An amazing week of learning in Dolphin Class!
In our English learning this week, we've continued our work relating to our third person re-tell. We began the week looking at the correct use of the determiners 'a' and 'an'. We re-visited our year three learning - reminding ourselves of the vowels and consonants rule, before investigating the rule exceptions. When a 'u' makes a 'y' sound - for example in the word universe, we would use the determiner 'a', however, when a 'h' makes an 'o' sound - for example in the word honest, the determiner 'an' would be used. We learnt the trick is to listen to the sound of the beginning of the word. We continued the week by completing our drafts of our re-tells, using inverted commas to indicate speech and verbs and adverbs to show possibility, (should, could). Our extended writes completed at the end of the week allowed the Dolphins to showcase all of their year five skills so far. The results were just fantastic - well done to you all!
In our maths learning this week, we've continued our investigations of calculation - this week investigating subtraction. We began the week by revisiting simple column methods - remembering the importance of 0 as a place holder, before moving on to rounding, estimating and two step problems. We learnt the importance of unusual vocabulary as synonyms for subtract - lose, drop and even share can al be synonyms for subtract, when read in context. Our arithmetic work secured this knowledge, as we investigated subtraction of four digit numbers from five digit ones.
Our Science learning this week saw us investigate different manipulative forces. We learnt about levers, gears and pulleys as ways of affecting forces. We looked at examples of the three different types in a real World context, before then investigating pulleys practically. It was lovely to see great teamwork in action during this experiment - the Dolphins were very determined to see their pulleys work successfully!
In our History learning this week, we continued our learning relating to early Islamic civilisations. We followed the path of early Islamic development, learning about its spread across countries and civilisations. We discussed reasons for this, including the effectiveness of the Islamic Arab army. We consolidated our learning by creating news reports detailing the invasions - many dramatic skills became apparent in this exercise!
Our Geography learning this week related to our continuing investigation of South America. We built on our previous learning relating to the Megacities of Brazil, discussing the factors for migration. We looked closely at the development of Sao Paulo as the America's biggest megacity and how reading four figure grid references can help plot these movements. We also help an interesting discussion relating to which came first, the features of Sao Paulo, or the expansion of the city. As always, great philosophical thoughts were displayed by all - a bit like the chicken and egg argument!
Have a fantastic week,
Love from Dolphin Class. xx
Dolphins Week beginning 03/10/22
