17/07/2020

Hello children and parents,

It has been lovely seeing some of you at the 'Keeping in touch' meetings for the last couple of weeks and sharing your lockdown challenges. I can't wait until September when you will all be coming back to school and I can continue teaching you in year 6. I've already started to plan for some of the things that we will be doing and am very excited to share them with you. I love teaching year 6 as it is your final special year in school and there are lots of new challenges and things to look forward to. I hope that you are not worried that the work will be too difficult because there will be plenty of opportunities to fill in any gaps that we missed in year 5. Working with us in year 6 will be Mrs Lynch and Mrs Quinlan at the beginning of the week and Mrs Sloan and Mr Grose at the end of the week - what a team!

I hope that you have a brilliant Summer holiday and look forward to seeing you all soon.

Kind regards

Mrs Wood

03/07/2020

Hello parents and children,

I hope that you are all well and looking forward to starting back at school, whether that is next Wednesday for the first 'Keeping in Touch' meeting or returning in September.

I hope that you have had a chance to have a look at all of the staff videos that are are on the school website, talking about our hobbies and happiness boxes. Next week, your challenge will be to write a 2 minute talk about a new skill that you have learnt during lockdown. I think that my new skill would have to be learning how to make a video of myself! I have more tutorials to add over the coming weeks so keep an eye on the 'Videos' section of our class page.

If you are coming to the 'Keeping in Touch' meeting next Wednesday, I am very excited to see you! Perhaps you would like to bring either your happiness box or talk about your new learned skill - or both!

I look forward to catching up with you all very soon.

Kind regards

Mrs Wood

24/06/2020

Hello class 5 parents and children,

Hope you are all well, enjoying the sunshine and looking forward to being able to get out and about a little bit more after 4th July.

As we wind down towards the end of the final Summer term, you will see that the home learning that we set will be slightly different. Rather than setting home learning packs which cover all of the curriculum, the focus will move towards fun, crafty and PSHE tasks. So, your lockdown challenges will consist of...

1. Music / Drama / Dance Activity
2. Creative / Craft & Design Activity
3. Social / Emotional Activity
4. Physical Activity
5. Spiritual / Reflective activity
6. Supporting the Community Activity .
7. Reading to Relax

I have already put next week's lockdown challenge on to the class page under home learning, so that you can have a sneaky peak before next week.

If you would like to continue with English home learning, you will still be able to access the tutorials and resources on the Oak Academy and Talk for Writing websites. I have also put all of the remaining WRH maths worksheets and answers on to the home learning page too, so you will still have access to them.

In addition, you will see that I have added a video section to our class page. Keep an eye out for new videos as I'm hoping to demonstrate how to crotchet and create some fun projects using crotchet, knitting and sewing.

Kind regards

Mrs Wood

16/06/2020

MATHS

Do you love a maths challenge? If you would like to have a go at some really tricky questions, take a look at the Maths Association website http://www.primarymathschallenge.org.uk/downloads.

Each year, the Mathematical Association run a competition for year 5 and 6 pupils; Some of the children in year 6 at St. Patricks chose to take part last year and really enjoyed it. If you would like to give yourself a maths challenge and enjoy tackling tricky questions, there are past papers to download on their website, (follow the link above.)

If you would like some more really tricky maths questions to have a go at, please contact me by emailing the school office FAO Mrs Wood.

There are also some brilliant resources on the Maths No Problem website for both KS1 and KS2 - https://mathsnoproblem.com/en/programs/school-at-home/. If you scroll down to the bottom of the page, there are some really useful videos which explain how to teach using the Concrete materials, Pictures, Abstract method and also bar modelling.

Mrs Wood

15/06/2020

Hello year 5 parents and children.

It's another glorious day of sunshine although it was nice to have some rain for the garden! I can imagine that all of the vegetables and plants that you are growing are really shooting up now and I hope that you are enjoying the fruits of your labour. In the Wood household, we are eating a lot of kale, chard, lettuce and spinach! I fear that my hair will turn green from all of the nutrients!! I wonder how your plants are growing.

It was lovely catching up with you on the phone last week and hearing about all of the things that you have been doing. Although I like to hear about the home learning that you are doing, it is equally nice to hear about the fun things that you are getting up to.

Thank you to the children who have shared their work to me by sending it to the school email address. I hope that you have had a chance to look at this week's home learning and decided what you are going to do. For English, I have put a different scheme of work called 'Talk for writing'. If you would prefer to still do the Oak Academy English lessons, there are some videos all about finishing the story of Little Red Riding Hood with an alternative ending.

