Swalwell Primary School
Working together, learning together
Welcome
Year 5
Welcome to Year 5
Adults who help us in our learning are: Miss Cobb and Mrs Waugh
Welcome
Welcome to Year 5! This year is an exciting year, packed full of memorable opportunities and the chance for the children to take on important responsibilities in their first year of upper key stage 2.
This year the children will continue to develop as independent learners while reaching their full academic potential in preparation for their transition to Year 6.
In Year 5 we work hard, respect each other and engage in and enjoy our learning. The year ahead is packed full of exciting challenges.
DT Engineer Bridge Building
Pointillism
This week we have produced our final pieces of artwork inspired by Georges Seurat. We used pointillism to create these AMAZING landscapes which will look fantastic on display in our classroom. Using tiny dots to create a painting took lots of time and concentration. We used primary colours in our paintings and learnt how to place colours carefully to create different colours, for example placing blue and yellow dots next to each other created the illusion of green. We are incredibly proud of our final pieces!
Fun Run
We were so excited to take part in the Gateshead SSP fun run in Saltwell Park. We joined thousands of children from Gateshead schools to run 1 mile around the park. It was a lovely sunny day and we all impressed Miss Grey with our speed and determination!
NECTAR Crew
Last week we celebrated careers and aspirations week in school. We were so lucky to have some amazing visitors who talked to us about their career journeys and answered lots of our questions.
We were very lucky to have a visit from a NECTAR crew who brought one of their ambulances to school for us to explore. We learnt about the amazing work that NECTAR do in caring for children who are unwell. Amy told us about the rewards and challenges of being a nurse. She told us that the most important skills needed in her role are compassion and communication. Sean told us all about his job as an Advanced Driver and the different jobs he had done before this. He showed us the controls inside the ambulance and even let us set off the sirens!
Crumbles
In Computing, we have been using the Crumble software to programme crumbles, sparkles, motors and buzzers. We were given the challenge to programme a sparkle and a motor to create a stick figure disco! We worked together to identify and solve problems.
Community Centre
Year 5 and 6 were invited to a local history talk at the Community Centre. We found out about what life was like in our local community during World War 2 and loved listening to stories from members of the community who lived through the event. We found out lots about rationing, daily chores and Christmas. We were also able to explore lots of artefacts from the time.
Spaghetti Bolognese
This half term in DT we have been adapting recipes to create balanced meals. We conducted research and worked together to decide on the final adaptations for a spaghetti bolognese recipe. We then carefully prepared all of our ingredients and followed our recipe to cook ourselves a delicious meal!
Clay sculptures
We used the skills we acquired in our sculpting lesson at Whickham school to help us create sculptures inspired by Greek artist Phidias. We learnt a lot about Phidias's achievements throughout this topic and we are so proud of our final pieces.
Commando Joes
This half term in Commando Joe's we have been working on a mission to Space with Tim Peake! We have enjoyed developing new skills in teamwork and leadership and have been successful in all of our missions!
Whickham School Transition Lesson - Sculpture
We visited Whickham School to experience an Art Lesson in the art barns. We used clay to explore and create our very own pinch animals. To express our ideas we added eyes, ears, noses, wings, fangs and horns used cross hatching skills to join the different components together. Our fantastic creations will fired to 1000 degrees in the kiln and we are very excited for them to be delivered to school!
Ancient Greece
This week, Year 5 and 6 were super lucky to have a visit from Durham University Museum staff. David and Olivia were experts on Ancient Greece and we learnt so much from the day. We started by becoming museum detectives, we explored ancient artefacts and made predictions about what we though they were and what they might tell us about life in Ancient Greece. We then learnt about votive offerings which were small objects offered to the Gods by Ancient Greek people. We used clay to make our own votive offerings. To finish off the day, we acted out a Greek play which included lots of deception and gruesome deaths!
Automata Models
This term, we were given a DT brief to create an automata model to advertise a Christmas trip to New York City. We investigated how different shaped cams made the components move in different ways. We accurately measured each side of our frame to ensure they were sturdy. Once everything was cut out precisely, assembled all of the components of our models, problem solving along the way. We are so proud of our final pieces!
Playground Leader Training
All of Year 5 attended a very special training session today where we learnt how to be playground leaders. We learnt about the STEP process (Space, Time, Equipment, People) and how we can use this to change the difficulty of different games for different abilities and age groups. We are looking forward to teaching the children in school lots of new games!
e-Safety Virtual Assembly
We joined in with schools all across the North East for an exciting e-Safety assembly. We learnt about the importance of privacy, two-step authentication and what to do if we are concerned about something online.
Brazilian Jiu Jitsu
We had a great time working with coaches from Blaydon Grapplers learning Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. we learned how to hold, defend and grapple with our partners - everyone thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity to try this new sport.
Pudsey
We were super lucky to have a visit from Pudsey Bear! We learnt all about Children and Need and the important work that they do.
Glo Event
We attended Swalwell Community Centre to take part in a Glow Event with MP Liz Twist which helped us learn about Road Safety and understanding brain injuries. We had a great time exploring an HGV cab and a police car to help us understand further the dangers on the roads.
Science at Whickham School
Year 5 and 6 attended Whickham school for a Science lesson on separating materials. We really enjoyed the experience of being in a Science lab learning all about safety, enquiry skills and using a range of scientific equipment. To begin with, we used a pestle and mortar to crush the rocks and salt together. We then mixed the two solids with a small amount of water. We noticed that the salt dissolved in the water but the sand did not. This meant that we could use filter paper to separate the sand from the salt water solution. Once the sand had been filtered out, we used a bunsen burner to boil the solution. Heating the water caused it to evaporate and we were left with just salt in our dish. Miss Grey was so impressed by our fantastic listening skills and our understanding of safety in a Science lab.
A week in Year 5
In Maths this week, we have been exploring factors. We worked together to create factor bugs for the numbers 1-30. Then, we sorted and compared our factor bugs to see if we could spot any patterns. We noticed that all of the numbers with an odd number of factors were square numbers. We also noticed that 2 was the only even number with only 2 factors!
In Science, we explored our school grounds to investigate the properties of materials. We examined different objects carefully and thought about why each material had been chosen. The climbing frame was made out of wood which is a durable material to make sure it was safe. A smooth, durable plastic had been used to make the slide to make sure there wasn’t a lot of friction when sliding down.
We also explored Fairtrade and why Fairtrade products ae important. We created posted, slideshows and acrostic poems to share with the class.
Does the saltiness of water effect the buoyancy of an object?
This was an excellent scientific question generated by one of our Year 5 scientists. It was inspired by our study of Lord Armstrong and his use of ships to transport goods around the world.
The class worked hard to plan and carry out a fair test to answer this question. By adding salt to our jug of water we were able to make out potato float!
Next week, we will conduct our own research to try and find out why this happened.
Another group of children set up an investigation inspired by Victorian botanist Richard Spruce. They have planted a range of mystery seeds and will monitor their growth over the next 12 weeks to see if all plants grow at the same rate.
Well done Year 5!
