Welcome to Hawk Class 

Friday 21st March 

Another wonderful week has whizzed past and we have been incredibly busy in Hawk class! STEM week kicked off with a visit into the planetarium where we were amazed to see the stars and the sun's perspective of Earth.

We then sprung into Tuesday with a very interesting visit from a local vet - we had lots of questions to ask!

Wednesday saw an entire day's worth of product design and letter writing to an engineering company. On Thursday, we had a challenge to complete the tallest tower using only specific materials and it was amazing to be able to enjoy our outside space in the sun. 

duke of welton/ prague week

It has been a fantastic week all round in year 5. Please see our Prague 2025 blog to catch up with what happened in Prague.

For the UK based contingent of Hawk Class, who decided they should take on the temporary name of Falcon Class, it has been a memorable time. Working towards the Duke of Welton Award, we took part in volunteering experiences, physical activities and also learnt new skills. Our week included a visit to read to the residents of Beechcroft Residential Home, learning Spanish and Czech on Duolingo, practising peer on peer massage, various physical activities and then today the long awaited Five Park Challenge Expedition. What a week! 

We could not believe it when Strava told us we had walked 10km or 6.3 miles. Well done Team Falcon you all truly deserve your award. Sleep soundly tonight!

Note from Mrs S...

I am so proud of the way everyone has shown such dedication to our school values. In particular, when a group of Falcons moved off the trampolines to allow some young children to jump on, a member of the local community was impressed with the respect shown and even asked me which school we came from.

Friday 14th February 2025

Where has this term gone? We can't believe it is nearly term 4 in year 5 and signs of spring are beginning to appear. This week was Safer Internet Day where we discussed the dangers of being scammed online. BBC Safer Internet Day will take you to the video we watched together highlighting how to protect ourselves from scammers. The children made some fantastic posters which will be displayed around school. 

We have been really enjoying our new Reading Plus online lessons - photo below to show the focus everyone has been showing in these sessions. This scheme is designed to identify your child's strengths and weaknesses within reading and then tailors the texts, questions and reading speed to help them make increased progress. Please feel free to log in at home and see what it's all about!

Maths has been all about finding fractions of amounts. We have applied many of the skills learned in our earlier fractions unit and are becoming increasingly confident in this area of maths. 

Our science investigation about gravity involving dropping bottles (see photo) blew everyone's mind! Ask your Hawk to explain which bottle landed first and why. You might be surprised like they were.

Happy half term Hawks. Enjoy the rest!

Friday 31st January 2025

Thank you Hawk families for your generous contributions to our lunchtime play resources. It was lovely to see such a wide range of 'things' brought in and the children are already thoroughly enjoying playing with them.

One photo below shows us learning how to search a flat file database using AND and OR. The database we explored was all about the passengers on the Titanic which particularly interested the class - especially the number of children under 18 who were on the boat!

There are also photos showing us carrying out our science investigation to find out what happens to the speed or a parachute when the size of the canopy is changed. This involved lots of discussion about fair testing as well as ensuring that we measured accurately.

In Maths we  have moved onto long division and we are all feeling pretty positive about using the bus stop method with remainders.

We also enjoyed a hands on History lesson about the chronology of the Vikings and their invasion onto British soil. We re-enacted key moments and then created a whole class timeline of events that spanned the length of the hall- it was tricky to get everyone in the picture! Hawks showed a really good understanding about where to place their event and how much space to leave to reflect how much time had passed.

Friday 24th January 2025

We are really excited to share with your our first attempt at installation art and hope you enjoy the photographs below - which were inspired by the work of Cai Guo-Qiang. The photos were taken by the Hawk artists themselves.

On Wednesday, we were joined by some students from Bath Spa University who led a drama workshop all about the rainforest - our geography topic this term. The session was a really great opportunity for collaboration and teamwork as well as developing our drama skills. The photos below show two of our groups creating a tarantula model. 

