Stanningley Primary School

We have been looking at mixtures [sand and water] and solutions [sugar and water] and trying to separate them using filter paper. We found that the sand was too big to fit through the holes and could be separated from the water. We found out that the sugar had dissolved into tiny bits which did fit through the filter paper so we will need to find a different way to separate it from the water. I wonder what we could do?

Year 5 enjoyed a day filled with cricket, learning and fun. They had the chance to play cricket on the outfield and to meet players from the Northern Superchargers. YCF Education Day is an annual event which was established in 2014 which welcomes over 600 children to Emerald Headingley Cricket Ground for the day, normally held in June. Schools across all parts of Yorkshire attend a range of workshops focusing on education and sport. The event aims to engage a variety of schools from all across Yorkshire to an International Sporting Venue, encouraging the children to participate within sport and educational activities through a diverse range of activities. As well as giving the children more knowledge and understanding about Yorkshires rich cricketing history and heritage.

We all dressed up in red, white and blue, had a picnic lunch [indoors - thanks to the lovely British weather!] and then learnt all about the history of the coronation.

Catherine came in today from Community Rail Lancashire to talk to us all about the dangers of playing near railway lines. We all know we need to stay away from railway lines but now we are clear on the dangers too. We also found out about lots of jobs that are connected to the railway. We loved getting dressed up in their costumes too!

We have been grouping materials by their properties today. We have been looking at their conductivity, magnetism, hardness and transparency, among others.

This week we have been looking at forgiveness and reconciliation. We have thought about how hard it can be to forgive but that it is important to be able to. We looked at the Christian stories of Jesus and the messages of forgiveness they contain and how these can help us in our own lives. Here we are role playing scenarios that end up negatively and then thinking about how we could turn them around to a positive by using forgiveness.

For our Big Class Treat we had a surprise Easter Egg hunt. The weather was pretty dismal but we still had lots of fun and found LOADS of eggs.

We had a visit from the author, Emma Barnes. She told us about how she got into writing, what inspires her and her top tips for writing - which included eating chocolate! We also got to see Stan, the Stanningley Bear, who looks amazing!

We had some eggselent entries for our Easter Egg Competition. Here they are...

As part of Healthy Week we had lots of fun trying different skipping games.

We had our S Factor heats this week with some great entries. The children really thought about they should present their experiments in an interesting way.

We had some great entries for our Book Week potato competition. Well done to out winners, Isaac, Max and Toby.

This week has been Book Week. We have been looking at the Tom Gates books by Liz Pichon. We created our own versions of Tom Gates with ourselves as the main character. We enjoyed dressing up for World Book Day and then had extra time as our book characters at the Book Day Disco!

Here are the Class Five entries for our annual Stanningley's Got Talent event. We had a good mix of musicians, dancers, comedians and gymnasts.

We have been looking at the work of the famous Pop Artist, Andy Warhol. We started off focusing on his portraits of famous people. We discussed the fact that he screen printed his images so he could mass produce them. We created our own modern versions by taking selfies and using an editing app to paint over them. We then recreated his work in a different way by using watercolours over photographs to give a similar effect to his screen prints.

For various reasons, we could not visit the Alps this year! Instead we brought the Alps to us. We went on a sleigh ride in Austria and drank gluhwein, followed by a snowball fight! We tried a fondue, some Alpine cheeses, sausage and of course chocolate!

We were investigating how we get day and night and how this is linked to the movement of Earth rotating on its axis. Our noses were the UK. The torch was the sun. [Obviously we were very careful not to look directly at the torch!] We discovered that when the sun shines on us we have day light. As Earth rotates and we turn away from the sun, there is no light and that is why we have night time.

We had a great session with Dave the Drummer who taught us how African drum patterns work. We created different patterns that all fitted together. We learnt that they key is to listen to the sounds of others - not just trying to make ourselves heard. A good life lesson!

Here are some videos of our drumming.

We were outside recreating the movement of celestial bodies again. This time we were looking at the movement of the moon as it orbits the Earth - as the Earth orbits the Sun. We watched each other's models, looking to see how we could make them even more accurate. We made sure that the same side of the moon faced the Earth all the way round and that Earth span anti-clockwise. This is the same direction that Earth travels around the sun. It was quite tricky but we did a good job of it.

Class Five have been having extra Design Technology lessons this term at Leeds West. We have been doing woodwork, food tech and learning to 'drive' a sewing machine.

Here we are enjoying our annual Christmas Dinner, served by the staff and enjoyed by all!

We have been looking at how the Earth and the other seven planets rotate around the Sun - the heliocentric model. We learnt that humans used to believe that the Sun and other planets orbited the Earth - a geocentric model. We had fun pretending to be different celestial bodies and acting out these different models.

This Children In Need day, we were lucky enough to be on the route to witness Kevin Sinfield's amazing 7 ultra marathons in 7 days. We made banners and lined the road. It was an exciting [if long] wait for him to come by but we all cheered very loudly when he came by and definitely helped him on his way!

We have been looking at how places change over time, including our own area. We explored the changes by looking at maps of the area over the past 150 years. We then went out into the streets to look for evidence of change with our own very knowledgeable guides, Mrs White and Miss Daniel!

We had a lump of plasticine that sank. Our mission was to try and make it float. We managed it by increasing the surface area to increase the water resistance which helped make it float.

Some of our year 5 boys represented SPS brilliantly at an inter school World Cup competition. The played better and better as the competition went on and ended up a very respectable 2nd place. An extra special mention to Dexter and Jacob who won some extra skills competitions too!

Year 5 performed spectacularly at our Harvest Festival. Here is an extract from their Harvest Rap. How they managed to remember all the words is beyond me!

Some of year 5 got to take part in a dodgeball competition. They all performed brilliantly and came in a well deserved second place.

In our science lessons we have been looking at forces. Today have been looking how a lever can allow a small force to have a greater effect.

This week we voted for our new school councilors. Congratulations to Emmy and Benji who were chosen by the class to represent them this year.

Today we have been reading out our persuasive school council speeches.

As part of our forces work we have been looking at air resistance. We made different sized parachutes to investigate how that might change the speed of descent....with mixed results!