News Groovy Shoes  School looked very bright and colourful today with the children in their 'groovy shoes'. We will let you know how much money we raised for the Rennie Grove Hospice in due course. Robin Hood Day On Wednesday we had a lovely day imagining that we lived in the time of Robin Hood. During the day the children carried out five activities: ·        Cooking around the camp fire ·        Making bows and arrows ·        Building rafts (mini) and then seeing if they would float ·        Creating and following a trail ·        Designing flags and then playing the game capture the flag The children all thoroughly enjoyed the day and were extremely well behaved. Now the children have experienced these activities we are looking forward to reading about them in some of their literacy during the final weeks of term. Here are some of their comments of the day: "During the day I enjoyed cooking dough balls over the campfire, mmm! They were delicious!" - Jake "I enjoyed making bows and arrows because it was fun to be outside and then shooting at targets" -Noah "I enjoyed everything on Robin Hood day especially flag making because we got to get messy! Also we played a capture the flag came, unfortunately my team lost but it was good fun" - Freya "I really enjoyed toasting bread because it was fun searching for the perfect branch and the bread and jam were delicious" - James "I enjoyed sitting near the campfire and making bread" - Safiya "I loved all the activities but my favourite was the bow and arrows." - Tia "At the end I really enjoyed the hot chocolate and the orange cake!" - George "I enjoyed doing the tracking because you had to follow the arrows. If you see an 'X' that means 'obstacle' " - Davoy "Robin Hood day made me feel like Robin Hood".  Ruby L "I really enjoyed Robin Hood day.  We did lots of fun activities and they were all to do with nature." Joshua W

Literacy We have written the final chapters of our Dragonland fantasy stories and we are beginning to edit and improve them before they are illustrated and published. There are lots of fantastic ideas and many, varied dragons! Homework: Grammar sheet about pronouns and their uses.

Mathematics In Mrs Prowle’s group, we practised different calculation methods and completed some investigations about decimals while Mrs Prowle was away. On her return we resumed our learning about coordinates and translation using the iPads. Mrs Williams and Mrs Gilder’s group are practising putting numbers on a number line - check your active learn account. In Mrs Roche's group we have been looking again at fractions and finding equivalent fractions. We also did some work adding fractions. Homework: Schofield and Sims

Science Maple Class completed our last task as 'Rock Detectives' by studying fossils. We had the chance to handle some ammonite fossils and drew storyboards to show how they formed before using hand lenses and microscopes to do detailed observational drawings.

History All three classes have begun their new topic Stone age to Bronze Age. We have been discussing how historians are able to collect evidence to tell us how people lived 300,000 years ago.

Week beginning 15/6

Literacy

All three classes have been finalising the plans for their Dragonland stories and have written the first, opening chapter. There are some great ideas starting to develop with some interesting and exciting characters. We're all looking forward to sharing our completed stories and publishing them with illustrations.

Homework: Grammar exercise about Verb agreement and editing.

Mathematics

In Mrs Prowle's group we were very excited to use the school's new iPads to help us with our learning about reading and plotting co-ordinates in the 1st quadrant. We were able to use an app that allowed us to create lots of different polygons using written co-ordinates provided by Mrs Prowle. 

Art

This week we have finished our Nick Schon watercolours which are looking really impressive!

News On Monday we had a great day at Cuffley Camp. The children worked in groups on problem solving activities that really challenged their teamwork skills. They had to cross ‘stinky swamps’, negotiate an ‘inferno’ and dodge ‘man eating sharks’ as they swung between rafts.  We were really impressed by the way they approached the problems and with their communication skills as they worked through them. In pairs they also completed an orienteering course, using their map reading skills to find letters hidden around the forest that spelled out a phrase. The third activity of the day was a really challenging assault course which the children loved.  They were all determined to beat the monkey bars and, by the end of the day, most of them had!  All the staff commented on how lovely it was to see the children in a completely different context with different aspects of their characters on show.  Here are some photos of our day: Swinging across the shark infested waters More assault course fun Picking up a bottle as a team Everyone needs to cross the sticky swamp and the planks need to come too! Teamwork Which shape? How many children fit on a plank? Is this the comfiest place to sit? Mastering the monkey bars Trapped! Escaping the 'Inferno' Listening to the shepherd! How are we going to get across? Fun on the assault course Just a bit further! Being a sloth! Rebecca and 'Team Jarratt' Happy, tired faces!

Literacy All three classes have been writing up their day at Cuffley and starting to plan their Dragonland fantasy stories. The children closed their eyes and listened to a powerful extract of music from ‘Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon’ and imagined their own dragon land before creating a bank of descriptive words and phrases that they could use.  Lots of great discussion work produced some wonderful ideas that will soon become chapter stories! Homework: Grammar exercise about prepositions.

Mathematics No maths this week, due to Cuffley Camp and its follow up work and the INSET day. Please continue to practise key skills, particularly times tables over the long weekend.

Art Continuing our work based on Nick Schon’s visit last week the children have recreated and enlarged their favourite pictures from their class stories and used watercolours to complete them, following the techniques he shared with us.

News Welcome back! We all hope you had a lovely half term and are raring to go for the last few weeks of the school year! It promises to be another busy time with lots of exciting activities planned.

Literacy Maple Class have been looking at the winners of the BBC2 500 words competition and thinking about what made those stories so good. We thought about how the authors had created atmosphere, suspense and vivid images in our minds. We were really impressed by the stories and found them really inspiring! Following Nick Schon’s visit we also wrote our Kipper stories to accompany the illustrations he did for us and made our own books! Useful Websites: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/4McrxpBT4C7WyP30gDfVZRF/500-words-2015-the-final http://nickschonillustrator.com/?page_id=2 Homework: Grammar exercise about simple, compound and complex sentences.

Mathematics In Mrs Prowle’s group, we have been reviewing the tests we completed before the break. We all did really well with some tricky questions and should be proud of the progress we’ve made this year. However, lots of us found mistakes where we hadn’t read the questions properly and it taught us to take more care and use all the time available for checking in future! There were also lots of silly multiplication mistakes so we have all realised that we do need to keep practising our times tables.