WILLOW CLASS

Welcome to Willow Class

 The wonderful Year 5 and 6 children in Willow are taught by

Mrs Pontet and Mrs Tawse, ably assisted by our amazing support team -

Mrs Jackson, Mrs Larkins, Mrs Jelly, Mrs White and Mrs Duffy. 

Summer Term 2024

Crime and Punishment is our topic theme this term, looking at the concepts of Grace, Justice and Power. As well as learning how things have changed over the past 2000 years, in terms of what is a crime and how punishments are given out, we will also be considering whether certain punishments are fair (or just) and how we might do things differently! 

'Holes' continues to be our whole class text and we will be learning how to write formal letters of complaint to make our views heard. Later in the term, we will be studying the narrative poem 'The Highwayman'.  In science we will be developing our understanding of light and then linking with PSHE, learning how the human body develops as we grow up. Hopefully with the weather warming up, most of our PE lessons will be outside - athletics, cricket and rounders are always fun to play.

All this and much more to look forward to - we can't wait! 

Friday 26th April

As well as learning to triple jump, we have had fun learning all about how gruesome the Romans could be when dealing out punishments to those they perceived to have committed a crime. Learning about transferring data using bluetooth was energetic as we pretended to send and intercept data on the playground. In art we experimented with contrasting colours, using a range of media to try out different effects. We loved listening to the film score of "A Close Shave" and discussing how the dynamics, tempo and pitch can really affect our emotions in different scenes. And our musical Spring Concert was amazing, with many of Willow Class performing on the piano, violin and cornet - the choir also reprised a couple of songs from the WASMA concert. Another busy week 

Friday 19th April

This week we began our 'Crime and Punishment' topic and discussed what this meant to us in 2024 in the UK.  Next week we will compare what Roman Britain considered a crime and how they dealt with this. 

In PE we were learning how to do long jump. We developed our understanding of light in science, considered the importance of music in films, learnt about the saints of the United Kingdom and also found out about Pop Art - creating some fantastic title pages in our sketch books.  The Year 6's also had their final practise of SATs exams - everyone tried their best and we are so proud of the progress they have demonstrated.

Upcoming dates:

Monday 15th April - Back to school - yay!

Wednesday 24th April 1.30pm - Spring Concert

Monday 6th May - Bank Holiday (school closed)

Monday 13th - Thursday 16th May - Year 6 SATS

Monday 20th - Friday 24th May - Y6 residential trip to PGL

Wednesday 22nd May - Year 5 Dongalling (details to follow)

Friday 24th May - break up for half term

Half Term - 227th - 31st May

Monday 3rd June - Back to school

Tuesday 11th June - Sports Morning

Wednesday 26th June - Changeover Morning (Y6 to visit new secondary school)

Thursday 27th June - Literary Festival event

Monday 1st - Wednesday 3rd July - Y5 Bushcraft residential

Tuesday 2nd July - District Sports

Wednesday 10th July 6pm - Year 6 Leaver's Show

Wednesday 17th July 10am - Y6 Leaver's Service at St Mary's Church

Friday 19th July 1.30pm - End of term

We love reading!

We expect everyone in Willow Class to have a good book in school.  You will have regular opportunities to read your own choice of book as well as read and discuss a variety of texts in lessons.

You always need your pencil case with 'Super Six', (Handwriting pen, pencil, rubber, sharpener, ruler and glue stick) all named, a refillable water bottle, a reading book and a positive attitude.

Please wear your PE kit to school on Tuesday and Thursday.

Don't forget your water bottle, reading book and pencil case everyday.

Spellings

Each week we will learn all about 10 spellings.  Practise them using the Spelling Shed games (see link below).  We will not have a weekly test but will have random tests every 2 - 3 weeks seeing if you can remember a mixture of the previous spellings.

March 2024

Wednesday 27th March

We had a lovely Easter service at church today. Each Phase of the school shared an important part of the Easter story and how it links to one of our school values.  Every child in the school had contributed to our ribbons, with a drawing of themselves with the value their Phase had focused on.  These will remain on display in the church over Easter.  

Tuesday 26th March

We have had such fun, designing, constructing and then testing our self-propelled vehicles. 

Well done to the winning buggy - covering a distance of 4.4 metres!

22nd March

We have loved designing and constructing our self-propelled buggies this week.  We will all compete in the Willow Grand Prix next week to see which vehicle can go the furthest!

STEM Week 2024

We did a carousel of interesting activities, visiting each teacher to learn something new.  The PTA treated us to a dome planetarium. We learnt about Tim Peake and designed our own planets.  In our houses, we competed in the annual inter-house engineering challenge and the week culminated in the amazing Science Fair!

World Book Day 2024

We dressed up as a word, eliciting some amazing vocabulary, did 'buddy reading' with the Infants and created book characters from a cardboard tube. Don't forget to use your £1 book voucher!

