Monthly Archives: April 2018

Writing descriptions

As part of Year 5’s English topic, we are focusing on writing setting and character descriptions.

We started today with a photograph of a setting and we created a mind map of words and phrases we could use in a description.

The children then began to write their own setting descriptions

Take a look at some of their starting sentences…

In the distance, there was a thick layer of fog covering the mountains. – Callum

In the distance, there was a cloud as white as an Artic Fox. – Sophie M

In the distance, mountains as tall as giants were hidden behind a thick layer of pale white fog. – Tiffanie

In the distance, there were mountains as large as giants towering over the village. – Millie

Miss Edwards can’t wait to see these finished!

Viking life presentations

Year 5 Kestrels have been spending time researching Viking life using the iPads and various information books. Once their information was collected and recorded in their History books they teamed up with a classmate to create a presentation using Microsoft PowerPoint. The children loved making their presentations, especially when it came to adding the transitions and animations to their slides! Some of them even included sound.

Today the children presented what they had created. It was really great to see how much hard work and effort all of the children had put in! All groups worked really well together and helped each other through the performance. Well done Kestrels.

Peer Mediator training

Year 5 had their last whole class training session with Miss McClelland. The next two sessions will be solely for the chosen Peer Mediators.

They started with a game as always.

The children have really got the hang of working well as a team, especially when it means they have to sacrifice their part in the game in order to win.The children came up with some good qualities they think Peer Mediators need:

  • Confidence
  • Patience
  • Tolerance
  • Caring
  • Polite
  • Co-operative
  • Democratic
  • Good listener
  • Good thinker
  • Peaceful
  • Responsible
  • Creative in problem solving
  • Independent
  • Trustworthy

The children then wrote down their top three qualities…

Once that was done the children had to think of classmates who had the three qualities they wrote down. They had to give their papers to the most qualified person.

Shayla received a lot of the papers and the class decided it was clear she always showed the qualities, she always has a smile and has a “good heart”.

Then the children were told what the job of Peer Mediator involved:
Some of your lunchtime
Later lunch
Twice a week

The children then voted for classmates that wished to be considered for the job. There were only 12 places available.

All the nominations were put into a box ready to be counted.

The results will be announced as soon as possible.

A big thank you to Miss McClelland for guiding us through the training, it was a lot of fun and thought provoking.

The class thought they had learnt so many skills and got better at:

  • Solving conflicts
  • Confidence
  • Thinking more
  • Working harder
  • Concentration
  • Independence
  • Multi tasking
  • Working with others
  • Sharing ideas

I think the children have been better team players and considering others feelings as well using strategies to everyone’s advantage.