Sycamore: Year 5 and Year 6

Welcome to Sycamore Class - Years 5 and 6. We are the wonderful Sycamore Class taught by Miss Ryder and supported by Ms. Taylor (Monday- Thursday mornings).

WELCOME TO TERM 1 IN SYCAMORE CLASS!

We are so excited to welcome everybody at the start of a new academic year and can’t wait to embark on our learning journey together! 

During the first few days, we will be discussing life in our new class and will share our expectations to ensure a really successful year for us all. We will enjoy getting to know each other through a number of exciting activities!

Throughout the term, we will build on these initial experiences to ensure a cohesive and positive learning environment for us all. This is paramount to Shoscombe School’s teaching practice and philosophy.

Here is an overview of our first term of learning:

Hold on tight for this thrilling ride through Term 1!!!

We are also looking forward to – a wonderful harvest celebration, a WW2 experience day at Swindon museum, a visit from Michael Gorely to deepen our understanding of WW2 and a very exciting link up to explore forces!  

There’s so much to do and enjoy. We can’t wait to share this learning journey with you!

Home Learning:

It is really important that children spend some time at home each week consolidating their learning at school and it is helpful if they have a quiet space to do so. You can find a copy of our Home Learning Expectation on the policies section of our website. In our class the expectation is:

• Weekly spellings and multiplication tables plus reading at least 4 times a week.
• A weekly task linked to an area of learning from across the curriculum. All children will be given a homework book to take home; this will be used to complete their topic-based task which needs to come into school every Tuesday with the completed work enclosed.
• Year 6 will begin to focus on some revision work in preparation for the SATs in May.

Assessments this year:

There are some assessments that are statutory. Year 6s will sit their SATs in May and there are regular school assessments in preparation for this. Year 5s will also have assessments throughout the year in a format that is familiar to them.

These are nothing to worry about; we will ensure that the children are ready and prepared for these. More information about these will be available nearer the time.

Reading at home:

Regular reading to an adult is still important, even for the ‘free’ readers as this supports their fluency and expression as well as checking that they understand words that may be new to them and the content.

Please make sure reading records, and books, come into school every day.  Each time your child reads, please date the relevant box and add your signature. We do not require a comment unless you wish to add one.

Please ensure your child is reading for 20 minutes at least four times per week.

Below there is a video to support you as parents to help your child read.

As the children have mastered the skills of phonetically decoding words and are reading with more fluency, there are still skills that the children must learn and build in order to become truly fluent. When hearing your child read at home, it is important that they read the punctuation; pausing where appropriate or adding emphasis and expression. Modelling a sentence that they may have misread is a good way to do this and then asking your child to reread the passage adding in what they have learnt.

We want to foster a love of reading as this will not only open up the world to them but is also key to helping them learn across all subjects as they move to secondary school.

The two films below show how it is possible to praise and guide your child at home when you hear them read.

Example  lesson : How to help Your Child be a fluent and confident reader (year 6)

Example lesson : How to help your Child be a fluent and confident reader (year 5)

Cycle B – Year 5/6 – 2024-2025

Please see the following link for the Year 5 and 6 long term overview: Sycamore Cycle B Y5/ 6 2024-2025