Today's Homework

Prepare for tomorrow
1. Daily Maths 1
2. Learn spellings

Prepare for handing in on Saturday
3. Choose the best way to present the information about the three babies.
You could make a poster, write some sentences, make a chart. You could do it in your topic book, you could use another piece of paper, you could print it from the computer. You could even do nothing and leave it as it is now but I think we know by now about making an effort to make things better.

Don't forget I want the pictures of young and old people in tomorrow as well.

The Morning After The Night Before

I hope everyone had a good time at the Cinema Night yesterday. By all accounts it went well. The Student Council will be meeting to talk about what to do with all the lovely money that was collected so we'll be waiting for Faisal to tell us about the wonderful things he'll be buying!

Today we had a very interesting visit from Max and Hannah, two babies from the creche. They came to the hall and we had a chance to ask Mrs White, their nanny, questions about what they do, what they can't do, what they eat and all sorts of other things. I think everyone thought that they were very cute and we also discovered a lot of specific information which fitted in with what we already knew. Next we'll need a much older person to talk to so if anyone has a spare grandparent hanging around, let us know!

Today's Homework

Hand in 1, 2 & 3 tomorrow
1. Daily Maths 3
It's the 3x table

2. Abacus SDM workbook p.106
Matching analogue and digital time

3. Haydn Richards p.14
Changing singular to plural and writing sentences using plurals

Bring these in any time this week
Find pictures of old people and babies
Use magazines, newspapers, posters. It doesn't have to be your family, but it can be.

Young And Old

We're starting our new unit of study now. It's called 'Young and Old' and in it, we'll be finding out about the differences between young people and old people: how we look, what we can do, what we wear, where we go. We'll also be looking at how things have changed around us since our grandparents were young, or perhaps even before! Do we play with the same toys? Is school still the same? I know mine was.

Thanks to everyone who has already brought photos and other objects in to show the class. I know everyone is very interested in learning about other families and I know they'll treat everything with respect and care. However, please do not send anything in to school if it is completely irreplaceable. Sometimes accidents do happen and things can get lost or damaged.

On the side you'll see a new list of websites connected to the things we'll be learning about over the next 8 weeks. Please take the time to look at them. Let me know what you think and if you find anything good yourself, let us know.

On the subject of websites, particularly related to this topic, please kids, be responsible when you are web-surfing. Let your parents know what you are looking at, sit with them and talk about the things you finding out. The internet is a great place to find out about lots of things but sometimes it shows us things we didn't want to see.

Coming Events

Two things for everyone to remember:

1. Tomorrow is Jeans for Genes Day. Please bring 5SR (or more!) which will go to this charity. You can then wear the clothes you choose, hopefully jeans. Remember what Mr Hugo said: no Crocs, no 'vest' type t-shirts with straps.
2. Tomorrow is the last day to give in your money for Cinema Night, if you want to go. It will be on Monday next week and the film is 'TMNT', which, my young friends tell me is 'Teenaged Mutant Ninja Turtles'. 15SR and the permission letter by tomorrow, please.

In commemoration of the day, I have changed the colour scheme for this website to a template called...Denim!

Today's Homework

Due in tomorrow:

1. Daily Maths 3
2. Topic - Put the 10 events from your book in order of importance. 1=Most Important, 10=Least Important. Then, write a paragraph explaining your reasons for choosing that order.

Due in on Saturday:

1. Find a picture of you as a baby. If possible, find pictures of your parents or grandparents when they were babies. Always ask for permission before bringing things to school.
   

Welcome Back!

Hello again everyone! I hope you all had a great holiday, as I did and you're ready to get on with lots more work, as I'm not! It sounds like not many people went away but lots went to the beach or had fun around Jeddah. It's good to see (almost) everyone back in class again.

We'll be finishing off our topic of 'Significant People' this week and moving on to our new topic of 'Young and Old', as I mentioned. If anyone has a picture of themselves as a baby, or any clothes that they used to wear when they were babies, please bring them in for our introduction. Just don't show anyone though. It's a secret!

Also, a reminder. This Wednesday is Jeans for Genes day and we'll all be asked to bring 5SR and wear something denim, if we can. It's all for a good cause and you can find out more about it here.

Happy Holidays

Well, we've come to the end of the first half term and I think we're all ready for a break now. We've been working hard and some really good research and presentations on our topic of Significant People has been done.

When we come back we'll be finishing off the last part of the first topic and getting ready to begin our next topic, which is all about us! It's called Young and Old and we'll be looking at how people as they get older and how places and things change over the years as well. So, if you come across anything in the holidays about you, when you were younger, about your parents or grandparents when they were little, about your city or country a long time ago or anything that you think would be interesting to show us, bring it back when we come back.

In the meantime, have a great break!

Student Council

Congratulations to...Faisal and Monika who were elected as Student Council member and Deputy this afternoon. They had both worked hard to prepare their thoughts before the presentations, they were both well-thought out and considered and they really deserved the votes of the class.

Well done to the rest of the class for putting themselves forward and voting for others. It's really refreshing to see so much enthusiasm for helping other people. I don't know if the Student Council will be able to cancel all homework, make Wednesday a free day or have parties every month as some people wanted but good luck to all of the Council members anyway.

Outdoor Ed 3

Here's a couple more photos from the Outdoor Ed day. I don't know if you can see them. I can't but that might be a problem with my computer. Leave a comment if you can't see them.

Student Council

As I mentioned on Saturday, each class needs to vote for one person to go on the Student Council. There could be many things that the Student Council do: helping decide the food for the cafe, deciding what the playground should look like, organising and choosing play equipment for the playground, deciding on reward systems for the school, meeting teachers to pass on student concerns and many other things. Even if we don't do all of those things, just being on the Student Council would be a great opportunity for you to get involved in how the school works.