In maths we have continued with long multiplication, moving on to multiplying up to 4 digit numbers by 2 digits. We will soon begin long division, but it is important that we keep practising our long multiplication skills to retain them in our memory. 

Thursday saw our termly trip to the library and it was, as ever, great to see the children hunting down and enquiring after books from certain authors or with a certain focus. We made it back just before the rain started to fall! 

In gymnastics on Friday, the boys rose to the challenge and worked incredibly hard on their symmetrical and asymmetrical balances- first class collaboration skills and some really impressive balances too! We will get some more photos up in the coming weeks.

Friday 17th January 2025

With the commencement of learning long multiplication this week, we have seen so much perseverance. As we navigated this new concept, we had a chance to talk about our values in action and also explore the concept of growth mindset. Please do talk to your Hawk and take a look at our Maths Calculation Policy to find out more about how we teach long multiplication at Welton. Well done team - you've tried so hard. 

Hawks waited patiently (and excitedly) for art this week and really enjoyed creating their installation art using similar techniques to 'Cai Guo-Qiang'. Below are some pictures showing the explosion of colour that took place outside our classroom. Photos of the finished products are to follow next week but for now enjoy these snaps of the messy painting process. 

Friday 10th January 2025

 Welcome back! We hope you have had a restful break. Hawk class have settled quickly back into the routine of Welton and are enjoying the new topics that we have started. There was a real buzz in the class on Wednesday when we studied the installation art of Cai Guo Qiang and began to make our own art based on his techniques - see photos below. Our new science topic of 'Forces' was timely with the frozen roads as we used secondary sources to answer questions about friction and air resistance. I think we all now understand why cars skid in the ice. Our new Maths topic of 'Multiplication and Division' has begun with Mrs Berry and Mrs Stevens eager to start teaching this unit and apply some of the ideas shared at the Maths INSET on Monday. 

Friday was filled with exercise as different groups of children spent time with Bath Rugby or Brad Cox from the School's Sport Partnership leading sessions on fitness and keeping fit. We rounded off the day talking about our dreams and goals for the future in PSHE. 

Friday 20th December 

 We have made it to the end of term and what a term it has been! From performing at Somervale this week to various sporting accolades and events and not forgetting all of the hard work our children have put in to understanding and securing their fraction knoweldge and further developing their writing skills. We have absolutely loved teaching your children this term and are grateful for all your continued support and encouragement.

This week a message was sent to parents regarding children who have been selected to take part in the Turing project this year. The selection process is based around a very specific criteria that is directed by the government. Any additional spaces were chosen using an online randomised. We appreciate that some children may feel a little disappointed however, as last year, we will endeavour to include and incorporate everyone in the experience. 

The week rounded of with much hilarity at our Christmas party and it was so lovely to see the class joining in and playing games with each other. We'd like to take this opportunity to thank you for the lovely and kind gifts you have given us and we wish you all a happy and healthy Christmas!

We look forward to seeing you in the New Year- Remember there is an INSET day on the 6th of January so children are not in school until Tuesday 7th January! Mrs Stevens and Mrs Berry :)

Friday 13th December 

 We were very proud to give our Oftsed inspector a 'Welton Welcome' on Tuesday and Wednesday - a chance to show off all of the hard work taking place in Hawk Class adn across the school.  A small number of Hawks were given the opportunity to talk to the inspector about our school which gave us a perfect opportunity to reflect on everything that goes on in Welton. When we listed them, we couldn't believe the number and range of opportunities that come our way and all felt very grateful. Well done Team Hawk.

In maths, we have been continuing with our fractions learning. Our main focus was adding fractions with different denominators which involved applying our knowledge of finding equivalent fractions.

In English, we have finished and presented our newspaper articles, now we are moving on to some winter/Christmas poetry.

In computing, we filmed our videos using a range of different filming techniques and angles.

In art we have begun our new topic on installation art. It was great having Mrs Plumley during this lesson as this is her passion and she shared some of her own projects.

