines of Mae's life and carried out some research to help us write a factfile.

Bikeability

The children in Year 5 have had the opportunity to take part in Bikeability. This is a programme designed to develop road sense, awareness of traffic dangers and build skills and confidence. On Monday morning, the children were given an introduction to the course, shown how to get on and off their bikes safely on the 'clean' side and learned how to use ABCD to check that their bikes are safe to ride. They spent the rest of the session on the yard developing confidence with riding and learning some skills that they would need for the rest of the course. During the rest of the week, the children were taught how to ride safely on the roads and were taken out of school to practise what they had learned. Some of the new skills we learned are: