The Grove Primary School

This term, Year 5 have focused on their topic of ‘Dreams’. In History, they have been learning about the Civil Rights movement and the significance of key figures and events, such as Rosa Parks and the Bus Boycott, and Martin Luther King Jr with his infamous “I have a dream…” speech in Washington. This has been an incredible topic for developing their understanding of individual rights and liberties and the importance of challenging discrimination in society. This encouraged us to think about what our own ‘dream’ society would look like! In Music lessons, the children have compared Blues and Gospel music and played notes on the school glockenspiels.

In English, our writing genres have been truly varied – the children have written instructions, presented and persuaded (using modal adverbs) in our Great Debate, and enjoyed performing with pre-written play scripts! They have developed their understanding further by writing their own scripts using essential features, such as: new line for a new speaker, colons after a name, prop list and cast list. The children have particularly enjoyed sequencing the story of Shakespeare’s ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’.

As part of our learning about forces in Science, the children interviewed an aerospace engineer, Chris Dobson, who was able to attend an online meeting with us as part of his Stem Ambassador role. This led to some interesting questions from the children and helped deepen our understanding of the impact of air resistance, gravity and other forces. Our hands-on activities have involved carrying out investigations into friction (using newton meters) and making an effective parachute to slow down the descent of our ‘space capsule’. Of course, our learning of science, engineering and technology was further enhanced by our visit to the STEAM event at Trowbridge County Hall!

Our Art has focused on the style of Surrealism and the work of Salvador Dali – this has led to some interesting creations! Of course, our children have also developed their skills in Maths, Computing, PE (hockey and gymnastics), and many other areas of the curriculum! We are so proud of the effort and level of engagement that all of the children have put in.

We are now looking forward to our next topic, ‘Splash!’, which also promises to be full of exciting learning and activities.