Welcome to Oak Tree Class!

We hope you have all had a lovely summer break and are ready for an exciting year ahead.

To begin our school year, the whole school transition topic will be ‘Together we Learn and Grow’ and we will be using Tom Blofeld’s ‘Bewilderwood’ series of books as a stimulus for our creative writing and artwork to help us settle back into school. Our whole school visit to Bewilderwood at the end of the first half term promises to be very exciting and we're looking forward to many more exciting learning experiences across the year. Once again, it is important we continue to work in partnership with you this year and we look forward to the year ahead. If you have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to get in touch. 

Best Wishes,

Mrs Frankin & Mrs Williams

Curriculum Overview:

Maths

Our Maths topics for this autumn term will focus heavily on number, place value and the four written calculations and it is imperative that children are supplementing this work with basic skills practise at home. Please encourage the children to use their log in for Times Table Rockstars regularly at home to ensure they know all the multiplication and division facts accurately and rapidly as this knowledge and recall will be hugely beneficial this year. 

English

We will continue to develop our writing skills through the study of various texts this yerm, first with Helen Ward's beautifully illustrated and thought-provoking book called 'Varmints', which looks at colonization and industrialisation. We will then move on to looking at William Grill's fascinating book about about Ernest Shackleton's Journey across the Antarctic. We will analyse the author's use of language and the impact it has upon the reader and then use these to help stimulate and inspire some of our own writing. We will explore different sentence structures, well-chosen vocabulary and a wide range of punctuation and grammar. We will also complete daily, whole class guiding reading sessions to develop the children's reading stamina, pace, understanding of vocabulary and comprehension skills alongside individual reading sessions where each child will be heard to read by an adult each week. In addition to everything that we do in school. it is incredibly important that children are reading a variety of texts (both fiction and non-fiction) regularly at home and recording comments in their reading planners. The planners need to be in school daily and to be signed by an adult regularly. Finally, the children will need to focus on using spelling strategies and rules consistently to help ensure they spell a variety of common and uncommon words accurately. Children should be practising their spellings regularly at home using Spelling frame and you can see the Spelling Strategies document below to help support your child learning their weekly word lists at home. 

Science  

In our weekly Science sessions, we have a Physics focus to begin with and will be learning all about Electricity Children begin with revision of simple circuits with lots of hands on experience with symbols, diagrams and incomplete circuits. Children will then compare series and parallel circuits and face some difficult challenges! Next, we have some biology! The children will then explore the structure of the heart and lungs; looking at the double circulation system and all about blood! They will then investigate why exercise is good for us and what can harm the heart and lungs. The children will be encouraged to work and think like scientists and explore these natural phenomena using their research skills, asking relevant questions to investigate.

Geography                                           

Our Geography enquiry question ‘Is Warrington a good place to settle? In this topic, the children will study why the location, transport links, proximity to cities, trade and industry all make Warrington a good place to live. Through use of digital and paper maps, children will investigate land use in different sized settlements and the ways in which settlements are linked together.  They will also look at how Warrington has changed over time. 

History                  

This year we will be studying both history and geography throughout the year to ensure we cover all curriculum objectives before the children leave us for High School. Our History enquiry question is ‘What can we learn from Ancient Civilisations? During this topic, the children will focus on the early ancient civilisations; Ancient Sumer, Ancient Mayans, Ancient, Indus Valley and Shang Dynasty.  They will learn about significant events from the time and order these events chronologically on a timeline of early world history. 

Additional Messages:

Reading:

Please make sure that you read regularly and get an adult to read with you and sign your planner at least three times a week. You can read your school reading book, an own book, newspapers, comics, etc.

Spellings:

Spellings will focus on either a particular spelling rule/pattern or will be taken from the statutory word list and will be taught and practised throughout the week. Tests will take place each Friday and new lists posted on Google Classroom. 

PE:

The children will have PE on a Wednesday and a Friday this term, children should wear their PE kits to school for each of these PE days.

Homework:

Homework will be set on a Friday and this should be returned by the following Thursday. Homework will consist of a Maths activity and an English activity linked to the unit of work they are covering in class, so they should be able to complete the activity independently. 

Some useful websites, resources and links:

https://spellingframe.co.uk - Spelling Frame - A great, interactive website to give you chance to practise your spellings in a variety of different ways.

https://ttrockstars.com/ - Times Table Rockstars. Use this website to practise your times tables, battle with your band mates and keep your arithmetic skills up to scratch!