5W Photos

Welcome to the new 5W 2023 -2024!

It's all happening this week ! Just when we thought it was safe to get back to the curriculum, there's a dance break! A team from FABRIC Centre for Advance Training came in to give Year 5 a taster of Jump Start ,  creative dance experiences for 7 - 11 year olds! Some were slightly hesitant, but after warm-up activities, there were some really exciting dance moves emerging around the hall. Sadly, photos don't do justice to the medium of dance - there was a lot of action and movement!

Space - Supporting Science Topic in Spring2

We began  the day with a rocket workshop - how do we propel a rocket to the Moon? There were several interesting demonstrations - and one very loud bang! All you need is a Pringles tube, a heat source and a bladder of hydrogen -perhaps don't try this at home!

We looked around some very interesting, interactive exhibits and then visited all the planets in the Solar System  - and some of their moons - in the amazing Planetarium. Which planet has the highest number of moons? 149 at the last count! A few pictures from the day - including new space travel recruits!

World Book Day (plus 1) 2024

What can be lovelier than dressing up as your favourite book character and then sharing a book with younger members of the school? Here, 5W share their reading skills with Year 1 - where else would you find dragons, witches and a horde of other characters in peaceful co-existence? 

Art topic - Pattern and the work of William Morris

Hard at work in the 5W studio, producing a printing block to make a repeat pattern, some experimenting with colour and type of pattern: basic repeat, half drop and rotation. A simple technique, but very effective - and messy!

It's Regular Reader Time Again!

Here are this terms Regular Readers who have achieved their 4 times a week plus reading target AND persuaded their parents to sign on the line! Special mention to Louie who was our Star Reader of the term - and of course, the usual reminder that many children are very regular readers, but don't necessarily record their wonderfulness!

Learning from the Past - Year 5 visit to the Beth Shalom Holocaust Memorial Centre on 21st November 2023

This visit gave us the opportunity to learn more about the experiences of a Jewish child, growing up in Germany during the late 1930s. We learned about how the many anti-Jewish laws impacted on daily family life, leading to the violence of Kristallnacht and the eventual escape of some children on the Kinder Transport. Year 5 had studied some of these areas in RE last term and there were  some excellent answers to questions and thoughtful comments about events,emotions and the eventual outcomes for those refugees. 

It's the Dragons Diner, but last half term it was our Yoga Studio - and for the rest of the Autumn term, it's the 5W Modern Dance Studio!

Celebrating Summer 1 Regular Readers!

Here are the 5W Regular Readers for this half-term who have: completed at least 4 entries a week in their reading diaries, persuaded their parents to sign weekly and have handed in those diaries for selection! Well done, Everyone! And a mention to those readers who are doing it regularly - but not necessarily recording that fact!

As you can see - a slide into anarchy with the photo-shoot!

It looks like fun - it's our science investigation!

For our 'Forces' topic, we investigated the effects of air resistance on possible designs for a 'new' parachute. We looked at either different materials or different sizes of parachute, made sure that any other variables were constant - and timed the drops! It might look a bit scary, but strict health and safety guidelines were in place - primarily, keep your feet on the table ! Can you spot the parachutes?

Space for an iPad ? - our D&T project finally lands!

After weeks of evaluating existing products, thinking about design criteria and learning the basic rudiments of creating templates and sewing and after an additional burst of creativity during the Easter holidays, the iPad cases were finally completed and ready to evalute.

Some excellent design ideas in keeping with the 'Space' theme and well-constructed within the limits of our fairly basic materials!

Well done. 5W !

Visiting Veolia - the Mansfield Materials Recovery Facility.

5W had a really fantastic morning at the MRF - it was an early start, but we learnt a lot about recovering materials from the recycling bins and had  a tour of the facility with its sort of top secret marvellous machines! Some members of staff had to admit to putting materials in the recycling bin that should not be there - no pizza boxes or shredded paper! Who knew? And don't get us started on floppy plastics! Suffice to say that when you've seen what comes out on the conveyor belt even after sorting , you will never want to put your floppies in the wrong bin again!

Have a look at our pictures - we did do a lot of work !

Year 5 visit the National Space Centre, Leicester

On Wednesday, 8th March 2023, we visited the National Space Centre to support our current science topic on Space! We started the day with a visit to the excellent Planetarium and took a tour through the Solar System, dropping in on each of the planets and finding out some exceptional facts - hexagonal storms! Who knew!

Slightly wobbly after gazing up at fast-moving spherical objects, our next activity was really Rocket Science as we experienced how rockets are propelled , using Newton's Third Law of Motion - and various explosive forces! Hydrogen certainly went with a BANG!

After a well-deserved lunch break, we toured some of the exhibits and learned about the Space Race between the Russians and the Americans. An exciting and interesting educational experience! See some pictures on our Year Group Photos page. 

World Book Day 2023 in 5W

It was good to have the opportunity to dress up as some of our favourite book characters - or at least the ones we could find a reasonably close costume fit for! During the day, we had a Dr Seuss-based assembly with Mrs Milton, did some book-based quizzing (still a lot of books out there to experience!), had a visit from published author Bemma Akyeampong and, while some participated in a Reading Scavenger Hunt, others made their own tiny books to write their own story/scribble hidden secrets/draw pictures for younger children - whatever could be contained in a book, plucked from our imagination! Can you identify some of the characters who inhabited the classroom for the day? The books are included as a clue!

Wallpaper - the art of block printing.

The culmination of our 6 week block of work on pattern and printing was the creation  of lengths of wallpaper - sort of in the style of William Morris. Considering the difficulties of creating the blocks from polystyrene, the finished products were actually rather good! Have a look at the stages of production - a lot of collaboration going on in every group and hopefully some enjoyment, too!

Spring 1's Remarkable Readers

This happy band have been reading and recording over the half term - and nagging their parents to sign their reading diaries! Well done, 5W - Keep Reading!

The Messy Art of Print-Making

This half term, we are looking at pattern and how to make prints. As you can see, it was a messy session after creating our print blocks - but the results are fantastic! Put in your wrapping paper orders now! Next steps will be looking at the work of William Morris - and possibly creating our own wall paper, so save that statement wall in readiness!

A Visit to the National Civil War Museum

17^th January 2023

The National Civil War Museum is in Newark, a Nottinghamshire town that played an important part in the Civil War and was put under siege by the Parliamentarians three times.

During our trip, we saw films about some of the actual people who lived in Newark during the War and found out that even young boys fought and were killed during the conflict.

We dressed up as Royalists and Roundheads, saw pictures of some of the major personalities such as the King, Charles I, his wife, Henrietta Maria, Prince Rupert of the Rhine who was related to the Royal family and was a skilled Cavalry leader and , of course, Oliver Cromwell.

We took part in musket drill, pike drill and in a pike battle. We looked at the armour and uniforms of different types of soldier – musketmen, cavalrymen and pikemen – and at the weapons they used. We also found out who had the best chance of surviving a battle!

In the morning, we had found out  about what happened during the siege and how the townspeople had to deal with the different problems they faced: fire from bombardment, lack of food as they lost their livestock and reserves and then the onset of disease, particularly the Plague that in a way saved the town from destruction when it was finally forced to surrender to the Parliamentarians.

How did the King send his message to the town, allowing them to surrender?

A toast unto his Majesty!

(And curse those Roundhead dogs!)

Beth Shalom - learning about the Shoah, thinking about  tolerance and acceptance of difference. 

Year 5 visited the National Holocaust Centre near Laxton, just outside Newark. Always a thought-provoking and interesting trip, we were lucky enough to start the day by hearing the testimony of a Holocaust survivor, Bob Norton, whose family had escaped to England from Czechoslovakia after many trials and tribulations. Sadly, apart from his immediate family, other relatives did not survive Hitler's final solution.

After lunch, we followed the journey of Leo Stein, a German Jewish boy, living in Berlin in the 1930s. His happy, comfortable life was turned upside down by the increasing number of laws restricting all areas of life for Jewish people, We saw how propaganda stirred up hatred for Jews and for other groups deemed unacceptable in the new regime. We learned about changes in schools and how Leo was bullied and humiliated and how his father's business was vandalised, convincing his parents to send Leo to safety on the Kindertransport, an escape route from Germany to Britain for children up to the age of 18. Have a look at some of the days activities in the slide show.