Welcome to Year 5!
Welcome back after the summer holiday. We hope you had a happy and healthy summer. It has been great to see so many happy faces back in school. The children have settled really well in their first week and are adapting to new routines, classrooms and teachers.
This week, we will send the children home with a reading book and a new reading record book. It is really beneficial that your child reads at home daily – it improves fluency and increases the enjoyment of reading. The children can record what they’ve read at home in the reading records. We will also set a task for them to complete at home. Please ask your child what their task is for their homework and actively encourage them to think about the presentation of their work in the journals and the importance of neat handwriting and accurate use of punctuation.
Thank you to all the children who have come to school in the correct uniform and PE kits this week. If you are unsure of the uniform, please click the link to see what is required.
Important Dates
PE – Tuesday and Wednesday
Spelling test – Friday
Library – Wednesday
Class assembly – Wednesday 20th November 2024 & Wednesday 26th February 2025
We are looking forward to a successful year!
School Games Mark Platinum award
We are delighted to announce that we have achieved the School Games Platinum Mark Award for the 2023/24 academic year.
The School Games Mark is a Government-led award scheme launched in 2012, facilitated by the Youth Sport Trust, to reward schools for their commitment to the development of competition across their school and into the community, and we are delighted to have been recognised for our success.
As part of our application, we were asked to fulfil criteria in the areas of participation, competition, workforce and clubs, and we are pleased that the hard work of everyone at our school has been rewarded this year.
Thank you to all the children who have represented school at different inter school events and competitions, parents for their support and staff for accompanying the children. We look forward to more events this year.
We are very proud of our children for engaging with these physical activities both in and out of school to support our ethos of being a happy and healthy school.
Staying Safe Week!
Last week was our themed week: Staying Safe. Year 5 were very busy learning how to stay safe in a range of different scenarios and situations.
On Monday, we kicked off the week with a road safety assembly. In this, the children recapped how to stay safe in each type of travel (car, bike/scooter, bus, train and walking).
- A seatbelt must be worn every journey – whether that be a long or short drive.
- You must not distract the driver.
- If there is a seat available on a bus or train you must sit down.
- Travel with an adult.
- Green Cross Code: Think, Stop, Look and Listen.
At the end of the day, we had a water safety assembly. The children discussed the difference between canals and rivers and how to stay safe around them. You should always ‘Stay Away From the Edge’.
Help at home: Can you spot the dangers in the poster?
On Tuesday, we started off the day with an assembly on hate crime and the subsequent consequences. We learnt that in law they take into consideration 5 of the protected characteristics (religion, race, sexual orientation, gender and disability). Year 5 then had an assembly about online safety. In this, the children were able to revisit their knowledge about how to stay safe on games: reporting bad behaviour, not accepting someone you don’t know etc.
Next, Year 5 were visited by the one and only D:Side Dave. Dave came in to also talk to us about online safety. In this session, the children talked about the positive and negative effects of social media and discussed how to make responsible and safe choices on the internet. Take a look at how long each social media site has been around for.
Year 5 used their detective skills to work out if online profiles were real or fake.
To finish the lesson, we looked at the different age ratings on games.
Help at home: Can you identify any of the warning symbols?
To finish off the day, we had a session about promoting good health. The children learnt about how they can keep themselves healthy and happy.
On Wednesday, we started the day off with an assembly lead by RNLI. Did you know RNLI stands for Royal National Lifeboat Institute? Alan came in to speak to us about how to stay safe at sea and on the beach. He discussed the flags that you might see on a beach and what they mean. You must swim between the yellow and red flags to be seen by a lifeguard.
Later on in the morning we had a talk from the local firefighters. In this session, they told the Year 5 and 6s how to prevent fires at home: using reliable charging cables, making sure candles are extinguished and cleaning the hob after use. Firemen Sam and Dave told them how to help stop a fire spreading too – whether that be shutting all the doors at night or testing smoke alarms regularly.
On Thursday, the whole school had an assembly about how to stay safe around dogs. We then later had a session with Mrs Hill. We learnt that there are two things you must do before stroking a dog: ask permission from the owner and let the dog sniff and come to you first. We looked at a range of different scenarios between 6 different dogs and an imaginary character called Tom. The children needed to be dog detectives and decide if Tom could have been hurt and who was responsible for the consequences. Lots of children thought different dogs were responsible but Charlie was able to deduce that Tom was responsible!
To finish off the morning, we had a session with the British Military Martial Arts.
To finish off our Staying Safe week, we learnt about sun safety, railway safety and we had a session learning about first aid.
There are 5 ways to protect yourself from UV rays: SLIP, SLOP, SLAP, SLIDE, SHADE.
- slip on clothing to cover your skin
- slop on suncream (20 minutes before the sun and every 2 hours to reapply)
- slap on a hat to protect your face and scalp
- slide on sunglasses to protect your eyes
- seek shade whether that be natural or human-made
In our railway safety lesson, we watched a video and discussed how to be safe near railways and on train platforms.
In our first aid session, we tried to help our partners by tying bandages around their head injuries. Year 5 also got to try out CPR.
There are 4 steps to take before CPR:
- Try to wake up the casualty
- Shout for help
- Check for breathing
- Call and ambulance
Staying safe week: road safety
Jake, from the Leeds City Council road safety team, gave a whole school assembly all about staying safe on and around roads including different types of active travel.
