Goldfinch
September 2023' - Ancient Greek Day. We had a fantastic day in Goldfinch today and learnt a lot from each other about Ancient Greece, especially about Greek Gods and Goddesses. While we looked the part, we also enjoyed some Greek dancing and writing. Well done everyone for working so hard on your presentations over the summer!
Welcome back to Autumn 2023. Here are some useful notes to help you to support your child in Goldfinch Class.
Tips for supporting your Year 5 or 6 child with reading at home.
July 2023 - Well done Goldfinch, our fund raiser today for Action Against Hunger raised £78.55! This money will be used to help people around the world suffering from severe food insecurity through initiatives such as screening under 5's for malnutrition and building and restoring water points.
Some pupils ran over 20 times around the playground in 10 minutes, while others walked or took part in a penalty shoot out in the ball court. It was a wonderful way to end the school year while also helping others :)
July 2023: Our Global Kitchen. We used the Eatwell plate to compare diets around the world and investigated miles to plate for all our ingredients. The classroom smelt wonderful with the aromas of Mexican and Chinese cooking. We practised dicing, shredding, grating, mincing and frying.
June 2023 - Goldfinch have been considering what different religions have to say about sustainability. We decided to use bee friendly plants and vegetables to create a sustainable area at school.
June '23 - Windsor trip to Dr Choc. Goldfinch found out about the general public's views on Fairtrade using their own questionnaires before they visited the Dr Choc factory and made their own delicious chocolate bars!
SATS information for Parents
Y5 Maths: we have been using Cuisenaire equipment to find the equivalence between mixed numbers and improper fractions. Using the concrete equipment helps us to understand the maths behind the written methods..
Science: closely studying the features of the different planets in our solar system has helped us to make good observational watercolours of each planet.
January 2022: Goldfinch got our Stargazers topic off to a good start with a visit to Winchester Planetarium and Science Centre. We 'visited' the planets in our solar system in the planetarium and discovered the research that help scientists learn about living in space.
Pupil Advocacy Week January 2023: We kick-started the Spring term by considering the ways in which we could serve our community. We all received first aid training for burns, choking and CPR and next day we made instructional videos to show our families what to do in an emergency.
Autumn '22: We ended our topic on Mountains, Earthquakes and Volcanoes by thinking about how we would stay warm at Everest Basecamp. We designed mountain boot liners to protect our feet from cold. After some research, we designed our own patterns and used these to make our boot liners from warm and durable materials.
Autumn 2022 - Goldfinch made a model of the Earth's layers and labelled them. We are starting to think about why volcanoes happen.
Autumn 2022 - Geography: Goldfinch used the materials they were given to build a structure that would be resistant to earthquakes. We have some great engineers in our class!
Autumn 2022: after investigating Friedrich Moh's scale that tests mineral hardness (which means the resistance of a mineral to being scratched) we thought about how this knowledge of different minerals would be important to mountain climbers.
Autumn 2022: Goldfinch investigated how and why earthquakes happen, using polystyrene and coloured water to help them think about what would happen on the Earth's crust when different types of plate boundaries are formed.
Autumn 2022: After watching champion rock climber, 11-year-old Brooke Raboutou, we investigated which kind of shoes would provide the best friction for a mountain climber. We considered which variables to control and repeated our tests to make sure our data was more reliable.
We linked our art to our Geography topic and made pastel interpretations of the famous Mount Fuji Eruption by Katsushika Hokusai (October 2022)
September 2022 - Welcome Meeting for Goldfinch Families: Here is some useful information about our class.
September 2022: We made a great start to our new Geography topic today, learning about 4 different ways that mountains can be formed. Can you remember how a mountain might be formed?
July 2022 Transition Morning - It was lovely to welcome the new members of Goldfinch into the classroom; they showed excellent communication skills during the 'getting to know you', activities and made a great start to our first Geography topic, 'Mountains, Earthquakes and Volcanoes'. I'm looking forward to building on this in September! Until then, enjoy the summer holidays :)
Summer 2022: we were so pleased to be able to send teams to the Y6 Eagle House Maths Challenge and the Y5 Luckley School Maths Challenge. They were excellent ambassadors for our school.
July 2022: After all the Covid restrictions of the Autumn term, we finally managed to catch up with our DT project - Come Dine With Me in Ancient Greece. We learnt about the sort of diet that the ancient Greeks would have had and the health benefits of this type of food. We developed lots of cookery skills to make hummus, flatbread, courgette stew and Gigantes Plaki. Mr Salkeld, a chef at L'Ortolan Restaurant, helped too and talked to us about life as a chef.
June 2022: Year 5 have been learning to draw, measure and calculate angles. How would you draw an angle of 280 degrees if you only have 180 degrees on your protractor?
