Year 5
Week beginning 23rd February 2026
Our project for this half-term is Maya Civilisation.
Year 5 has ended the week—and a truly wonderful term—with enthusiasm, pride and a sense of real accomplishment. Our space topic has captured the children’s imaginations from start to finish, and they have produced tremendous pieces of learning throughout. They have retained an impressive range of facts about planets, stars and the wider universe, and it has been a joy to see their curiosity deepen each week. A standout highlight this week was the visit from the science dome, which gave the children an exhilarating, immersive experience that brought the wonders of space to life in a memorable way. We also finished the term off with a riveting jazz music event!
As we head into half term, we wish all families a fun, restful break and hope the children return refreshed for the Easter term. After the half term, we will continue to promote our agreed year group rules to ensure a calm, safe and respectful learning environment. These include:
1. Staying in the classroom unless an adult comes to get them.
2. Talking at the right times.
3. Remaining in their seats unless given permission.
4. Never using violent or threatening behaviour or language.
By consistently revisiting these expectations, we aim to support positive behaviour, readiness to learn and a safe environment where every child can thrive.
Important dates and messages:
Key Dates
The calendar section on the website lists all major events throughout the academic year, but here are some reminders:
- Monday 23rd February - Return to school for term 4
- Monday 23rd February - Parent outcome in the hall 2:15pm
- Thursday 5th March - World Book Day
- Thursday 26th March - Mediterranean Class Worship
- Friday 27th March - Break up for Easter holidays @ 1:20pm
- Monday 13th April - Return for the summer term
- Monday 4th May - Bank holiday
- Friday 22nd May - Break up for half term @ 3pm
- Monday 1st June - Staff INSET day
- Tuesday 2nd June - Children return for term 6
- Thursday 11th June 2026 - School’s 170th Birthday
- Friday 19th June 2026 - Sports Day at King’s Park Stadium
- Saturday 27th June - St. James’ Summer Fayre
- Wednesday 22nd July - Break up for summer holidays @ 1:20pm
Worship theme:
LENT – Temptation
Time to take opportunities to reflect, practise gratitude and consider how we can show care and compassion in our everyday actions
Mark 1:13 And He was in the wilderness forty days being tempted by Satan; and He was with the wild beasts, and the angels were ministering to Him.
Curriculum
This week, Year 5 will begin to hook the children onto our new project: Mayan Civilisation.
In English, the children will explore the text Rain Player by David Wisniewski, making predictions and analysing the text.
In Maths, pupils will begin a new fractions unit, starting with multiplying fractions by an integer.
Science will be learning about what forces are; how to define them and how we measure them.
RE lessons will explore how and why Christians see the kingdom of Jesus.
The children will also be learning project-related information across the curriculum, including the origins of chocolate in history, health and wellbeing in PSHE and E-saefty in computing.
Other news:
-
PPA Days - PPA Days will be every other Tuesday, and children should come in wearing PE kits.
- PE every Thursday - Children should wear their PE kits every Tuesday.
Homework:
- Please find links to the relevant information below for the Project Overview and Homework.
- MyMaths - We will set up MyMaths tasks termly, based on the learning we will be doing this term. Please let us know if you are finding them too easy or tricky, and remember that below, there are many resources you can use to extend your learning from home. Various MyMaths activities have will be set for this term. This is to allow children who like to do more to be able to. However, children do not have to complete all the MyMaths activities. One per week is our minimum recommendation.
- Reading books - we would like to remind everyone to have a reading book in school - this can be a school or home book. We want all children to be able to share recommendations and reviews of what we have read recently. We display books we've read in the classroom to get children talking about the stories they love and inspire others to try new titles.
- Reading records - All children should now have a grey reading record in which they can record how often they are reading. They will receive one raffle ticket if they read three times a week and two if they read more than five. At the end of each term, we will draw a raffle to win a trip to Costa. You have to be in it to win it! Activities in the reading records can be completed at home for fun!
Reading:
This term, we are reading Boy in the Tower. We will be using Designated Reader sentence stems to support our written answers. Each lesson focuses on a different reading skill, including inferring, predicting, questioning, evaluating, clarifying, summarising and making connections.
Spellings:
This term we will be trialling a new spellings scheme with Purple Mash, starting with words ending with 'ious':
ambitious, precious , infectious, cautious , fictitious , vicious , repetitious , superstitious, nutritious and gracious.
Best wishes,
Year 5 Team
Miss Martin and Miss Perry
Learning as a family in Jesus, through Love, Hope, and Forgiveness.
Matthew 19:26: “With God all things are possible.”