Please see below for some examples of the amazing work we've been doing!

Year 5 have been scaling new heights in our Mountains topic, as we learned about George Mallory and Sandy Irvine's expedition to the world's highest peak in 1924, as well as Tenzing Norgay and Sir Edmund Hillary's successful climb to the summit of Mount Everest 29 years later.

In English we have written recounts as diary entries, changed a text from the first to the third person and used drama to re-enact the final moments of the fateful 1924 expedition. In Geography, we are developing our understanding of local mountain ranges and learning how they differ from others, while in Art we have used charcoal to create some dramatic mountain skylines. We have been impressed with the pupils' enthusiasm for this topic, and they have shown this with some excellent and imaginative home learning.

In Maths, we have begun studying geometry. Year 5 have been identifying and measuring angles, and are now drawing their own using protractors. We will be moving into polygon recognition, and seeing how we can identify different triangles and quadrilaterals.

Our Science topic has moved on to Living Things and Their Habitats, and we have been learning about reproduction in flowering plants. The children particularly enjoyed dissecting lilies and identifying the parts of the flower they had been learning about.

We have also been enjoying some exciting Computing lessons, designing and creating our own websites and using micro:bits to measure temperature (pictures right). We have again been so impressed with the way the children have conducted themselves in these lessons and it has been great to see them using the new Chromebooks so enthusiastically and responsibly. They really are having a great year!

We have been having a fantastic time and enjoying the return to school in Year 5. Before Easter, we completed our termly assessments, and both Mr Picken and Mr Nelson were very pleased with the way Year 5 conducted themselves and approached the tests. They are quite demanding, and yet everyone had a go at everything we put in front of them and pushed themselves to do well.

We also hope you have had a restful Easter, and we have enjoyed hearing about how much chocolate was eaten during the break!

It has been a fabulous start to the Summer term, and all pupils have come back refreshed and ready to learn. We are continuing with our study of The Highwayman in English, and have seen some wonderful actors playing the parts of the characters in the poem. We have also practised our dictionary skills to look up some of the old vocabulary in the poem and scribbled hasty warning notes on “parchment” while writing in role. Some of the children particularly enjoyed the freedom of not having to worry about their handwriting on this occasion.

In Maths, we are now starting to add and subtract decimals. We are also moving on to our new Geography topic, Mountains. We have already learnt about the tallest mountain in the world, the highest above sea level, and the tallest in the solar system! Thinking big in Year 5!

Sadly the year is flying by, but we are looking forward to making the most of our final term together.

The Year 5 team recommend this super book '!Wonder' by RJ Palacio

What a few weeks it has been for Year 5!

Firstly, Mr Picken would like to say a huge thank you for all your well wishes and say that he is finally feeling as though he is on the mend. We both hope you all had a restful half-term and managed to spend some quality time with your families.

We have been so pleased to see the commitment to learning everyone in Year 5 is showing. Our live lessons are very well attended, and the children are clearly putting huge amounts of effort into their home learning. This could not happen without the support of parents and families, so thank you.

We are still working hard on fractions in Maths, and will be soon moving on to decimals and percentages. It has been tricky adapting this for home learning, but there has been a lot of hard work from everyone involved, and in particular our support staff.

In English, the children produced some great work during our study of film narrative, which they rounded off with an impressive set of reviews of The Piano. We have now started learning about Michael Morpurgo and are looking forward to being able to focus on speaking and listening again, in addition to reading and writing, when we are back in school.

We were delighted by the children’s excellent work on climate change in Geography, as it was the first time the entire unit had been taught in Year 5. We have also been studying Italian and PE and are nearing the end of Mrs Frisby and the Rats of NIMH, Robert C O’Brien’s classic story, which we have read to the year group in the afternoons.

Everyone at Lowther is looking forward to a safe return to school, and we can’t wait to welcome you all back soon.

Marta's online lessons have kept Italian language and culture thriving and home-made masks like the version above allowed us to celebrate Carnevale.

Our focus on the use of line in Art produced some excellent work, including this lovely still life drawing.

Year 5 have made an excellent start to the new term and taken learning from home and the new Google Classroom routine in their stride. Building on a superb autumn term, they have shown real enthusiasm for learning and tremendous maturity in the way they have adapted to working online.

The children enjoyed our study of Poetic Style in English and used techniques such as simile, metaphor, alliteration, onomatopoeia and personification impressively when they wrote their own version of Kit Wright’s poem The Magic Box. They also produced some beautiful calligrams, or shape poems, in a lovely combination of English and Art.

In Maths, we have revised column multiplication to multiply 2-digit by 4-digit numbers and developed our skills with short division using the “bus stop” method. We have now moved on to equivalent fractions and mixed numbers.

We have also been studying line drawings in Art, climate change in Geography, forces in Science and Christian and Jewish celebrations in RE, as well as keeping active with PE lessons every Friday.

One of many superb versions of The Magic Box written in Year 5.

We put some of our learning about gravity, momentum and friction to good use by making our own marble runs.

Year 5 had an exciting end to the first term of the year and are super excited about Christmas, unlike a certain character in our English topic, a Christmas Carol. It has been interesting to see Scrooge's alternative view of Christmas!

We had an excellent visit from the Connected Learning Centre, who worked with the children on producing a book and delivering a video presentation about the Maya people of Central America. We have been learning about the Maya in History and the children used Green Screen technology to present their reports as though they were on location.

We have also had a busy couple of weeks of taking assessments and then going through the papers. Year 5 hove worked tirelessly this term, and we are really proud of the way the children have applied themselves.

We would like to end by wishing you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

What a start to the year for Year 5! In History, we studied Ancient Greek, discussing the validity of the Trojan Horse story as well as learning about Greek gods and goddesses, democracy and myths and legends. We have now turned to the Ancient Mayans, where we have already learnt about Chichen Itza, what modern Mayans are doing and we hove become archaeologists, working out what the lost cities were used for.

Our English work tied in well with History, as the study of Greek myths and legends got the year off to a flying start. We used a playscript to act out the story of Theseus and the Minotaur and read a number of other classic myths.

Stories play a big part of our work on speaking and listening, and the children heard a professional storyteller recount the tale of Icarus and Daedalus before telling the story themselves. They produced their own myths which was celebrated in our first “Phase write-off” of the year, with a pupil from each Year 5 class being chosen to read out their myth to an audience. The writing was of an exceptional quality.

We have also studied the classic picture book Way Home by Libby Hathorn and Gregory Rogers, developed our Instruction writing skills and begun work on a Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. The Autumn English programme is a full one but the children have responded with great enthusiasm and are making excellent progress.

In Maths, we have moved on from Place Value into Multiplication and Division. Year 5 have shown an excellent understanding of factors, multiples, prime, square and cube numbers, and have now moved on to multiplying and dividing by 10, 100 and 1000. They are smashing the year 5 curriculum!

Each year group has prepared a performance for you and recorded it. We hope you enjoy watching our Harvest Assembly. You can also watch the full (All year groups) version here.