Our Year Six

We are writing to share some information about year 6. 

Our two classes are Hawks class with Miss Ball and Kestrels class with Mr Fox. Our teaching assistants are Mrs Jones and Mrs Searle. 

Curriculum  

Our project question for this term is ‘What does it mean to belong?’ where we will explore life during World War II and the plight of refugees from then until the modern day. We use the texts ‘Letters from the Lighthouse’ and ‘Refugee’ as the main basis for our writing. As part of our RE curriculum, we explore the question ‘What kind of king is Jesus?’. In science, we study our circulatory system and the function of the heart. In the second half term, we focus on electricity including its safe use. An overview of the curriculum can be found on the website at https://www.stwilfrids-hh.school/web/year_six/363095  

Reading at Home 

Even when your child enjoys reading and reads well on their own, they still need to read aloud all the way through their junior years.  Books can be borrowed from the school library and each year group has a selection of books that your child can borrow and read at home. Every time your child reads at home, you (or your child) should fill in the page numbers/chapters read on their online reading record ‘Boom Reader’. Children have received their log in details for this. If they read 5 times in a week, they will receive reading reward time. We also celebrate which class has read the most in our celebration worship on a Friday.  

Our new ‘St Wilfrid’s Reading Challenge’ has also started where children are given the challenge of reading 6 carefully chosen texts for their year group across the school year. These books can be read independently by the child or enjoyed with an adult at home. The children will then have some questions to answer about the book when they return it to school. 

Homework 

Homework will be set weekly from the week beginning 15th September onwards. Maths homework is set on a Thursday and needs to be submitted by the following Thursday. English homework is set at the beginning of each month and is due in at the end of each month. 

Maths homework will be an activity on the website MyMaths. This will either reinforce learning done that week in school or will introduce learning to be done the following week. The English homework is usually a writing task, based on a prompt such as an element of grammar or punctuation, which will be set on Microsoft Teams. In addition, children will be set spellings to practise and these will be tested on a Thursday. These will be a mixture of words from the statutory ‘word lists’ and those with spelling patterns. Spellings will be set on ‘Spelling Shed’. Times tables and related division facts should be practised on an on-going basis, ideally a few minutes daily. Children are expected to know these and be making progress with them. ‘Times Tables Rockstars’ is an excellent website to use to practise these and children have been provided with logins to access this at home. All children are expected to complete and submit their homework on time. Children have been given their log-in details for the above websites, but if these have been misplaced, please inform the class teacher. 

PE 

This term, PE is on a Monday and a Friday and on these days, children should attend school in their PE kit. If there is any reason why your child cannot participate in a PE session, please let the class teacher know via the year group email address. As an alternative, or in addition to plimsolls, sports trainers are allowed in the juniors. These are particularly useful during the winter months as it allows the field to be used for outside PE. PE is only cancelled in the event of heavy rain, icy or extremely cold conditions, therefore a pair of jogging bottoms and a sweatshirt (ideally navy) are allowed. Children with pierced ears must be able to remove their own earrings or cover these with tape brought from home. 

Water bottles and snacks 

Please remember to bring in a water bottle and a healthy fruit or savoury snack (for example, fresh fruit, a bagel, raisins) for break time. Please ensure any snacks are both nut and egg free. 

Uniform      

Please ensure your child has a waterproof coat in school every day. Children will only stay indoors at playtimes if it is raining heavily. All clothing, including PE kit, should be labelled with your child’s surname.   

We are looking forward to a great Autumn term.  If at any point you have a message for your child’s teacher, please contact us through the year group email: year6@stwilfrids-hh.school  

Please do contact us if you have any questions. 

Best Wishes 

Mr M Fox and Miss S Ball