June 2022 - History (Stone Age to Iron Age) - Goldfinch have been investigating the possible uses of Stonehenge and the stages it was built in. This week they solidified their knowledge by building their own prehistoric monuments using either biscuits and icing or cheese puffs with water. There was a lot of rebuilding when parts were knocked during the construction process - well done for persevering Goldfinch!
June 2022: Goldfinch class have been studying Charles Darwin and his finches as part of our learning about evolution. We used colour shading to show topography on our models of the Galapagos Islands and investigated which type of beak was best for eating nuts and seeds.
May 2022 - The year 6's worked in small groups to tackle a carousel of matchstick puzzles. They showed some good communication skills and problem solving skills to solve many of the problems,
April 2022: FOFSA Easter activities. Goldfinch were treated to an afternoon of baking, painting, planting and games. A huge thank you to the volunteers who made such a fun afternoon possible.
Maths: Year 6 have been investigating the different dimensions of cuboids with the same volume.
March 2022 Our trip to The Living Rainforest. We had a great day learning about the adaptations animals and plants have made to thrive in the rainforest and even created out own animals with amazing adaptations.
March 2022: Today we trained to be Mental Health Champions. We learnt about good strategies for feeling calmer. Can you remember how you can support good mental health for yourselves, their families and their friends.
March 2022: How much of the circulatory system can you memorise in 30 seconds? Goldfinch played Memory Tag in teams to replicate a diagram of the circulatory system which they then created as 3D information posters. It really helped them to write their explanations in English.
February 2022: Goldfinch were incensed by the footage of an orangutan fighting off a bulldozer in the rainforests of Borneo. We wrote some fantastic newspaper reports about the dramatic event.
February 2022: Goldfinch have been learning about the Linnaean classification system. Do you know what the 5 kingdoms are? We investigated Fungi today.
Silence, Pere Noel! Vous allez reveiller les enfants! Getting ready for our Christmas performance to our parents.
Year 6 SATs Information Meeting for Parents - November 23rd 2021: Information slides and useful links
Guide to Goldfinch Home learning Autumn 2021
Year 5 are investigating area - but what does a square metre look like?
October 2021: Goldfinch class have been making things disappear. They learnt about the science of refraction that caused these great optical illusions.
September 2021: Can we design a tool that allows us to look safely at Medusa? We used what we learnt about reflections to design a very useful gadget called a periscope.
3 September 2021: Yasas! It's all Greek to Me! We started the term in style by sharing with the class everything we had found out about our ancient Greek god, goddess, hero or beast.
The World on our Plate: we investigated and made meals from around the world and learnt which meal travelled the furthest to our plates.
May 2021: Year 5 have been investigating the internal angles of polygons. They were able to make connections with knowledge they had about other 2D shapes.
May 2021: Mrs Gan led our Ascension music lesson at St James Church. We reflected on and celebrated Ascension with a music soundscape. Reverend Gemma talked to us about Ascension before our very windswept picnic.
DT (Spring 2021): Our moving mechanisms project had a Space Theme ranging from the solar system to Star Wars and Among Us. We investigated the movement of different cam mechanisms before designing and building our own frames to house our moving mechanisms. Our classroom was extremely industrious all week. Lots of us felt like this was 'proper DT!'.
March 2021: How are black holes formed? How do black holes behave? We investigated using foil wrapped balloons and marbles.
February 2021- Remote Learning RE: Goldfinch have been learning about community in the context of 'Does the Community of the Gurdwara help Sikhs to lead better lives?' We live in communities too and we considered whether our communities help us to lead better lives too. Then we thought about what we could do to make our community better. Our 'wordarts' reflect what community means to us.
January 2021 - Remote Learning Science: the children have produced some fantastic work on the Planets. They produced some detailed artwork , graphed information or investigated distances with the 'loo' roll challenge!
December 2020 - D&T: As part of this term's topic about Mountains and Volcanoes, Goldfinch have investigated, designed and made mountain boot liners.
November 2020: Goldfinch have loved reading The Hobbit. We described Smaug in French making sure our adjectives and nouns agreed.
November 2020: Investigating thermal properties: What would be the best material to keep us warm at Everest 'Basecamp?'
October 2020: We are so lucky to be able to hold our Daily Mile in such a beautiful park. Does anyone else think that amazing cloud bank looks like a snowy mountain range?
October 2020: Goldfinch have been getting to grips with friction. There was great excitement when the jelly came out - although it ended up covered in oil. We investigated which shoes would provide the best grip for mountain climbers.
September 2020: In a hole, in the ground, there lived a hobbit. Goldfinch have been investigating Tolkien's descriptions of the hobbit-hole.
September 2020: After watching base jumpers in the mountains, Goldfinch have been investigating what variables will affect air resistance. They chose to investigate variables such as the size or shape of the parachute, the number of holes or the weight of the 'person.'
Goldfinch Class Information for Parents Autumn 2020
Goldfinch class have continued to 'Dig into the Past' with their home-school interactive books about the Stone Age to the Iron Age. We were impressed with the range of presentation.
Hello Goldfinch Class and your families,
Wow! How did we get to the last two weeks of the summer term? We were so impressed with the quality of work that so many of you turned in to Google Classrooms last week. See the photos below for the range of activities you were involved with. Do please email finchparents if you still have any problems setting up your Google Classroom - those who have been in touch were soon up and running.
It's the final week of the Duolingo competition for French. If you want to be in with a chance of winning the French Petanque set, you need to turn in a screenshot of your Duolingo homepage for French, showing the number of crowns you have earned.
Don't forget to take part in the Virtual School Sports day - details are below and on Google Classroom.
We are looking forward to seeing the Year 6 complete their Bikeability course this week and are loving the films that you are sending in for the Leavers' Movie. We are aiming for the 'premiere' at 7.30pm on Monday 20th July, with a live Facebook feed so we can keep in touch throughout the film.
Year 5 should focus on completing their transition packs ready for their final picnic on Monday 13th July. Thank you so much to those Year 5s who recorded such positive messages for the Year 4 transition film. It looks great and will be really reassuring.
The last two week's work is condensed below but do try to work via Google Classroom if you can.
Mrs Wirth, Mrs Stangroom and the Goldfinch team.
Two week Plan - Goldfinch Home Learning 6th-17th July 2020
Goldfinch enjoyed planning for the opening of their own dinosaur parks, planning budgets for exhibits, attractions and staffing, as well as writing restaurant menus and visitor guides.
Goldfinch Home Learning Summer Week Beginning 29th June 2020
Music
Look at these fantastic origami T-Rex models. They were very tricky. Some of you even tried your hand at other types of origami.
Goldfinch Home Learning Summer Week Beginning 22nd June 2020
Goldfinch Home Learning Summer Week Beginning 15th June 2020
Goldfinch Home Learning Summer Week Beginning 8th June 2020
Look at all our fantastic home learning last week. We think you'll agree that there are some impressive 3D maps of the Galapagos Islands. What did you learn about Darwin's finches?
Goldfinch Home Learning Summer Week Beginning 1st June 2020
Goldfinch Home Learning Summer Week Beginning 18th May 2020
Goldfinch Home Learning Showcase WC 11/5/2020
Goldfinch Home Learning Summer Week Beginning 11th May 2020
Goldfinch Learning Showcase - see our wonderful home learning.
Goldfinch Home Learning Summer Week Beginning 4th May 2020
Goldfinch Home Learning Showcase: The children were set the task of investigating, designing and building replica iron age round houses. Their projects needed to be able to support a 1kg weight, protect against 200ml of water and hold up against a 30 second blast from a hairdryer or fan. We think their projects look fantastic.
Goldfinch Home Learning Summer Week Beginning 27th April 2020
Goldfinch Home Learning Summer Week Beginning 20 April 2020
Goldfinch Easter Holidays Project: Have a go at this media project if you're looking for something to do over Easter.
Puple Mash Update: Goldfinch pupils can now use the 2Simple 2Email function to contact me and other children in your year group. It is a safe environment for you to contact each other. You can only 'email' children in your own year goup and I will be able to monitor all messages including deleted emails. Click the Computing icon followed by the 2Email icon.
Goldfinch Home Learning Week Beginning Monday 30th March 2020
Goldfinch Home Learning - Week Beginning Monday 23rd March 2020.
March 2020 - Keeping Healthy: Smoky Sue helped us to learn about the dangers of cigarette smoking. Just look at how much tar was collected from one cigarette!
February 2020 - How and why is oxygen transported around the body? We were creative in the way we presented our research to help our explanation writing .
Year 6 SATs meeting for parents - discussion notes.
December 2019 - Come Dine with Me: Ancient Greece. For this DT project, the children researched the food that would have been eaten by the ancient Greeks, before planning and considering the health benefits of their own ancient Greek menus. The whole school smelt delicious with the mouth watering aromas that came from the children's kitchen. But, it is certain that the best part was tasting and evaluating each other's menus. Some of us even went on the investigate contemporary Michelin chefs from Athens who have added a a modern twist to Greek cooking.
November 2019 - Learn to Earn. Today we welcomed Mrs Hagan-Grenfell to our class to talk about her role as a regional director for Barclays. She shared lots of the skills she needs on a daily basis when working with her team and her customers; we were able to think about how we are learning to develop these skills in school.
Ancient Greece Family Learning Event. November 2019. It was lovely to see so many parents working alongside their children to find out more about Ancient Greece. The children's Greek Myth inspired dances were very entertaining.
Greek Myths and Legends Presentations
Goldfinch Class Meeting with Parents - notes from the meeting.
Year 5 and 6 Spelling List
DT Project: Making moving mechanisms with cams. It was very industrious in Goldfinch class today.
We visited Winchester Planetarium and Science Museum as part of our science topic about space.
Goldfinch Home Learning
The following timetable will help you plan your home learning over the week and give you an idea of the expectations in Goldfinch class.
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Monday |
Tuesday |
Wednesday |
Thursday |
Weekend |
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At least15 mins reading |
At least15 mins reading
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At least15 mins reading |
At least15 mins reading |
At least15 mins reading |
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5-10 mins times tables practice |
5-10 mins times tables practice
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5-10 mins times tables practice |
5-10 mins times tables practice |
5-10 mins times tables practice |
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5-10 mins spelling practice |
5-10 mins spelling practice
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5-10 mins spelling practice |
5-10 mins spelling practice |
5-10 mins spelling practice |
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Your choice from list:
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Your choice from list:
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Your choice from list:
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Your choice from list:
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Your choice from list:
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English and Maths Homework due |
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Spelling Journals needed in school |
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Homework choices
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English – set on Thursday and due the next Thursday
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Maths - set on Thursday and due the next Thursday
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Spelling is set on Thursday but should be practiced little and often. Your spelling journals are needed every Thursday.
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Reading – a question is set every Friday but reading should happen every day. Your Reading Records are needed every Friday.
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After school Activity eg Guides, football, swimming, chess etc
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Completing work from class ( not always applicable)
SATs Meeting for Parents: Wednesday 6th February 2019 in Goldfinch Class
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. What a busy time we have had in the past few weeks. We're sure that you are all ready for a relaxing break and spending some precious time with your families. Thank you so much for all the generous Christmas cards and gifts which were all very much appreciated.
We look forward to welcoming our new teacher on the Goldfinch team, Mrs Osmond, who has met with Mrs Wirth to plan our learning for next term. Follow the link to find out what we will be covering next term.
Goldfinch Ho Ho Ho Home Learning for the Holidays
Maths: we used our knowledge of place value to divide 4 digit numbers. The concrete apparatus helped us to understand the maths behind the equation.
Maths: we used Dienes to help us visualise what happens when we multiply 2-digit numbers together:
Preparing for our Acts of Remembrance
Autumn Colours - Artwork inspired by Andy Goldsworthy
Views of Mount Fuji - October 3rd 2018
Science: What variables may affect the rate of dissolving? We came up with a list of variables which may affect dissolving: type of liquid, temperature of liquid, amount of solid, amount of liquid, type of container etc.
Goldfinch Class Parent Information Meeting Notes
Move Up Morning: this morning we had to work in teams to figure out how we could use a pencil and a trundle wheel to work out the height of the trees at the park. How would you do it? ( As an added bonus we were treated to a flyover by the Red Arrows.)
'Dino-Week': We continued our celebration of all things dinosaur with our Family Learning event. We scaled up dinosaur footprints; I think everyone was astounded at the size of an ultrasaurus footprint and we worked our memories hard to remember all the details from the Mesozoic era.
Dino-Scientists at the Natural History Museum
What better way to get rid of pre-SATs nerves than with a spot of Desk Yoga and then hot buttered toast?
#SATSDetox: To wind down from our SATs this week, we started a new painted stones movement. Check out 'The Finchstones' on Facebook.
Useful SATs Revision guides and Quizes
Click here to see our Summer Term Curriculum Overview:
Easter Home Learning and Year 6 Revision Activities
Science: How does the circulatory system work?
We answered this question by acting out the circulatory system. Some of us were the heart, lungs, muscles, brain and digestive tract. The rest of us were blood cells transporting oxygen, carbon dioxide, water and nutrients around the body.
Could you memorise the circulatory system in a minute?
We played Memory Tag in teams to complete a drawing of the circulatory system. We worked in a relay to memorise sections of the original diagram with only one minute each to remember and draw what we had seen. It was quite a challenge but we all felt we had really paid a lot of attention to the original diagram and had to work well as a team to complete our own versions.
Hello Goldfinch Class.
We hope that you've had some fantastic fun in the snow over the last couple of days. Did any of you manage to make a World Book Day inspired snowman. If you did, don't forget to post a photo of it on my post on the school's Facebook page.
Just in case you want to come inside and warm up at any point, Mrs Gan and I have some home learning for you to look at, including the spelling activities that you should have had in school on Thursday.
Year 6: make use of the extra time to get ahead with some pages in your SATs revision books.
Year 5: what can you learn about Roman numerals?
Keep warm and stay safe. See you on Monday.