Friday 1st March - We started the week discussing the concept of 'liberty' and learnt all about the famous Statue of Liberty and why it is so important to Americans.  Calypso music was fun to listen to and in computing we developed our understanding of online bullying and how to tackle it.  We have discovered about the 4 blood types in science and how to say the planets in French.  And we finally completed our amazing collaborative architectural skylines.  On Wednesday we had the athlete Ryan Scott in school - it was such fun to complete the physical challenges and then hear all about Ryan's achievements and mindset.

Next Thursday is World Book Day.  Everyone got a £1 book voucher today to spend or use to get one of the special WBD books for free!  We can't wait to see which words you are dressing up as 

February 2024

Friday 23rd February - We've loved learning how to write an exciting action scene this week - using a variety of sentence structures and punctuation to good effect. We learnt how diverse the Grand Canyon is, exploring different biomes of this amazing geographical feature. Discussing the features of a wheeled buggy in DT was great and we've started thinking about how to design our own. The rain didn't stop us in PE as we developed our fitness on Thursday as well as our tennis skills on Monday.  A busy week! 

Friday 9th February - The end of a busy half term.  This week we have learnt about how the Grand Canyon was formed, continued to develop our gymnastic and handball skills and made origami hearts.

On Wednesday we visited Maidenhead Mosque, which was brilliant as it helped build on our understanding of the Islamic faith.  Today we could wear non-uniform and we had a visit from a fire engine.  We learnt all about fire safety as well as the vital equipment used on the truck.  We finished the week by watching the film 'Stormbreaker'.  It was interesting to make comparisons with the book we have been reading.

We hope everyone has a restful, fun-filled half term break.  See you on Monday 19th February! 

Friday 2nd February - We had a great time on Wednesday at The Piggott School, taking part in the Year 9 Leadership Programme.  Football, basketball and Cantonese activities were organised by the students for us to enjoy.  Also this week, we have begun to plan our independent balanced argument using our research from home about a North American country, learnt about how our lungs work, discussed how stereotypes can affect our views and worked collaboratively to plan our architectural skylines in art.

Next week we're visiting Maidenhead Mosque and have a non-uniform day on Friday.

January 2024

Friday 26th January - Drawing and shading this afternoon ended another great week of learning.  We have begun learning about balanced arguments and the 'language of debate', as well as how modal verbs can change the possibility of a sentence. Making origami hearts in science was tricky but fun.  We discussed the important issue of tackling racism, as well as what Muslims believe about heaven. Both PE sessions were in the hall this week - one fast-paced handball lesson and one gymnastics lesson focusing on balance and team work.

Thanks to all the parents who attended our residential meetings this week.  If you were unable to attend, please find the information in the presentations section of the website.

Friday 19th January - Another great week in Willow Class.  We've all written our own Native American tales, discovered some amazing physical features in North America, learnt how useful search engines are, considered the Muslim belief of Jihad, developed our understanding of how important blood is, practised our gymnastic moves and created some accurate drawings of iconic American buildings.  

Looking forward to seeing parents and carers at our PGL and Bushcraft meetings next week 

Friday 12th January

We've been back in school for 8 days and really got back into the swing of learning. We've discussed the diverse climate of North America, learnt about the Islamic belief of Jihad, considered online reputations and developed our gymnastic skills.  We loved learning about the blood in our bodies and looked at the architecture of famous buildings.  In English we have continued to learn about Native American origin stories and even had a go at acting one out!

December 2023

Friday 15th December - Christmas fun in our last week of the year. 

Inter-house carol competition, delivering gifts around the village, pantomime trip to Windsor, Christmas lunch wearing our Christmas jumpers and some fun Christmas calligrams.

Friday 8th December - We've had a really active week.  Netball skills, street dance and the 'Reindeer Run' today which we did to raise money for Thames Hospice.  But all our other lessons have continued: showcasing our Ancient Greek learning by writing non-chronological reports, finishing our whole class reading texts, considering the Christmas Story by discussing the concept of 'Incarnation', problem solving with electrical circuits and we were lucky enough to watch Phase 1's nativity performance.

Next week we have more exciting opportunities in our countdown to Christmas. 

Have a great weekend 

Friday 1st December - Decorating our Greek vases, practising our stop motion animation, discussing the Ancient Greek legacy, learning some street dance moves, speaking in French about where we live, carrying out a science investigation involving traffic lights, rugby matches on the field culminating in delivering our class worship about peace to the whole school and our parents and carers.  I hope you all have enough energy to come along to the Christmas Fair tomorrow - see you there! 

November 2023

Friday 24th November - This week has been assessment week and we've been proud of how hard the children have worked to demonstrate their progress so far this term.  But it's not all been tests. 

We've learnt about how the Ancient Greeks created the Olympics, storyboarded our own stop motion animation, been dramatic learning Shakespeare, played tag rugby, had our final swimming lesson and painted our Greek vases.  We've been so busy, we haven't had time to take any photos!