Don’t forget, as part of our staying safe themed week, we are running our active travel safety competition this week.
For a chance to win one of three £10 Love2Shop vouchers, we’d love to see your active travel staying safe photos, maybe using a traffic crossing or wearing a bike helmet (send photos to moortownoffice@spherefederation.org). Photos should be sent by 4pm on Thursday 11 July and winners will be announced on Friday 12 July.
Help at home: Jake reminded us of the green cross code. Talk to your child about what we need to remember when crossing the road.
Staying safe: online safety
Louise from West Yorkshire Police gave a whole school assembly all about staying safe online.
There were lots of clear online safety messages around content, contact and conduct.
At the end of the assembly, the children reflected on what they were going to do after hearing Louise’s messages.
I am going to check my younger sisters’ Roblox settings.
I am not going to accept friend requests from people I don’t know.
I am not going to play games that have a age rating older than me.
Help at home: ask your child how content, conduct and contact are linked to online safety.
Drop Down Morning
Last week, Year 5 have had a drop down morning. We looked back at 3 subjects to recap: History, Geography and Computing.
History
In our History lesson, we revisited the Viking and the Early Islamic Civilisation. The children played Pictionary with their key vocabulary from this unit.
Then, they had picture prompts to help them recall facts about each historical time period.
Computing
Year 5 had the task of sorting their key vocabulary so the word, picture and definition matched. After, they completed a RIC about Scratch coding.
Geography
The children recapped their Year 3/4 knowledge about volcanoes. They labelled the different layers of Earth; found information about dormant, extinct and active volcanoes; and recalled knowledge about geographical vocabulary.
Design Technology: I can use tools and materials to add applique to my product.
This week, Year 5 have been adding applique to their cushions. Applique means ‘pieces of fabric sewn or stuck on to a larger piece to form a picture or pattern. The children were mostly using running stitch to add this. They have been incredibly resilient in this work and not giving up after tying SO many knots.
Take a look at their work:
Help at home: Donate an old piece of clothing that we can use to stuff our cushions. We want to be sustainable and therefore recycle old material. The piece of clothing will be cut up so make sure you won’t want it back!
Staying Safe themed week
Our next whole school themed week, based around Staying Safe, will be taking place next week. The key message is how to be safe in a range of situations – at home, at school, online and in the environment.
A variety of events and visitors are planned to help us deliver this key aspect of education including road safety (Leeds City Council); water safety (Canal and River Trust and RNLI); fire safety (West Yorkshire Fire Service); staying safe around dogs (Dogs Trust); first aid (Leeds Beckett and Red Cross); safety in our community (PCSOs) and e-safety (d:side).
Here are some events taking place.
Monday 08 July 3pm – 3:30pm d:side e-safety drop in information session
A representative from d:side, a health education provider, will be available to discuss e-safety issues and details of your child’s e-safety learning in the themed week.
Thursday 11 July from 8:30am West Yorkshire Police bike register event
Pupils are invited to bring along their bikes to be registered at this bike security marking event at school. Registering your bike helps police and retailers identify and verify the legitimate owner of bikes that have been stolen or are being resold. This is a first come first served event.
Friday 12 July 2:35-3:15pm Leeds Beckett University Carnegie Great Outdoors basic first aid session for parents/carers – there are limited places available so please confirm your place via school gateway.
The themed week is a good opportunity to continue to think about healthy, active and safe ways to travel to school. Children are encouraged to travel to school in a sustainable way, keeping safe along the way.
For a chance to win one of three £10 Love2Shop vouchers, we’d love to see their active travel staying safe photos, maybe using a traffic crossing or wearing their bike helmet (send photos to moortownoffice@spherefederation.org). Photos should be sent by 4pm on Thursday 11 July and winners will be announced on Friday 12 July.
Due to the rising costs of visitors to school, this year, we are requesting a voluntary contribution of £1 per pupil to go towards paying for visitors. This can be made on school gateway. Thank you for your support with this.
Finally, can you help? Does your job involve an aspect of safety? If you are able to support our Staying Safe themed week by coming into school to speak to the children, please contact me via the office or your child’s class teacher.
We will keep you up to date about events during the week on the class news pages on our website.
Thank you for your support to keep Moortown a happy, healthy and safe school.
KS1 and KS2 Olympic Event
Today, a group of KS1 and Year 5/6 pupils took part in the East & North East Leeds Well School Partnership KS1&2 ‘Olympic’ Event at Leeds Beckett University.
Our KS1 children completed a 10-station skills circuit carousel on the pitch in the middle of the track while our KS2 children took part in athletic track and field events.
Well done to all the children for giving 100% in all of the activities and learning new skills in such a great sporting setting.
It was really fun and we got to do a mixture of events. There was something for everyone.
I thought all the activities were really good. My favourite was the skipping.
We had chance to run around the big track.
It was all about having fun and cheering on your team.
Science: We are biologists!
In our next science unit, we are biologists. Biology is the study of living things.
In this week’s lesson, we dissected a flower called Alstroemeria. We labelled the different parts and discussed which of them make up the male and female reproductive systems. Have a look at our work:
Help at home: Label the different parts of the flower.
