English
What are we reading in Term 2?
“The Jamie Drake equation” tells us a story of the Year 6 boy named Jamie Drake. His father is an astronaut working on the International Space Station. One day Jamie goes to the local observatory and meets an astronomer. He accidentally downloads the alien message on his phone. An important day comes when Jamie’s dad is scheduled to go on a spacewalk. His mission is to release the probes, that will travel to a faraway planet to search for life. Just as his father performs the spacewalk, something terrible happens...
Reading in Year 5...
We aim to cover a range of different text types throughout Year 5, including: instructions, narratives, diary entries, persuasive adverts, non-chronological reports, newspaper reports, balanced arguments, explanations and interviews (to name only a few!). We will also be using some digital images and short film clips to develop our inference and deduction skills, and to support our written work. Some of the skills we will be developing are broken down into more detail below...
VIPERS
Our latest strategy for reading is called the 'Vipers' approach. This involves using a range of key question prompts based on the 2016 reading content domains found in the National Curriculum. Please refer to the posters below to see the key questions and National Curriculum content domains.
How can you help your child with their reading at home?
We encourage your child to read on a regular basis. Short, regular bursts of reading is key: even if it's only 10 minutes a day, you'll be surprised at how much they learn and improve! To support and help your child in developing their reading skills, please encourage them to talk about their books, empathise with characters and predict events within the story. We have a lovely library in school and a superb library in the town centre. Try to encourage your child to widen their reading horizons by selecting books from different genres - if they usually choose a fiction book maybe suggest that they try a non-fiction book for a change. Perhaps they might be inspired by our current topic, or one that they know is coming soon, to select a book relevant to that theme. Here are some activities that could help you fit reading into your daily routine!
Why not try...
- Tag Team - take it in turns to read a page each of your child's favourite book before bedtime.
- The Early Bird - get your child to read to you on the way to school, instead of listening to the radio.
- Poetry Post-its - write short poems on Post-its or note paper and put them up in random places around the house. When your child spots one, they have to read it.
- Magazine Madness - that football magazine or the one that seems only to be filled with happy, rainbow-coloured unicorns still contains words! Instead of just looking at the pictures, ask your child to tell you about it and read it to you while you're cooking the dinner or washing the car.
The key is, make it fun - reading can be enjoyed by everyone!
How can you help with your child's comprehension?
If you have the pleasure of having more time to read with your child at home, then there are many different types of questions that you could be asking them, in order to help develop their comprehension and understanding of the text.
The following documents provide examples of questions that could be asked while reading, for both fiction and non-fiction text types. We hope you find these useful!
Are you challenging yourself to read books from our literary heritage?
The Times Educational Supplement have put together a list of books all children should read before they leave primary school. You only have the rest of Year 5 and then one more year after that left at River; how many do you still have left to read?
Writing in Term 1
Our writing for this term is going to be linked to our topic, 'Peasants, Princes and Pestilence', and our class book, 'Chaucer's Canterbury Tales'.
We will be writing in a range of genres. The first of which will be a narrative, retelling one of the Canterbury Tales in the style of Marcia Williams, aiming to make our first book of the year for our class book corner.
Enjoy activities and exploring different text types here.