Years 5 and 6
There are 3 classes in Upper Key Stage Two. The classes are:
Team Amethyst - Mr Holcroft
Team Violet - Miss Rogers
Team Magenta - Mr Kilner
We are also assisted by the phenomenal Mrs Barrington, the superlative Miss MacManus, the wonderful Mrs Butler, the amazing Mrs Fisher and the stupendous Miss Williams.
Upper Key Stage 2 Reminders
Years 5 and 6 have PE each Tuesday and Friday.
Toast is available for the half-term via Parent Pay.
Your child will have a 'Reading Reward Card' in their reading record. Please ensure that your child reads each day - continuing to read with them is wonderful! If your child reads on at least five days in one week they will receive one stamp. When they have achieved 4 stamps your child will be given a reward in school. If you are unsure about anything, please speak to a member of the team. Thank you for your continued support and happy reading!
Our Curriculum
Click here for an overview of the subjects we will be studying this year.
Information Briefings
Previous Meetings
New to Year 5 and 6 Parent Briefing - Thursday 6th July 8.55am
We covered details about school life that will help children settle quickly in the next academic year. Click here to access the slides from the meeting.
Lledr Hall Briefing - Friday 18th November 2.50pm
This briefing looked at the upcoming Year 5 residential trip. Click here to access the information slides from the meeting.
Year 5 and 6 Reading Briefing - Wednesday 19th October - 8.45am
Thank you to everyone who attended the Reading Briefing. Please click here for access to the information from the meeting.
Year 6 SATs Briefing - Friday 16th September - 2.50pm
Thank you to everyone who attended the SATs briefing. Please click here for access to the information from the meeting.
Homework
Our homework can be found on our Google Classroom page. Click here, or on the image, to access Google Classroom.
Summer 2
RHS Bridgewater
We had a wonderful day visiting RHS Bridgewater! We enjoyed a session learning about ways to help the environment in our own garden spaces, however big or small. After comparing gardens in the Cop 26 garden, we designed our own gardens... using lego! We enjoyed walks through the walled gardens, the Chinese Streamside garden, around the lake and of course we enjoyed some fun in the park and den building!
Transition
St. Ambrose visited our future Year 7s to create some awe-inspiring self portraits. It was a great opportunity to meet some of our future teachers and we are so grateful that they shared their expertise with us so that we could create such expressive pieces of art.
Circle Time
There's no better way to learn resilience, turn taking, grace, and friendly competition than playing games. We have been psychic detectives, agents of espionage and the clumsiest construction crew in history.
Chronology
To start our History topic of Peterloo, we played a timeline game where we had to correctly order each of the areas of history we have studied at St Edmund's so far.
Blackpool Pleasure Beach!
Y6 had a wonderful End of Year trip to Blackpool. Despite the rain, we had lots of fun on many rides!
Our Growing Bodies
In this lesson, Year 6 children were taught about how pregnancy is the product of the union between a married Christian couple. There was definitely some squirming in seats but the TenTen lesson gives enough knowledge about behaviour to empower children and protect them from harm.
Lledr Hall
Year 5 have had an AMAZING TIME at Lledr Hall. They've been surfing, mountain climbing, gorge walking, tunnelling...and occasionally sleeping. The full set of events can be found here
Foetal Development
In our Science Topic, 'Animals Including Humans', we researched the changes in a foetus week-by-week during pregnancy. Did you know that twelve weeks into pregnancy a baby starts to grow fingernails!?
Craft and Design
In our current Art topic we have been looking into Architecture, where we have drawn houses using our observational skills and learned about different architects. This week we learned about Friedensreich Hundertwasser and created pages about his design ideas and amazing imagination.
The Feast of St. Peter and St. Paul
We joined our school for a beautiful Mass. The Feast of Saints Peter and Paul or Solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul is a liturgical feast in honor of the martyrdom in Rome of the apostles Saint Peter and Saint Paul, which is observed on 29 June.
School Nurses
Year 6 had a visit from the school nurses, who delivered a lesson all about the changes our bodies go through as we go through puberty.
Summer 1
Volume
Year 6 have been busily investigating volume - the space occupied within the boundaries of any three-dimensional solid. Now that we have finished the SATs, it feels great to be learning just for learning's sake!