As promised, I have included our final, final, final class photo in school uniform for you to see on the class page of the website. I'm afraid that any more entries are now too late. You all look fabulous.

Kind regards

Mrs Wood

04/06/2020

Hello year 5 parents and children. I hope that you had a lovely half term and are enjoying getting back into your home schooling routines again.The weather continued to be glorious during half term so I enjoyed lots of barbeques in the garden with my family.

This week I am back in school in the year 5 classroom with my bubble of children. It is so nice to see familiar faces again but the classroom seems very empty without you all!

This morning we watched a video about different sorts of social distance greetings that we can do. If you would like to have a look the link is https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMg6t-z8KEI. My favourite distance greeting is the Star Trek live long and prosper hand sign! I wonder what yours is.

Next week I hope to start my phonecalls to families so that I can catch up with you all. Unfortunately I won't be able to give a day or time as I will be fitting them into slots in my working day. I will start with the boys at the beginning of the week, so that will at least give you a rough idea!

Thank you to all of the parents that have sent in photographs for the class photo. I recieved a couple after the deadline but I haven't forgotten you! If you still would like to send in a photograph to be included, I will do a final final final version at the end of next week!

I look forward to catching up with you all soon

Kind regards

Mrs Wood

18/05/2020

Hello parents and children,

It was lovely catching up with you on the phone last week, it is so nice to hear your voices and to find out all about what you have been doing. I can hardly believe that we are nearly at the end of this half term - you have worked really hard at home and I am so proud of you all, parents included!

Don't forget that it still isn't too late to send in your photos for the class group photograph. You need to send one photograph in school uniform and one fun photograph to the school email address, (admin@st-patricks.wilts.sch.uk) FAO Mrs Wood. I've really enjoyed receiving the photos so far, especially the fun photos, and it would be great to see lots of you on the final picture. The deadline to send them to the office is 2:30pm tomorrow. I will then put the photo montages together before the end of term. If you would like a printed copy, please email the school office and it can be printed off for collection.

I hope that you all have a well deserved rest at half term and I look forward to catching up with you after the holidays.

Kind regards

Mrs Wood

10/05/2020

Hello parents and children,

I hope that you had a wonderful bank holiday weekend in the sunshine and were able to go outside to take part in the VE day celebrations. My family and I took our chairs out onto the drive, ate some delicious cake and joined in with our neighbours to sing "We'll Meet Again," after listening to the queen's speech. It was a very memorable and special way to commemorate the day.

Thank you to the children who have sent in photographs of their home learning, I hope that you have seen them in the class gallery. I am very impressed with the work that you have done - please keep sending it in. Thank you also to the parents who have sent in photographs for the year 5 class photographs. It is still not too late if you have not sent them in yet. Please send two photographs of your child, one in school uniform and a fun photograph, to the school office FAO Mrs Wood.

This week I will be making phone calls to families from the school office to see how you are getting on. I will start making the first phone calls on Tuesday morning, starting with the girls in the class.

I look forward to catching up with you all soon

Kind regards

Mrs Wood

04/05/2020

Hello parents and children,

I wonder how you are getting on this week. Have you tried any interesting enrichment activities or new challenges? I have been busy in the garden, caring for some seedlings that I planted last month and digging the borders ready to plant them out. I also took some cuttings from geraniums and grew them into new plants - I wonder if any of you tried that task for Science home learning. I take my dog Rosie for a walk every day and it is lovely to see the leaves on the trees coming out and the seasons changing.

I hope that you managed to log in to the Oak Academy website to take part in the first English lesson today. I watched the videos and really enjoyed them - I think that the teachers are very helpful.

Don't forget that on Friday, it is the commemoration of Victory in Europe Day. Look out for the brilliant resources from Miss Mcloughlin and Mrs Courtney so that you can join in with the Corsham community.

I look forward to hearing from you all next week.

Kind regards

Mrs Wood.

28/04/2020

Hello again children and parents!

I hope that you are well and managing to find things to do at home that keep you both healthy and happy. It was lovely catching up with you all on the phone last week to hear about how you are getting on and especially hearing the voices of the children in year 5. Thank you to Isla K who recited her poem to me over the phone - it really brightened my day! It sounds as if you have all been really busy and I'm impressed with the home learning that you have managed to complete -  I can imagine how tricky it is for working parents to juggle so many roles.

I will next be in school to make phone calls in the week commencing Mon 11th May. If you need to contact me at any other time, please send an email to the school office who will forward your message to me.

