Another week done and only 3 left to go until half term, it's amazing how fast time is flying by.
In English this week, we have started our second writing genre, a third person re-tell. We decided to do ours based on Chapter 3 of Rumaysa where we see her first interaction with the witch. We began the week by looking at a magpie text in order to get a better understanding of what a third person re-tell looks like before moving on to plan our own piece of writing. This saw us drafting our work using adverbials of time and place, which helps our writing to have more detail
In Maths this week, we've learnt about how to use addition using 5-digit numbers. We revisited column method as this is a quick and easy method to use and understand. Something that did confuse us a bit was our lesson on using rounding to estimate the answer to addition calculations, not finding out the actual answer seemed absurd to some of the children who found themselves just solving the calculations as opposed to estimating them. To end the week we expanded our learning into multi-step addition questions and how the vocab in a word problem gives us hints to the type of calculation that is hiding within it.
Our science learning this week related to air resistance within the topic of forces. To this end we thought, how do we test air resistance? The easiest solution to us was to make the teacher climb up to the top of the fire escape and throw egg parachutes off the top. By using different sized parachutes we could see how the change in air resistance affected the speed at which they hit the floor. It was messy, fun and educational, what more could you ask for!
Our History learning this week saw us further explore the early Islamic civilisations. We discussed how the Kaaba structure within ancient Makkah was in existence before the beginnings of Islam and was used as a shrine by Christians, Pagans and Jews. We then discussed historians views of the beginning of the Islamic religion, which saw Muhammad, (P.B.U.H), sleeping in a cave near to Makkah. It was here that he heard the word 'recite'. From this point, he was given messages from God, which he shared with people in Makkah. These people became the very first Muslims.
Our Geography lesson this week was about two megacities that could be found in South America, Brazil, they are called Rio de Janerio and Sao Paulo. By using our knowledge of what makes a megacity we began discussing why Rio de Janeiro, had such a problem with overcrowding due to it being trapped between mountains and the ocean. We also discussed why Sao Paulo has been able to grow so much that is became the most populous city in both North and South America by using conurbation, which resulted in them having a massive population of around thirty million!