Oak Tree Class Blog
Oak Tree Class Blog
Week 6, ending 28 March
Mrs Amos (a.amos) on: Oak Tree Class Blog
Week 6, ending 28 March
Reader:
Special Mention:
None, due to Good Friday holiday
Phew! We made it – and in one piece!!
Jazz music has ended the term for us in Oak Tree Class – Ella Fitzgerald seemed to be the most preferred performer, I think.
In maths, we continue to work hard on understanding decimals and the children have been amazing at this particular unit! There is work on percentages next term and once this work is completed, it is hoped that all the children’s arithmetic test scores will improve – I spoke to many of you at the last Parents’ Evening about this. Hopefully a great score has been reached this week and that your child has shared it with you!
In English, we have covered some very important grammar, including how we do (and do NOT!) use commas in our sentences. I hope this will help to raise the standard of all written work moving into Y6.
Our school visit to St John’s Church was an adventure for RE this week. Rev Richard explained the Easter story very well and the children were engrossed throughout! Excellent behaviour from all involved too.
We are eagerly anticipating the Easter Egg Scramble here on the final day of term, along with our After Show Party! I hope the Easter Bunny is good to you all – and you have lots of goodies to feast on!
Have a super Easter,
Yours,
Mrs Adrienne Amos
PS Just to say, PE for Oak Tree Class next term will be on Thursdays and Fridays.
Week 6, ending 22 March 2024
Mrs Amos (a.amos) on: Oak Tree Class Blog
Reader: Phoebe
Special Mention: Blake
Well done to these children!
House music has accompanied all our Early Bird Maths work each morning – Basement Jaxx seemed to get most heads bobbing in time to the beat!
Although Oliver has certainly dominated our week, we have also managed to learn more about decimal numbers in maths, finished publishing our news reports about the sighting of a yeti in Yeadon and the children have learned even more about mountains and Western USA.
The three performances of Oliver this week have been incredible! I was so proud of each child and the important role they played – it seemed that everyone had a chance to shine. Many thanks, again, for your support with this show this term – from line learning and costume providing, from raffle ticket buying to attending the show – some of you even helping out with the FORP support. Wow! So amazing! I feel so lucky to be working with your children (and you!) – and many thanks for the flowers and gifts; I felt quite overwhelmed on Wednesday night. Mr Jennings also said how much he had enjoyed the shows, feeling especially proud of the seven or eight brave ukulele players. The Y5s did a splendid job today singing the most popular songs to the EYFS children, as they were not able to attend the dress rehearsal last week; they sang and danced with the gusto and enthusiasm I have come to expect from them! I know Mr Cooke has mentioned the show in his newsletter and that even more pics have been uploaded onto the RPPS and Nursery Facebook page. It has been well celebrated.
Just one more week to go until Easter – and in this week, we have the Scholastic Book Fair each evening, a Road Safety session, a trip to the local church, a ‘Wrap Party’ following Oliver and the children are again being asked to bring in an Easter egg and a £1 for the annual Easter Egg Tombola!
Homework this week is simply a spelling activity and I have also asked the children to complete the Book Fair activity: Why I am a Reading Ambassador. We have talked a lot about this, so they should come home brimming with ideas! It can be a poster, a letter, a leaflet, a speech – anything! BUT MUST BE HANDED IN (with their name clearly displayed) ON TUESDAY. (Not Wednesday. But Spellings are for Wednesday, as usual).
Have a super weekend,
Yours,
Mrs Adrienne Amos
Week 4, ending 15 March
Mrs Amos (a.amos) on: Oak Tree Class Blog
Reader: Stanley
Special Mention: Ruby
Well done to these children this week!
Soul Music has been the genre of the week, but it has to be said that we have spent quite a lot of time listening to and singing along to Oliver (!) too.
We have also completed mid-year assessments (in Reading, Writing, Maths and Punctuation & Grammar) across the school in our Assessment Week. I have been really proud of how easily the children have switched from taking assessments in the morning and working very hard on these, and then practising Oliver and working equally as hard on this project! Well done, Oak Tree Class!