Anyway, if you want to be on the Student Council you need to do a talk to the class, explaining why you think you should be on the Council. It doesn't have to be long talk; you could explain what you want to do, what the Student Council should do, why you would be best at helping people, listening to them or working with other people.

After the talks, we'll vote. If you're not in it, you can't win it!

Homework

I was a bit disappointed today to find that some people hadn't done their homework. Not many, only three or four but as I'd given everyone four days to do it, I wasn't expecting people to say that they hadn't had time. So this message is partly for our class and partly for the mums and dads.

If there is ever any problem with the homework: you don't understand it, you can't remember what to do, you've left your books at school, you didn't have time to do it, you were visiting grandparents, you went to a party or even the cat was sick on it ASK YOUR PARENTS TO WRITE A NOTE IN THE DIARY.

Coming to school and telling me that you didn't have time or you forgot it in the car is not good enough. It isn't acceptable in Y4. You should be able to organise yourselves to bring your books to and from school when you need them.

Now I don't mind this happening once. Everyone forgets things once or twice, even me! But some people are telling me the same excuse every time they have homework and time's up.

Thanks for reading.

Outdoor Ed 2

The first day went really well and everyone had a nice time, even those who forgot their swimming kit, towels or lunches. Let's hope everyone is a bit more organised today.

Here's a couple of photos of the day.

Outdoor Ed

Remember everybody, Saturday and Monday are our Outdoor Ed days. We will be spending most of those days on the beach and in the water, learning team work, co-operation and independent problem solving. It will be a lot of fun but it is also an important part of our social and physical education in Y4 so, see you there!
Mr Patterson reminded us of things that we need to bring with us on those days and, in case anyone has forgotten (not my class!) here's the list again:

• Lunch - bring lots as you 'll be using a lot of energy
• Water - in a plastic bottle. It will be hot! (no fizzy drinks)
• Swimming costume or trunks
  
• 3 old t-shirts
• Plastic bag - for your wet clothes
• Mask and snorkel - no mask = no diving!
• Sun cream - make sure it is water proof, otherwise it will wash off straight away
• Flip flops - for wearing to and from the beach
• Dive boots or water sports shoes - so they don't fall off in the water. Not trainers!
• No cameras!

There we go then. Try to bring all that stuff, and yourselves and we'll have a great time!

The First Module

So, we're beginning with our first unit of study: Significant People. The sub-title of it is 'They Made A Difference' and in it we'll be researching and studying people from different cultures and different countries, looking at the way that they have changed the world and what effect they have had on the people around them.

We'll be asking the children to think about famous people and to consider whether famous is the same as important. They'll be looking for famous artists and musicians and trying to find out what it is that has made those people famous. Why do we know their names all these years after they lived? Or perhaps they are famous now.

To help you in your research, I have listed some internet resources in the sidebar on the right. Please use them, along with anything else you might find, to help you find out about the lives of these significant people. Please remember though, the information that you find is for you to take and use, changing it into your own words. Do not just print off a page from a website and try to hand it in.

If you find anything interesting anywhere else that you think might help the rest of us, post a comment on this post and I'll share it with the class.

Our New Curriculum

This year, we will be using the International Primary Curriculum as the basis for our study, instead of an adaptation of the English National Curriculum.

There are quite a few differences between the two, one of which is the greater flexibility that we have when using the IPC. It allows us to choose different units of study, or modules, instead of following whatever they do in the UK. Another difference is the way that all of us work together.

If we had the idea before that the teacher passes on information to the children and the children soak it up, that isn't the case any more. Teachers and children will be working together, with teachers acting as guides. The children will be given a lot more responsibility over their own work this year. Of course, teachers will still be supervising and helping, but they will not be there to stand at the front and talk at the class.

It's going to be an interesting, challenging year. Let's get it started!

New Start

Ok, here we are again. Hmm. Not much has changed here in a while, has it? Well, I'll use the excuse that I thought that the class names were all changing, so y4-5.blogspot wouldn't be the right name any more. But, we've kept the old names so I guess that I can keep the old blog as well.

Now, that's not the only change. There are lots of new things happening at school this term, including a new class (Hello!) so I'll get around to adding the necessary new bits as soon as possible.

One of those is about the new units of study we'll be covering. I've been looking for some useful websites to help with research and I'll be adding them to the link list on the right. In the meantime, be patient!

Back soon.

Problems

It's fraction time again in Y4-5. Lots of us are having problems with fractions, especially converting one fraction to another. Here's an idea!

Look at the maths links in the side bar. There is a lot of information about fractions on the Marvellous Maths site.

Here's another one that's good. Click on this link. If you go to the bottom of that page, you can change the worksheet so that it gets harder, as you get better!

New Bits

I've added a link to the collection on the side. It's under the heading 'Science'. As we're now studying electricity, I've found a site about safety and electricity. Some of it is for older kids but there are games and other things that will be helpful to us.

Have a look at it and see if there's anything you already know!

Writing it right

Congratulations to our winners! I don't know if you have noticed but the handwriting competition winners, which have been posted outside our room for the last couple of weeks, have had stars added to them. The stars tell you who came 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th in all of Y4 and the best two calligraphers in the year group are...

Arshee and Cara!!!

Well done you two. More apples are being grown, as we speak. I shall have to plant a special orchard for all of the apples that Arshee is winning.




Well done also to our other winners from Y4-5: Abdullah (who managed to spell his name right), Damian and Nadia.





Apples for you as well. Someone needs to keep track of them all!