Welcome to Fox Class

2022 - 2023

Teacher: Miss Becky Pistell

Teacher (Thursday pm and Fridays): Mrs Kate Hedges

Hello and a very warm welcome to Fox Class! 

Term 5 PE - There is no change to our PE days this term. We are still doing indoor PE on a Tuesday and outdoor PE on a Friday so please wear PE kits into school on a Friday. :) 

Homework will be set every Friday and will be due in on Thursdays.

We are very much looking forward to all the learning we have planned this term! Please click on the link below to find out what we are learning.

Our topic this term is learning about World War II. We will be going on our class trip to the Army Flying Museum this term and learning more about how people lived their lives during the war. 

Week 5

On Wednesday we took part in National Numeracy Day, where the children enjoyed creating and pricing up a weekly shopping list.  In science, we have been learning about the digestive system and this week we looked closely at teeth.  We looked at each others teeth and tried to count the number of teeth we had.  In PSHE we have continued to think about relationships.  In Year 4 we have been discussing the romantic relationship of girlfriend / boyfriend.  In Year 5 we have been discussing the impact playing online games can have on relationships, which closely links to the Online safety lessons we have learned in computing.

Week 2

This week we had the opportunity to inspect an old gas mask and other WW2 memorabilia which was found in one of our pupils garden.  We also visited the Army Flying Museum at Middle Wallop on Wednesday (see separate post).  

Today in PSHE, Year 4 talked about the difficult subject of loss, and how this is a part of life which we will all experience at some time.  We talked about the cycle of grief, how to focus on remembering good times and how we can think about showing ways to those that we love.  Some of the children were upset by this subject and I hope they can focus on the positive memories of those we have lost.

Year 5 have been learning about recognising characteristics which may help us choose long term friends and partners and created their own Dolly characters and then met other characters to decide if their characters would be compatible.

Army Flying Museum

We had a wonderful day visiting the Army Flying Museum at Middle Wallop.  We had a tour of the museum, starting with some early aircrafts and ending by looking at a collection of gliders.  After a quick snack we then split into 2 groups and while one group tried on clothes and looked at some resources the other group walked around the museum looking at propaganda posters and reading the messages in the posters.  We then swapped over so each group took part in both activities.  After lunch, we split again and one group had a tour of a 1940s house while the other group completed activities based around the helicopters.  Once again we swapped activities before heading back to school.  

Term 5 Week 1

This week  we have started learning about World War II for our topic.  We have been thinking about the propaganda posters during World War II and then used paint to create our own posters.  In PSHE we are thinking about Relationships this term.  Year 4 have been thinking about jealousy and how people may react in different situations and different ways we may overcome these thoughts and feelings.  In Year 5, we have been recognising personal qualities and linking these to self esteem.  We identified self esteem as how much you value yourself and thought of ways we could improve our self esteem.

Week 5

This week we've continued to learn about different countries in Spanish and the importance of Good Friday to Christians in RE.  Both year 4 and year 5 have played their final game of Kwick Sticks this term with both year groups improving their skills with a hockey stick, particularly dribbling the ball and completing push passes.  In PSHE Year 4 continued to discuss ways to make good choices in relation to friendships, particularly when faced with peer pressure.  Year 5 discussed body image and the influence that social media has on this.  In DT we planned and created our own water wheels.  We then tested the water wheels, which luckily all worked.  We reflected on the our water wheels and realised that the more symmetrical water wheels worked better than those that weren't and how the way the water was poured also affected how quickly the wheel could spin. 

Week 4

This week some of the children in Year 4 represented the school in a rugby tournament, where they won 5 out of their 8 games.  In class, we have continued learning about rivers in geography and in PE both Year 4 and Year 5 have been improving their skills in quicksticks (although taught separately).  In PSHE this week, Year 5 children have been learning a little first aid and have practised putting someone in the recovery position, while Year 4 children have been learning about the effects of alcohol, including changed behaviour and the damage it may cause to the liver. In DT we looked at how a water wheel works in preparation for our own models that we will make next week. We then used the pointillism technique we had learned last term to create some lovely Mother's Day cards - I hope they were appreciated. 

