The week kicked off with pupils investigating how frictional forces vary between different surfaces, using a range of objects at their disposal, as well as the school's grounds. In English, we set off on our adventures to Antarctica with Ernest Shackleton and his crew on board the Endurance, and made some lovely diary entries that articulate the sense of anticipation, excitement and trepidation experienced by the crew.  The evacuation of the town of Grindavik in Iceland  leant a human dimension to the impact that volcanoes have on populations, supplementing our work in geography.

Y5 kicked off the week with a fabulous Anglo Saxon workshop delivered by the brilliant Saxon Sue. The children enjoyed a hands-on experience of what life would have been like during this period and developed some useful skills as well. Candle making, weaving, ink making and amulet design were just a selection of the activities they engaged in before becoming archaeologists on the hunt for Anglo Saxon artefacts. In Science, pupils carried out an investigation to determine why the moon has so many different sizes of crater, by making their own craters in the classroom!

Over the last few days, we have completed astronaut training, begun learning about the Anglo-Saxons settlement in Britain and started our new English text 'Tuesday' by David Wiesner. In science, the children learnt about life on the International Space Station as well as some of the skills needed to become an astronaut. The images below show the view of Earth from the ISS as well as some excellent descriptive writing of the view. All the Year 5 teachers have been very impressed with how quickly the children have settled into life in Year 5, and we are very excited about our year together.

After the excitement of celebrating King Charles III coronation last week, we have continued to learn about coastal features and coastal erosion. This week we used sand trays and water to investigate longshore drift. We are hoping to see examples of how groynes work to help prevent longshore drift on the Isle of Wight. We began our week working with Monty Lynch, building on our cricket throwing and catching skills. Our non-chronological reports, about South Africa, are almost finished and are looking great and full of information. We have practised estimating, measuring and drawing angles in maths. We even included rotation in our gymnastics this week!