Come Dine With Me
Our Design Technology Food lessons have been dedicated to creating different courses in a Come Dine With Me Competition! It has been fantastic chopping, dicing and stir-frying our way to victory!
Flag Football
Children in Years 5 and 6 have been lucky enough this half-term to take part in 'EdgeRush Flag Football', which is an introduction to American Football.
Nature Park
Representatives from St. Edmund's have been taking part in the Nature Park Scheme, linked with the RHS and the Natural History Museum. The scheme aims to improve biodiversity across Great Britain using school sites as green spaces.
The Watertower
We have reopened an unsolved case of the disappearance of Bubba D'Angelo from Preston, Australia in the 90s. We are bringing all of our deduction and comprehension skills to solve the case!
Spring 2
World Book Day
We celebrated another wonderful World Book Day - an entire day dedicated to our love of books and reading!
We also dedicated the first fortnight back in school to our poetry theme, so look out for some of our wonderful creations here!
RHS Bridgewater
Representatives from our school visited RHS Bridgewater to trial some new activities by Education Nature Park to promote biodiversity in schools.
We are looking forward to working more with them soon as we make our school a greener space.
Class Visitors
To support us with 'Living Things and their Habitats', we have welcomed some visitors into class. Tadpoles are an excellent illustration of an amphibian that undergoes a complete metamorphosis; leaf insects will allow us to observe an incomplete metamorphosis over the next few months.
Sonic Rhymes
St. Edmund's are so grateful to the poet, Sonic Rhymes, who visited our school on the first day back to celebrate World Book Day in style.
We spent the day as a school developing different poems before performing them to one another. Thank you Sonic!
Chicks
We borrowed the eggs from Nursery and Reception and were fortunate enough to see them hatch.
Our classes are even more full of life this half-term, which is perfect for our current Science lessons.
BMX Experience
Each class in UKS2 were lucky enough to visit Peel Park's BMX course! We are very lucky to have such an excellent resource right on our doorstep.
Whilst at the park, we also took part in baseball games on the brand-new court!
Labelling Plants
Each class dissected tulips to investigate the male and female parts of flowering plants. Looking closer at each plant's flower helped us to build on our knowledge of reproduction in some plants.
Spring 1
Safer Internet Day
Following this year's Safer Internet Day theme of 'Want to talk about it?', we spent time discussing the ways to keep ourselves safe online. We acted out given scenarios, creating solutions for the character's problems.
Fair, Share, Dare
In PE, we started our new topic by playing 'Spiderman' with our partners and reflected on how fair the rules are. Then we played in teams passing the ball between us to score at each end of the pitch.
A night at the movies
In music, we are exploring music used in movies from the 1920s to the present day. We watched two cartoons from the 1920s and 30s, observing how they used sound effects and music to capture the action effectively. Then we used instruments to create action noises e.g. crash, walking, falling.
Electrical Systems
In Design Technology, we started our new unit by researching toys and looking at their form compared to their function. This is preparing us for when we will make our own Steady Hand Game.
Planetarium!
We had an amazing time in the 'Wonder Dome' Planetarium, looking at fascinating images of the Planets and our Solar System. We loved recalling our knowledge from our Science topic on Space, and asked lots of intriguing questions.
Ancient Maya
In History, we started our new topic by investigating different clues about the Ancient Maya and how they lived. We used our historical understanding to decipher whether a fact was more important than another. Then we ranked their importance, justifying our responses.
Ancient Maya Workshop
We enjoyed a fantastic workshop learning about the Ancient Mayan Empire and much more! Here’s photos of us learning about their social hierarchy, trying some of their dances and holding artefacts.
Gravity!
In Science we have been investigating gravity as the force acting between an unsupported object and Earth. We experienced different forces, learned about Isaac Newton's work, and then used a Newton Metre to measure the force acting on objects.
Forces!
Our Science topic has been filled with exciting experiments. To investigate Friction, we compared the force needed to move different types of shoes. Using different materials, we compared the Air Resistance of parachutes, dropping them from LK2's balcony.
After a Water Resistance experiment comparing the time for different shapes of plasticine to sink, we created our own boats for a class race.
Pendulums and Gravity!
We enjoyed investigating gravity further by comparing the ‘weight’ of a Pringles tube on different planets with differing gravity. The mass of an object never changes but the weight does in relation to the gravitational pull on the object.