As well as continuing our PE unit on Outdoor Adventurous Activities, each week we are also strengthening our core by two- or three-times weekly Pilates sessions and a couple of Daily Mile activities. It’s always good to see how open to these new ventures my class is.
We had a visitor, Jane, leading a special PSHE lesson this week (Personal, Social and Health Education). She came from SCARF and led the children to discuss and develop good practices for happy and healthy friendships. It was fun to welcome Gerald the Giraffe, too!
It has been lovely to see parents on both Parents’ Evenings this week – I hope you were all suitably impressed by the work that you saw in their books/Topic folder.
I look forward to seeing many of you next week at the Oliver production. Here’s a reminder of the dates and times:
Tuesday, 19 March – 1.30pm
Tuesday, 19 March – 6pm
Wednesday, 20 March – 6pm
It is expected that the performances will end around 7.30pm
(Please do remember that we need everyone from Y5 to attend and participate in every performance – each person has a very valuable role to play!)
Have a great weekend!
Mrs Adrienne Amos
Week 3, ending 8 March 2024
Mrs Amos (a.amos) on: Oak Tree Class Blog
Reader: Eva
Special Mention: Amelia
Congratulations to these hard workers this week!
Gosh, it has been a busy week here at Rufford Park! The music genre that the children in Oak have been listening to has been ‘Legendary Bands’. The Who, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones are among the tunes we have enjoyed.
In Maths, we have started some work on Decimals/Percentages, but we have also spent time recapping the key methods (algorithms) for Addition, Subtraction, Multiplication and Division. Homework this weekend is also refreshing the children’s memories of these methods.
Our news reports about the alleged yeti/bigfoot visit continue in English lessons – we have been working especially hard to keep our language formal and to use relative clauses to add extra information. They are going to be a superb final piece of work, I think: one to be proud of.
Oliver rehearsals have continued for Y5 children – only a week or so to go now. Hopefully, all children can be at the two evening performances – it is really important you let me know as soon as possible if this is not the case. Costumes need to be brought in on Monday, on a coat hanger and covered by a named plastic bag. (This way, we can hang them up on the costume rack we now have in Oak Tree’s classroom.)
World Book Day was a real highlight of the week for us – during this day, the children designed their own book covers for AI inspired blurbs, they had an extremely entertaining assembly by the author, Phil Earle, they spend time reading a huge variety of non-fiction books and also were encouraged to visit other KS2 classrooms to listen to a newly purchased audio book for half an hour. We are really trying to inspire children to find a genre, an author or a type of book to love – and thus become real Readers for Pleasure.
Have a great weekend
Yours,
Mrs Adrienne Amos
Week 2, ending 1 March 2024
Mrs Amos (a.amos) on: Oak Tree Class Blog
Reader:
Special Mention:
None this week, due to no Special Mention Assembly
EMO tunes have been the music theme for this week and Avril Lavigne’s classic hit, Sk8er Boi, was by far the most popular. Tune!
In English, the children are continuing to learn about newspapers and are constructing their own news report about a possible Yeti sighting in Yeadon – you may have heard something about this already! In Maths, we have finished our Y5 work on fractions, and now know how to multiply fractions and find fractions of quantities. Homework reflects these two concepts.
A big highlight for the children this week was to listen to the antics of James Ketchell, adventurer, thanks to the generosity of FORP and spend part of the afternoon listening to his key ‘rules to live by’. Some of these were: never to give up on something you really want to do; if you find something hard, then take it a small step at a time and always be kind. I hope that your child will be able to expand on this a little more!
In our art session, we looked at the work on linear perspective by Susie Barstow and the children have created some beautiful landscapes, following her style.
Oliver rehearsals and prop making sessions continue – not long to go now! So please do encourage your child to learn their words (if they have not already done so) and remember to book your tickets for one of the three shows on offer (Tuesday, 19th March at 1.30 and 6pm and Wednesday, 20th at 6pm).
Homework is Maths and Spellings – both are due in on Wednesday (and do remember World Book Day is on Thursday, 7th March and we are encouraging the children to come dressed as the character they represented on their thought bubble - someone inspirational).
I hope you have a super weekend.
Yours,
Mrs Adrienne Amos