Thank you to the parents who have sent pictures of their children's work to me. It is so nice to see what you have been doing. If you have any home learning that you are particularly proud of and would like to celebrate - please take a photograph of it and email it to the school office FAO Mrs Wood. I can put it on to the school website on our class page or send an email message back to you. Please let me know if you are happy for your work to go on to the class page.

Please remember that if you are unable to access the home learning on the school website, there are hard copies that you can collect from the school reception area.

We have been very lucky with the beautiful weather up until now, but it looks as if we are in for quite a few rainy days. Perhaps you could start a project on something that interests you - find out about a person or period in history that you don't know anything about, test yourself on world geography or country's flags or have a go at colour mixing with a painting set.

If you enjoy maths and logic games you could have a go at playing 'Shut the Box' using playing cards and two dice or Mancala. If you don't have a mancala game you can make  one using old egg boxes and small stones or skittles https://artscrackers.com/2013/04/05/egg-carton-mancala/. There are instructions for how to play this two player game on the attached website.

Hope to hear from you all soon

Keep smiling

Mrs Wood

20/04/2020

Hello year 5 children and parents,

It was lovely being in school today, teaching a very small class! It was very strange not teaching year 5 though and I missed you all. I popped my head into the year 5 classroom to see if it is still there - and it is.

It was also lovely chatting with some of you on the phone today. I hope to catch up with you all by the end of the week, so if there is anything that you would like to ask me, get your questions ready . If you have any queries at any other time please drop an email to the school office and I can email a response back to you. 

From what I've heard the home learning is going well. Some of you have found it useful to stick with the timetable that I sent home in the home learning pack when the school closed. You will have seen that the new home learning is set out differently to give you the choice of how and when to do the tasks, whatever works best for you. Some of you had also noticed that I tricked you with the spellings by giving you some that you have already done! This was a test to see if anybody would notice!! Well done if you did spot my mistake - I have now updated the home learning on the website with new spellings. (Sorry!)

It would be lovely to celebrate some of your home learning on the school website class page, so if you have any art work from RE, or any other pieces of work that you are particularly proud of, please take a photograph and email them to the school office.

I look forward to catching up with you all soon

Kind regards

Mrs Wood.

17/04/2020

Dear Parents and Children,

I hope that you are all well and have had an enjoyable Easter. I wonder if you did any fun Easter activities during your time at home.

You will find on this page your first week of home learning for the Summer term which includes activities for maths and English and also learning tasks across the curriculum. Spellings have been set for each group so that you can still follow the same spelling programme. If you have access to the internet, there is a fantastic website resource for maths called White Rose Hub. This is the scheme that the school follows for maths so the children should recognise the same style of questions. Each day there is a video tutorial for parents and children to follow with additional questions to practice. If your child finds the maths concepts and questions too tricky, please take a look at the year group below.

Home Learning answers will be available to look at on the class page of the school website on Friday.

If you have any questions or queries, please contact me by emailing the school office and I will reply by email.

Kind regards

Mrs Wood

30/03/2020

Good morning year 5. I hope that you and your families are well and are enjoying your time at home together. I wonder if you completed some of the home learning enrichment tasks and which ones you chose. I would love to read your newspaper reports about the Highwayman and look forward to seeing your workbooks when you return to school.

Well done for completing your first week of Professor Assessor questions on Place Value and I have seen that some of you have already logged in this morning to start your next assignment on calculations revision. At the end of this week I will look at the questions that you have completed and set individual assignments over the Easter break for you to have a go at. The questions will be based on the answers that you submitted so that you can practice topics that you find tricky.

After the Easter holidays we will be starting new topics for Maths and English.

Keep working and keep smiling year 5!

You are all amazing

Mrs Wood

23/03/2020

Well done class 5 for logging on to Professor Assessor to complete the first maths home learning task today. I've had a look at how you are getting on. Keep up the good work.

Hope you are also enjoying the lovely weather.

Kind regards

Mrs Wood

PS: Check out Miss Wilkinson's Story Time reading on YouTube. It's a lovely story and so nice to see a familiar friendly face. Thank you Miss Wilkinson. xx

22/03/2020

Good morning year 5!

I hope that you are enjoying the sun and are itching to start your pack of home learning activities!

On your timetable you will see that your afternoons should include enrichment activities. You will already have received a large list of suggestions on a letter from Miss McLoughlin.

Here are a few more that you might like to try...

