This week, Italy Class visited a local art studio for a workshop on the theme of ‘The Dot’.  All the children had a really positive experience; it was a lovely calm morning and everyone learned some new painting techniques. We are looking forward to seeing all the artwork displayed at school in our own gallery.

On Friday, we explored the Maya number system discovering that the Maya worked in base 20 using shells, stones and sticks to represent zero, one and five.  Everyone made great progress in understanding how to read and write numbers using the Maya system.

Year 5 enjoyed a dance workshop on Tuesday based on the book ‘Kensuke’s Kingdom’ by Michael Morpurgo, which we had read last term.  They retold the story through dance and mime; the final performance was fantastic!

In our final lesson on earthquakes, Year 5 learnt about how and why engineers construct earthquake proof buildings. After identifying the  factors that make buildings withstand earthquakes, the children designed and made an earthquake-proof structure using marshmallows and straws.  To find out if the design was successful, the structure was tested on a ‘ground’ of jelly.  We all had a fun, challenging and sticky afternoon!

This week, we had a virtual visit from the author Cathy Cassidy who talked about her books, particularly her latest book in the Lost and Found series Forever Phoenix.  She shared stories of her early writing days and about her life as a children’s writer.  Cathy gave her top tips for daydreaming and also read from two of her books which counted towards our minutes for the 200 Million Minutes Reading Challenge. We even got to meet her pet tortoise!

Year 5 are very enthusiastic about the 200 Million Minutes Challenge which we started on World Book Day.  Everyone is keeping a tally of how many minutes they read for each day, at home and at school, and this week the champions of Italy Class are…Zac and Maggie!  Well done both of you!

To celebrate Science Week we had a virtual visit from James, a local Reserve Warden for Norfolk Wildlife Trust.  He talked to the children about his job as an ecologist and the wildlife of the Brecks. Year 5 asked lots of questions about his job which involves monitoring the population of different species and maintaining this important habitat.  He shared some interesting specimens from his collection of animal skulls and feathers.  Year 5 have recently completed their ‘Home for Nature’ competition designs and were able to tell James all about their designs and received some really interesting feedback.  

Here’s some more Year 5 work which was completed just before the half term holiday.  We are so impressed with how hard you are all working at home. You should all be very proud of yourselves.

Here’s a selection of work completed by Italy Class at home: Character descriptions, coding, multiplication and volcano diagrams. Fantastic work, everyone!

Here is some of the work completed by Year 5 at school.  The display shows persuasive writing completed at the end of the autumn term.  Italy class had strong views about fox hunting and were very passionate about getting their point across in their letters to our local MP.  All the children have joined in with an art lesson creating their own piece of art based on Van Gogh’s Starry Night with very impressive results. You will also see diagrams showing how volcanoes are formed as well as diagrams demonstrating why the Earth experiences day and night.  Excellent progress has been made by all of the children with multiplication and they have participated in discussions to interpret the quotes of Gandhi.