Friday 6th December 

 What a brilliant evening was had by everyone at the PTFA Christmas Fair this evening. Thank you Hawk families for all of your support bringing things in for us to sell and joining us for the event. 

This week in English we have loved being journalists and writing newspaper articles about our horrific tale of Jack and the Beanstalk. We especially enjoyed creating headlines with puns. One of our favourites was contributed by Ella, "Let's stalk about Jack"! Everyone loved bouncing ideas off one another - yet another example of fantastic collaboration at Welton.

Our maths fractions learning is coming along well. It has shown us how important it is to be able to recall our tables facts in order to find equivalent fractions. This skill underpins so much of our fractions learning so please please keep doing TTRS at home. 

Our festive singning is improving every day and we are looking forward to being the choir at the Christmas show  on Wednesday 18th December. Well done to the footballers who took part in the tournament on Wednesday - Team Welton are proud of you!

Friday 6th December 

 What a brilliant evening was had by everyone at the PTFA Christmas Fair this evening. Thank you Hawk families for all of your support bringing things in for us to sell and joining us for the event. 

This week in English we have loved being journalists and writing newspaper articles about our horrific tale of Jack and the Beanstalk. We especially enjoyed creating headlines with puns. One of our favourites was contributed by Ella, "Let's stalk about Jack"! Everyone loved bouncing ideas off one another - yet another example of fantastic collaboration at Welton.

Our maths fractions learning is coming along well. It has shown us how important it is to be able to recall our tables facts in order to find equivalent fractions. This skill underpins so much of our fractions learning so please please keep doing TTRS at home. 

Our festive singning is improving every day and we are looking forward to being the choir at the Christmas show  on Wednesday 18th December. Well done to the footballers who took part in the tournament on Wednesday - Team Welton are proud of you!

Friday 27th September:

As our place value unit comes to an end, we have spent the week consolidating some of our learning so far in year 5. Our Monday maths was entirely practical as we worked our way around a carousel using a range of concrete and pictorial methods to solve maths questions.Then later in the week we really honed in on reasoning and problem solving questions and how we approach them - remembering to use concrete and pictorial methods to support our learning.

In DT we explored a 'Doodler' (ask your Hawk what this is!). We analysed the component parts of Mrs Stevens' 'Doodler'and will use this to help us construct our own. In addition we revisited how to construct a circuit.

We have also loved developing our persuasive techniques in English- it has been great to read writing this week that has been bursting with passion and enthusiasm. We hope to carry this on into next week where we will write letters to the Prime Minister imploring the government to put more money aside to ensure everyone has equal access to sporting activities. Ask your Hawk about some of their persuasive facts- they're brilliant!

We rounded up the week with some more brilliant basketball in the sunshine! It was lovely to see so much positive communication between the class as they passed the ball and moved towards the goal. Well done everyone! 

Friday 20th September:

This week in Maths we have been using place value to compare numbers up to 1,000,000 and place them in order on a number line. We have also been learning to round numbers to the nearest 10,100 or 1,000 within 1,000,000!

On Wednesday Hawk Class was buzzing with science as we took part in the Developing Experts live science lesson. Ask your Hawk what happened to the height of the foam when the strength of the acid (vinegar) was increased? As well as learning more about what it means to be a scientist, the main foci of the session were to develop our working scientifically skills, and understand how to plan and carry out a fair test  (only change one variable and keep everything else - the other variables- the same). Try asking your Hawk which variables were kept the same and which one variable was changed? The experiment that we completed is one that can easily be replicated at home - with adult support of course! Please email any photos to the school address for us to see.

We also enjoyed a trip to the library on Thursday followed by an opportunity to take part in our class rep ballot vote. We are really excited to announce that Daniel and Gracie are our class reps and we can't wait for them to feedback to the others on school council our views.

On Friday afternoon, we developed our listening skills and deepened our trust with each other as we had a go at playing sport using a blindfold. Next week in English we're looking at inclusion in sport and writing letters explaining why it is so important.