• Look in your toy cupboard with new eyes. Is there something in there that you have never played with or a kit that you didn’t complete building?
• Learn how to do tricks with a football or tennis ball.
• Plant some seeds.
• Work out how many of your steps would make a mile. Can you walk or run a mile around your house or garden? (Try not to wear the carpet out!)
• Find Cosmic Kids yoga on Youtube and join in with a yoga lesson.
• Help out with some household chores - perhaps you could wash the car or help with the gardening.
• Paint a picture in the style of a famous artist.
• Play hopscotch.
• Make a bug hotel in the garden.
• Make a bird feeder or a bird nesting box.
• Use old sheets or towels to make a den to play in.
• Use the sewing skills that you learnt in class to complete a new sewing project. Look on Youtube to learn how to do some new stitches.

Golden Book 19/03/2020

Tomorrow all of class 5 are in the Golden Book for their fantastic work on the Highwaman. This week we have written diary extracts, designed wanted posters and performed our version of the Highwayman poem to an audience of class 3. Well done class 5!

Spring term newsletter 2020

Dear Parents and Children,

I hope that you have had an enjoyable Christmas holiday and are now refreshed and ready to start a new term at school.  I am looking forward to getting to meeting parents at ‘Meet the Teacher’ on Tuesday 14^th January and hope that you are as excited as I am about the work that is planned for this term!

Curriculum

This term, the children will continue to learn about Ancient Greece in History and will also study North and South America in Geography. In English, we will be looking at the book ‘Varmints’ and using it to inspire writing on character descriptions, writing balanced arguments, newspaper reports, instructions and stories. In maths, we will be working on multiplication and division, fractions, decimals and problem solving. In Science we will be looking at materials and testing their properties. In PE we will be playing Netball and learning new team games. Our art and DT work will be connected to our English and History topics with a focus on watercolour painting and woodwork. In music this term the children will be learning songs from Musicals for a concert which will be performed with other local schools in Corsham School on Wednesday 5^th February.

Reading

Your child will continue to bring home a reading book every day to share with you. ’Free Reading’ books may be chosen from the class library or from home. Please encourage your child to choose books that are a little challenging for them to read. Comics and easy books are also great to read as they can improve comprehension skills and give ideas for story writing, but they will not stretch their vocabulary and reading ability. Please encourage your child to read with expression, and to express opinions about the characters in the story, the plot, and what might happen next. Reading books and reading record should be brought to school each day.

In year 5 this term, the children will be challenged to move up the class reading ladder. Reading records will be collected in on Mondays and a record kept of how many adult signatures there are to show that they have read at home. A small prize will be awarded to the first child to reach 100 reads. There can only be one signature per day, although your child may read more times than this! Weekends and school holiday reads will also count towards their total.

Music

Please save the date of Wednesday 5^th February in your diaries for the ‘Magical Musicals’ concert which will take place at The Corsham School in the evening. More details about the concert timings and tickets for parents to follow.

Spellings

A list of spellings for each week will be given out each week. Your child will be tested in class on Thursdays with the words listed and new spellings will be given out on Friday. We encourage children to learn spellings using the Look, Cover, Write, Check method, following the sequence:

LOOK at the word

COVER the word

WRITE the word

CHECK their spelling against the word.

Children will also be given fun strategies in class to help them to learn their spellings both in school and at home. In the case of spelling lists being lost, spare copies will be kept in the classroom – so no excuses!

Numeracy

The children in year 5 have been given login details for an online maths system called Professor Assessor. Numeracy homework assignments will be given for the children to complete on computers/tablets at home. Each child will get an assignment unique to them, to practise skills that have been taught in the numeracy lessons. In addition, the children will be able to use the ‘Times Tables Fun’ system on their Professor Assessor login. 

Home Learning

New home learning will be given out on Fridays. Please remember to hand home learning folders in each Thursday.

Water Bottles

Please ensure your child brings a named bottle to school every day, filled with water. The children are allowed to fill their water bottles up during the day if they run out. Please ensure water bottles are also taken home regularly and washed.

Uniform

Please ensure your entire child's uniform and PE kit is named, one school sweatshirt looks very like another!

PE

Our class PE lessons will be on Mondays and Fridays. I would advise children to bring their PE kits to school on Monday and keep them in all week.

Timetable of things to remember!

Please help your child to take responsibility themselves for the things that they need to remember.  Perhaps your child could cut out the timetable and place it somewhere at home or in their school bag to remind them each day.

I look forward to working with you and your child this year. If you have any queries please do not hesitate to see me at the end of the school day.

Kind regards, 

Mrs Wood

For more detail of curriculum planning, please see document below.