Week 3

In computing this week, we continued to learn about animation.  This week we used Stop Motion app to create stop animation - some examples can be seen below, and more will be added next week.  In PSHE, Year 4 have been learning some facts about smoking and the impact that peer pressure has on the choices we make.  The children were given scenarios to act out and then we discussed some ways we could handle the different situations.  Year 5 children had completed similar activities last week with Mrs Vipond.  On Friday afternoon, our Year 5 children joined Owl class on a visit to watch Annie at SWGS.  It was lovely to see them return full of excitement for the production they had watched.  

Animation

In computing this term we have been creating our own animations.  This week we have been using the app Stop Motion to create our own stop animation film.  Here are some examples of the films we created. 

Week 2

This week in science, have been looking at friction and its effects.  We have been using force meters to measure friction.  We have created some amazing animation in computing using pivot animator.  Some children have created their own animations at home using this program.  If you have, remember to add it to the 'What have you done to be creative?' section on your brick walls in your home learning books. We have also been learning to push pass and stop the ball while playing Quick Sticks in PE.

Term 4 Week 1

We began our term by celebrating World Book Day (a little early).  We shared the spoons we had created over the holidays, took part in a special workshop based on 'Alice in Wonderland' and shared our own stories with children from Squirrel Class.

We have also begun learning about the River Nile in Geography and learning to play Quicksticks (a simple game of hockey) in PE.  In PSHE we have been thinking of our friendships and how they may change and develop and in computing we have made flipbooks as an early form of animation and compared it with animation on the computer using pivot animator.

Cake Sale

Thank you to all the children and parents who supported our cake sale today.  The children have been involved in planning the event, making posters, writing the letters and finally setting up and running the cake sale today.  Thank you to those that donated cakes and to those that bought them - we raised a magnificent £197, which we have rounded up to £200 for Save the Children.  Here are a few photos, but please check out the gallery for more photos by clicking the link below.

Resourceful Day

What a wonderful day we've had.  Our first session this morning was mini golf in the hall.  We all encouraged each other well and used our Christian value of perseverance for some holes.  We followed mini gold with outdoor activities.  We began by ordering ourselves by height, but without talking, then by age.  Next we made different shapes by holding hands.  The circle was quite simple but forming a square and triangle were a little more challenging.  We then had to recover a key from across the playground from our spaceship, without breaking our chain.  It took a few attempts for us to achieve this but we did complete this activity.  Next we tried to reach a target across the lava using stepping stones, but we didn't have enough for everyone.  We didn't manage to achieve this challenge, so I think we'll be trying again with this.  After break, we visited our escape room.  We worked in groups of 8 to open various locks by completing challenges.  The challenges were quite tricky and working as a team, even trickier, but we all had lots of fun.  2 teams managed to open all the locks and stop their timer - well done to those teams.  After lunch we completed various activities in our classroom including games such as operation, frustration, connect 4 and table football.  We also had to build a house of cards, describe our pattern to a partner with a barrier, move beads using tweezers and build a tower using spaghetti and marshmallows.  We also drew pictures for our school motto of Learn, Achieve, Grow Together.

Week 5

This week we took advantage of the whole playground to play a game of netball.  In PSHE, we created our own posters and letters for the cake sale we will be holding next Thursday.

Week 4

This week we have been looking at different foods and deciding if they were solid or liquid.  We looked at coffee, jelly and squirty cream. The children enjoyed the reward they had chosen of a Teddy Bears Picnic.  We went outside and while some chose to play football others had fun in our wooded area.  Those with wellies also had lots of fun jumping in the puddles, some of which were still frozen.