Next Friday is Willow Class Collective Worship - parents and carers are invited to join us at 2.30pm.

Have a great weekend 

Friday 17th November - What a jam-packed week! 

We've begun learning about "A Midsummer Night's Dream", had a go at playing Pachelbel's canon, learnt about Ancient Greek theatre, played dodgeball (as it was raining on our PE day), tinkered with stop motion animation, created computerised electrical circuits and made our Greek vases.  Today we all wore spots to help raise money for Children in Need.  I think we all need a restful weekend, ready for more exciting learning next week.  Have a great weekend! 

Friday 10th November

Today we commemorated Armistice Day with a two minute silence followed by a poem and a prayer.  As a school we have made a beautiful poppy display.  The children have been very thoughtful in their reflections about this important day.

This week we have been independently writing a historical recount about the famous Martin Luther King speech - "I have a dream", learning about the Battle of Marathon, comparing Pachelbel's Canon to modern music, developing our understanding of electrical circuits, as well as completing some exhausting circuit training to improve our fitness!  This afternoon we began designing our Ancient Greek vases, adding detail and characters known from this time.  We can't wait to begin making them next week.

Thanks to our PTA cake sale money, we’ve got some new pens for the class as well as some books, including graphic novels as requested by the children. A big thank you to everyone who supported this event! 

Friday 3rd November

Only a four day week but so much learning has happened!  We've discovered the impact of Dr Martin Luther King's "I have a dream" speech, begun our tag rugby PE lessons, experimented with electrical circuits, learnt about the importance of Hajj to Muslims, researched ancient Greek pots (ready to create own own later this term), discussed the important difference between fact and opinion and even had a go at performing a Haka!  We finished the week with our cake sale.  Have a great weekend 

October 2023

Friday 13th October.

This week we have thought a lot about food - both at our Harvest service at church as well spending most of today making our Greek mezzes.  We loved making the dough for the flatbreads, as well as making hummus and tzatziki - and we used our knife skills to prepare crudites to dip!

This week we have also used our investigation skills in science, continued practising our netball and swimming skills, learnt about birthdays in French and learnt all about the events which happened after Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a bus. Another busy week!

3rd October - We had a fantastic Ancient Greek day!  We were playing games thought to have be played then, requiring strategy and thought to beat your opponent. We were writing as a scribe using reeds and ink on real papyrus and trying to run Athens making decisions using democracy.  The final showdown between Persians and Greeks was so much fun as we battled with spears and shields using formations used by the soldiers.  We learnt so much and had lots of fun!

September 2023

Autumn 2023

We are looking forward to welcoming everyone back to school.  Lots of our learning will be centred around the topic "Ancient Greece" and we will not only learn about how this period in history has shaped our lives today but also read and write Greek myths in English, make Greek pots and discover how to make some Greek food. In science, we will learn about forces around us and develop our understanding of electricity. Looping and remixing will be explored in music and computing lessons and we will learn about the Islamic faith in RE. We will build on our knowledge of French as well as have two PE lessons a week - including swimming this term. So much learning to do!

Friday 29th September

This week ended with lots of food! We practised knife skills ready to make our Greek mezze - chopping, dicing and batoning vegetables - and then all ate cake to help raise money for the MacMillan Cancer charity.  We also began playing loops on the xylophones, played netball, spoke French and thought of lots of creative writing ideas to construct our own Greek myth.  The Year 6's also took part in Bike-ability training.  This involved practising their skills on the playground before venturing off around the local area, ensuring they were riding safely. Another busy week!

Friday 22nd September

We've loved learning the story of Pandora's Box, even acting it out to help us remember all the events that happen.  We tested our theories about air resistance in science, developed our coding skills in computing, played netball, went swimming, had fun speaking French and learnt all about what constitutes a healthy balanced diet. 

Year 6 - don't forget it's Bikeability on Monday.  Bring your bike and helmet ready.

Friday 15th September

Another busy week.  We've written some amazing atmospheric settings, learnt about Sir Isaac Newton, discovered what the five pillars of Islam are, using the computer to compose loops in music, played netball, gone swimming and debated whether we would've preferred to live in Athens or Sparta.

Today we all got to eat our lunch outside in the sunshine and designed Christmas cards!

Everyone has settled back into school life and is working hard.  Enjoy your weekend 

Friday 8th September

Wow! We've only been back at school for a week and yet already done so much.

Learning about forces in science, looping in music, Greece in history and revising how to keep safe on the internet.  We braved the heat to do PE and this afternoon tried out Greek food.  Olives certainly split the class - some loved them, others not!

Our house captains have been voted for as well as our class reps for school council.  I was so proud of all those who stepped up and gave a speech about why they would be good in the role.  But I was particularly pleased with the grace shown by all of the children whether they won or lost.

Enjoy the weather over the weekend