Then we learned about Galileo Galilei's research on pendulums, making our own and analysing their accuracy in timing an excerpt of music.
TriKidz Triathlon
We had a fantastic Triathlon experience with Tri Kidz. In the session, we all had a go at 'swimming', cycling and running. After this, we had group competitions before the final round. We had so much fun!
School subjects
To start our latest French topic, we recapped the school subjects and practised asking and answering questions on our opinion of them. Facile!
Autumn 2
Glue investigation!
This week, we looked at glue and how it has developed throughout history. During our investigation, we created different glue solutions, and tested their effectiveness.
Computing
Our current computing topic involves using a Micro:bit. We have started to program an animation using the Micro:bit. Children were first able to create ideas which they then programmed using a forever loop!
Aim, Strike, Retrieve
In PE, we started our new theme with a 'Destroy the Castle' activity, where each team created their own structure with a range of equipment, then practised aiming to 'destroy' it. This week we played 'Strike to Learn' , practising using different equipment to serve to a partner.
Chess Club
We have tried to become a little more competitive in our games this half-term. We have practised standard openings, early check-mates and controlling the centre.
Bonne nuit petit Jésus
Our French topic this half term is 'Celebrations'. We have been looking at the Christmas Story. This week, we read it aloud together after practising lots of new vocabulary!
Through the Wall
To start our new text in English, our classes were divided: we did not associate with the 'other' side. We practised emphasising words for effect, before reading this to each 'side' of our classroom. We carried on reading to discover that children living on both sides are no different, and the Wall is not as 'great' as once thought.
CARITAS
Whilst studying how to put our faith into action, we debated the ethics of how goods are manufactured, transported and sold. We discussed the choices we can make to help our global community.
Soluble or Insoluble?
This week, we tested the solubility of materials. We discussed the difference between melting and dissolving before working in groups to test marshmallows, hot chocolate, sprinkles, flour, salt, coffee and icing sugar.
Properties and Materials
To start our Science topic, we recapped our previous knowledge by sorting materials based on their properties, and working in groups to separate mixed materials in our 'Cinderella's Problem' activity - there was a lot of mess!
Autumn 1
Final Portraits
Here are some of our final portraits from our Art lessons this half-term. They are all so expressive, daring and creative! We practised lots of different techniques on the way and wanted our final portraits to represent our individuality.
Rotating or Orbiting?
We discussed how the sun is at the centre of our solar system and how Earth rotates on its axis, whilst orbiting the Sun. The Moon simultaneously rotates on its axis, whilst orbiting us in an anti clockwise direction. We enjoyed making both a human model and then a a paper model of this.
Fruity Thinking
In Circle Time, we enjoyed learning about this half term's SUMO Principle, Fruity Thinking. We worked together to change 'Faulty' thoughts from our Inner Critic into 'Fruity' Thoughts with our Inner Coaches.
Chronology
To start our History topic of Ancient Greece, we played a timeline game where we had to correctly order each of the areas of history we have studied at St Edmund's so far.
Golden Time
We celebrated our hard work in History and Art during Golden Time by competing in the Ancient Olympic Pentathlon and creating bizarre portraits.
Solar System Dynamics
In music, we have enjoyed learning ‘Sunblast’ and listening to multiple pieces of music with a theme of the Solar System. This week, we learned how to play a melodic ostinato on the glockenspiels.
The Ancient Agora of Athens
In our Ancient Greece topic, we enjoyed learning about the people who would be in The Agora (market) on a normal day in Athens. We were all given the role of a person and had to meet others, discovering why they were also at the Agora today. This helped us understand every day life in Ancient Greece.
Beyond the Physical
In our first week back at school, we developed a game where, as each player was caught, they added to an ever-growing line of chasers. We will keep working on this game, adding changes and challenges as we grow in confidence.
Ourselves
In French, we have been extending our learning about family members and pets. This week, we have been writing descriptions of animals with their size and colour.
Poem Portraits
To start our Art topic, we developed our own unique self-portraits by first making a continuous line drawing of ourselves. Then we used a poem to create an outline of our portrait.
Curiosity
In English, we started our topic by debating whether there is life on other planets. Then we have been learning about the Mars Rover, Curiosity, writing a proposal about our own rovers to NASA. We enjoyed making a timeline of the previous rovers, orbiters and landers.