This week in Science we continued to learn about magnets and how they work. On each table around the classroom there was a different question that we needed to investigate; everyone had a go at investigating each question and at the end of the lesson we discussed our findings. The questions were: 
Do magnets always attract other magnets?
Are the paperclips more attracted to one part of the magnet?
Can magnets make other magnets move without touching
What happens when a magnet is spun in water?
Do different magnets make longer paperclip chains?

Some of the main things that we found out where that the opposite poles of a magnet attract, and the same poles repel each other. We also found out that the paperclips were only attracted to the ends of the magnet but the magnetic force could pass through the paperclips!

In English the children have planned and written the first draft of their explanation text about how their robot pet works. We will edit them and write out our final drafts next week.

This week in maths we finished our work on multiplication and division – this has been one of our hardest maths topics so far but the children have really persevered through the challenges! Next week we will start our new unit of work on Money.

In Jigsaw this week the children continued to work on their group projects. So far they have designed a garden decoration and planned out how they will make it using junk modelling materials. We have really been focusing on the different skills that we need to work well as a team and how we can support each other to achieve things. Next Monday, the children will begin making their decorations – thank you to everyone who has brought in junk modelling supplies for us to use!
​
This week’s spellings have been set on Spelling Shed; we will have a short test on Tuesday next week.
Spelling Rule: Adding the –ly suffix to an adjective turns it into an adverb.
calmly
exactly
deadly
bravely
boldly
gladly
deeply
clearly
hourly
​quickly 

This week in English we finished our Sentence Stacking lessons for our explanation text, ‘How does a Robot Dog Work?’ and we have now moved on to planning our own explanation texts. The children have spent our English lessons on Thursday and Friday designing their own robot pets – I have been impressed with their creativity and excellent drawings! The children have also written about the different features of their robot pets, thinking about the skills and tricks they can do, and how the owner will need to look after it.

In maths we have been focusing on dividing a two-digit number by a one-digit number. We have been using our place value grids and dienes to support divisions when we need to exchange; this has been quite challenging but the children have practised hard and are getting the hang of it. We have also learnt about remainders in divisions and how to write this as part of our answer.

In Science this week we carried out an investigation to find out which materials are magnetic and which are non-magnetic. We used the magnets to test different materials and objects in the classroom and found some surprising results, for example, we found out that parts of the wall are magnetic! We narrowed down our initial thoughts as we realised all magnetic materials are metal; however, we learnt that not all metals are magnetic –iron, nickel or cobalt are the only magnetic materials.
​
This week’s spellings have been set on Spelling Shed; we will have a short test on Tuesday next week.
Spelling Rule: The long /a/ vowel sound spelled ’ey.’
obey
prey
convey
survey
grey
osprey
disobey
they
surveyor
conveyor

​We have had a busy but brilliant two weeks after the Christmas holiday – I’ve been really impressed with how hard the children have been working!
In English we have started a new unit of work based on writing an explanation text. Last week, we watched a short animation called Mr Hublot and we used this as a stimulus to begin our piece titled ‘How does a Robot Dog Work?’.
In maths we have started a new topic and so far we have focused on multiplying 2-digit numbers by 1-digit numbers. We have learnt how to use the formal written method of short multiplication which has been tricky, especially when there has been carrying involved, but the children have worked really hard on practising this!
On Wednesday, we had our second Dance lesson of the term. We really focused on starting and ending our routines well, and demonstrating skills such as canon and unison. Our focus has been creating routines that represent volcanoes erupting which links to our Geography topic of Mountains and Volcanoes. The children had to create sequences of moves that represented the different stages of a volcano erupting and I was impressed with how well they managed to do this.
Our Science topic this term is Forces and Magnets. Last week we carried out and experiment to find out which surface would be most likely to prevent people slipping. In order to do this, we first learnt about friction and how it works as a force. The children worked in small groups to carry out their investigations using toy cars to work out which materials created the most friction.
 
This week’s spellings have been set on Spelling Shed; we will have a short test on Tuesday next week.
Spelling Rule: The long /a/ vowel sound spelled ’ei’
vein
weigh
eight
neighbour
sleigh
reign
freight
reins
veil
eighteen

In English this week we have finished writing our fairy tales with a twist! I have been so impressed with how hard the children have worked on these pieces; the children have not only worked hard on the content, but also shown a lot of care in the presentation of their work!
​
In maths we have now finished our work on multiplication and division. We have covered the 3, 4 and 8 times tables. We have looked at patterns in the times tables, and different strategies to help us learn them, as well as using more practical methods for working out the answers.

On Thursday we finally made our Bell Beaker clay pots. We started off by molding the clay into the pot shapes, trying not to make it too wide or thin. Then we looked at the designs we had previously made and used the clay tools to draw them onto our pots! We’re leaving the pots to dry out properly and then the children can take them home next week. 

We have finished this term's spellings and I haven't set any over the Christmas period. We'll start again in January.