What a fantastic first week back! To launch us right back into learning, we took the children into battle! They were excellent Roman soldiers, utilising their self-made shields to defend themselves and the rest of their legion. Their shield designs were not only historically accurate, but also vivid and creative.

The children in year 5 have completed their own portal story this week and we can't wait for them to publish their final versions at the beginning of next week. They had to use all their writing tools to engage the reader with dramatic, daring tales of children trapped in Ancient Rome, the future or even crowded football matches. Last half term saw them practising using relative clauses and precise vocabulary to build images, a range of adverbial openers to set the scene and action, and short sentences to quicken the pace (and the heart rate!).

We've been building on our multiplication skills as well this week, with the compact written method to multiply two 2-digits numbers. 5E realised there were "3 steps to success" with this method and by taking each one in turn, they could calculate the correct product. As always, number fact knowledge was KING (or QUEEN!)....if we didn't have a really strong foundation of times tables, the method felt trickier.

Our science this week has been fantastic! We realised that we were actually studying CHEMISTRY - the way substances react together. We tested a variety of materials to find out if they made a new material. For example, water and oil never mix which means it is a reversible change however, mixing milk and vinegar creates and irreversible change as a new product is made!

Thanks to the luck of the draw, 5E rounded off their week with a commonwealth PE session. They learnt about how each region of the West Midlands got involved with a range of amazing events. The stand-out part was (according to ALL of the children) the parachute game. In order to cross under the parachute, they had to answer quiz questions about locations such as the Aquatic Centre in Sandwell and events that promoted equity for all participants, especially women and those with disabilities. Each child made a personal pledge, ranging from sporting focus to global change!

Questions to ask this weekend:

*Show me how to calculate 56 x 23.

*How would you improve your teacher's boring sentences? Billy saw a big wall. It had soldiers on top.

*What is an irreversible change?

*What product is made when you combine warm milk and vinegar? 

*Which reactants produce carbon dioxide and how can it be used?

*Can you count to 10 in Spanish?