Week 3

This week we have been enjoying some drama, while learning about Medicine and Disease as our history topic.  We have also been improving our netball skills and improving our fitness levels in PE.  This week we have created our own images using the techniques we have learned while learning about pointillism.  

Week 2

This week we have been learning the skills to play netball, and improving our fitness with a circuit type activity in PE.  We have been learning about pointillism and the work of Georges Seurat in art and thinking about different careers and the different salary for each career.   In English we have been basing our learning on the story The Egyptian Cinderella and thinking about direct speech.

Week 5

This week we have been bringing our dance moves into a wonderful sequence.  We have worked in pairs to work on our Spanish translations.  In science, we have been using torches and balls to model how day and night is caused by the earth revolving and the sunlight shining on different parts of the earth. In DT, we continued with our work with bread, and this time we made our own bread.  Thank you to Reeve the Baker for donating the flour and fresh yeast, which was a new process for us all, leading to a few restarts of our bread!  While the bread was rising, we voted for our favourite bread from last week, where the white farmhouse was voted as our favourite bread.  In our outdoor PE session, we have been learning how to score tries in rugby, followed by a visit by Father Christmas.

Week 4

This week, we have had a visit from the Bridge Project, where we have been learning about People of God and writing about Joshua.  This term we have been enjoying our dance lessons as our indoor PE.  On Thursday we began our DT lessons by tasting different breads, which were kindly donated by Reeve the Baker, before walking to the church for Mrs Smith's leaving service. 

Week 1

As our new term has begun, we have been learning about lots of new things. We've started learning about the planets in science and Europe in our topic.  In computing we have been learning to edit images and create posters using our word processing skills.  In PE we've enjoyed dance with our dance teacher and tag rugby, where we were assisted by Mr Wakeman.

Week 6

This week we have been presenting the news in preparation for writing newspaper reports in English.  In PE, we have been improving our football skills and creating sequences to music using jumps and turns in gymnastics.  In science we have been investigating the effect of distance from a light source on shadows, whilst in art we painted our clay cartouches that we made last week. In maths on Fridays we have been learning about perimeter and this week we measured the perimeter of different areas of the school grounds.  We also had fun learning lots of new skills on skilful day.  Please see the gallery for photos from skilful day. 

Week 5

We are still writing lots and we put ourselves into Rumpelstiltskin's shoes this week. We thought about where he had been before meeting Rosalind and what he thought of her - we then retold the story through Rumpelstiltskin's point of view. We also started our clay cartouches. We designed the cartouches last week and have now sculpted and carved them. We can't wait to paint them next week!

Week 4

In PSHE we have learnt about the importance of having rules; we made up own our games realising we needed rules to make them work! This week we have continued our learning of different notation in music and composed using crotchets and quavers. We were also very pleased to have The Bridge Project in, we learnt about different ways people worship God from around the world - including using puppets and flags! In English, we were excited to start writing our own stories based on Rumpelstiltskin which we will finish next week. 

Week 3

In music, we have been having fun using the glockenspiels.  We have used our new ipads to research Egyptian Gods in History.  We also used books and although most of us found using the internet easier to find information, those that had found a relevant book found this the easiest way to retrieve information.  We also got to examine our mummified fruit from last week.  The fruit without the natron had gone mouldy and didn't smell very nice, but the fruit that had been mummified had dried out and changed colour. 

Week 2

We have been introduced to our Talk 4 Writing story this week - Rumpelstiltskin! We have had lots of fun learning the story through actions and we even did a bit of drama to help re-tell the story. On Monday we had indoor PE. We are doing Multiskills this term and have been learning our A,B,C - agility, balance and co-ordination. This week we were focusing on our balance skills! In History, we learnt about mummification and we have mummified pieces of fruit. We will have to wait and see what happens to the fruit!

Week 1

This week we have been learning about Cyberbullying in Computing and what we should do if we are faced with unkind messages or content that makes us feel uncomfortable in anyway when online.  We discussed the ability to block messages, but stressed the importance of speaking to an adult in these situations.